"H Ryder" wrote in message
...
I've inherited a garden full of old and rampant climbers. Mainly roses,
what
looks like evergreen jasmine and clematis. Most of this is very overgrown
and all tangled together. In particular one patch of jasmine mainly
consists
of dead looking huge, think stems which turn out to have green growth at
teh
ends. The ends are, in general, not where I want the climber to be. What
do
I do? If I just cut jasmine, clematis and roses back to the base will they
regrow? TIA,
Hayley


Yes, but..........

You might be better off being more selective :

- take the jasmine right back, it will regroup readily and doing this first
will let you see more clearly the others

- then, identify if you can the types of clematis you have, the have
different preferred pruning regimes, some need to be cut hard back each year
others trimmed, yet others left alone. All will regroup if cut right back
but you might miss flowering.

- that leaves you with the roses, again most will regroup if cut back hard
but better to see if you can salvage a basic framework. Cut out dead,
diseased, tangled, crossing or damaged wood and see what you have left. If
it makes sense use some as your new framework tying in as appropriate. Most
climbing roses prefer to have their stems bent down to the horizontal
(hormone drains to the lower edge and flowering growth breaks from the upper
side)

pk