Am I supposed to cut down my smoke bush every year?I have a purple smoke and an emerald and they both look the same.
Problem with smoke bush
I'm guessing that Minnesota is probably about as cold a zone as you can grow Cotinus - I think the purple leaf variety is hardy only to 4 or 5, depending on who you talk to. Some sites recommend a hard prune of Cotinus in late winter/earl spring. Since yours has come out of dormancy with some winter-kill, I'd definitely prune back those limbs.
My smokebush was damaged, and I hard pruned it, and it was completely rejuvenated. I had several of them, and I tended to leave them unpruned to get the "smoke", but a hard pruning will definitely result in a plant with greatly improved structure. You can hack them almost to the ground and they spring back.
But "supposed to". No. I'm in zone 5a, and some of my 5 smokebushes were never pruned.
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