Honeysuckle

[bigredfeather]

We have a very large Honeysuckle plant that was at our house when we moved in. It is growing up a trellis on the house. In painting the house, I had to take the trellis off the house to paint behind it. This Honeysuckle is about 3' wide and 10' tall w/ nice green growth on the outside. Behind the green growth of the plant is about a foots worth of dry woody stuff. The green growth has wrapped itself around the old woody growth.

My question is should I:
a) Leave it alone and put it back up as is.
b) Try and remove the old growth and leave the green. Problem I see with this is I doubt I can get the new growth reattached to the trellis.
c) Cut the whole thing down and let it start over in the Spring.

TIA

 

[lesa]

I would vote for a or c- depending on how much you will miss having the vine, during winter and early spring. I think starting fresh is a good idea. I did that with my wisteria, and it came back much healthier looking....Let us know what you decide!

 

[Muggins]

Here in south western Ohio the stuff is so invasive we tear it out. This plant is one that should never have been (brought into the country. We had beautiful wooded areas here 25 years ago. Now our woods and the state park (Hueson woods) is so over grown you can't walk through it and it has smothered out all native flowers, KILL IT!!!!

Muggins

 

[chris09]

If it was me I would prune back all green growth to about half and then prune back dead vine to about 1 to 2 inches of good live growth.
Winter is going to be the best time to prune Honeysuckle back for the best Spring flowering.

Chris