My wife and I have a small arbor in our backyard, in a fence that separates the driveway/garage from the yard. At the base of it, we planted 2 clematis in large pots. 1 each of Snow Queen and Blue Ravine which we ordered from Brushwood Nursery. We had read that both of these varieties were tolerant of shade.

They've been in place for about a month now, and we've seen almost no growth. I'm starting to think that it's just too shady. They do get some filtered sunlight throughout the day, and maybe a little direct sun early in the morning, but not much. What's funny is if they would actually grow taller, the top half of the arbor actually gets a lot more direct sun. Still not tons, but at least a few hours worth. Probably enough to sustain them.

Were we being too optimistic in planting these here? I'd be more willing to move them, but unfortunately very little of our property actually gets good sun. We have several mature Douglas Firs that shade much of the property.
The front yard gets a more sun, and we've planted a Jackmanii, Rubens, and Guernsey Cream up there. As you can imagine, they're all doing fine. :p But at the moment don't really have room for any more up there. Additionally, we've had an unusually cool and wet spring here in PDX, so I'm sure that probably isn't helping.

So, what does everybody think? I don't really know much about this stuff, except that clematis supposedly do much better in sun, and perhaps "tolerant" of shade is not good enough here. Should we attempt to move them? Or try and wait until the weather warms up? Maybe move them until they get a little bigger and try and put them back?

Sorry for the long post, just trying to get all the details out there.

Cheers!
Patrick

Clematis take three years to mature too. First year they sleep, second year creep and third year leap.

They do grow up towards the sun automatically once they get going.

No worries.

Either way, thanks for the reassurance. I'll just let them sit and see how they do.