Becky, I'm new to this website..while browsing, I see your picture of this beautiful purple clematis on a white picket fence. Stunning! Mind sharing the name of that clematis? Group? I had 3 clematis, one was Comtesse de Bouchard, which was my only Group #3. I cut it back myself in the Fall and come spring, its vine only grew about 8 inches, maybe it had that same amount of leaves but they looked like they had some type of fungus or wilt. Produced no more leaves than that and usually this clematis was always a heavy bloomer. My favorite and the only one I now have is Dr. Ruppel. The man that does the prunning of our shrubs and the clematis usually prunes the clematis in mid March and feeds them. I had another one called Westerplatte that looked very similar to Niorobe variety but it wasn't a prolific bloomer and I dug that one up myself a few months ago so am looking for a replacement and yours caught my eye.
