I have a 'Pink Delight' and 'Black Knight' (the latter being much more vigorous) and they are both sending out new growth this Spring. But the shoots are low to the ground and they have been very slow to get going this year, so I think it was a harsh winter and they suffered a lot of dieback.

Not sure why yours would be stone cold dead though???

I never give up on a woody plant until the 4th of July - I've had plants that took that long to come back to life after a very rough winter.

If yours are really, truly dead, and assuming that your winter was like the one we had on the cape, I'd guess that the ground being so thoroughly saturated for such long periods might have been more of a problem for butterfly bushes than the extreme cold was.

Well, I think the two smaller ones were truly dead (though I just pulled them yesterday ... maybe I should replant them and utter a few incantations over them ...but they came out of the ground very much as though they were dead and gone. I haven't pulled the big one (Buddleia davidii 'Nanho Blue') because I just can't bear to give up on it, so I'll leave it -- dead-looking mound of sticks that it is just now -- for a bit longer. The branches are dry and snap as though they are thoroughly dead and there is literally NO new growth in sight, but who knows ... It does seem to have been a particularly challenging year for shrubs around here ... didn't seem like an inordinate amount of snow (to me), but it certainly was unremittingly cold with lots of wind.

Sorry, Marti, for your losses, but a lot of shrubs down
here gave up the ghost as well. . .in my discussions with
other gardener's - and nurseymen, who lost a LOT of
their overwintering stock - it was less about the actual cold, than the rapid cycles of freeze and thaw that we had, and the unusually intense winds during the same periods. It is not uncommon for me to successfully overwinter dozens of 2-3 gallon pots of shrubs and perennials, with little protection other than some leaves mounded over them - much less success this year:
lost almost 50% of them !

Carl

I once had a Nanho Blue appear dead as a doornail well into spring, but I left it alone and half of it came back. Future years, was back to normal.

(what is a doornail? :-)

Pruned the 15 year old pink delight today and thought of you, Marty, when I checked the 2 year old black knight which looked like Wendy's doornail. Even the roots that I could see looked like they'd passed silently away. Then...there at the very bottom... I noticed an infinitesimal glint of what could be something green. Put on bifocals and sure enough, a speck of life - and I do mean speck. I'm not going to pull him out. Last year I pulled out new ones that really looked like they'd bit the dust. Now I wonder.
Won't hurt to wait.

Jane
P.S. For those of us who suffered through readings in Middle English, 'dead as doornail' is from that period. Amazingly, the phrase is still alive. The door, however,...

Here is a link that might be useful: Phrases.org.UK

OK, I'm leaving the Nanho in... and I've repotted the two I pulled out the other day and will watch them closely JUST in case ... but will also buy some new ones, I think :)

As for doornails, how funny! I actually wondered briefly "what IS that anyway" when I typed it, but I'm so used to using the phrase (my mom always did), I just plowed on. Between my mom and a bachelor's degree in Victorian literature (and plenty of Shakespeare in there, too :) ... I must just assume it's common usage! ;)

Good article in the Times today from a friend in Wisconsin about the destruction wrought by the past winter in midwestern gardens...

Here is a link that might be useful: Slow Exit of the Midwestâs Winter Buries Gardens in a Deep Freeze

The branches on my daphne ordora variegata were black but when I got my clippers and looked very closely I saw tiny bits of green and my osmanthus goshiki won a reprieve when I couldn't find it's pot to return it. Today I saw teeny bits of green.

I've learned patience this year.

I have three butterfly bushes that all seem to be dead. I keep checking to see signs of life but nothing so far. I was going to pull them but will wait a bit after reading this thread. Have my fingers crossed.