something is munching on my clematis!

[Growing4twins]

hey guys, does anybody know which bugs adore munching on my clematis??  I brought one from aldis a few months back & when i went to plant it i found that there were actually 4 plants in the pot. i split them in 2 & planted them.  One took really well & is on its 2nd set of flowers (which i didnt know clematis's did) but as soon as they opened some horrid little bug ate the flowers over night!!  The 2nd set that i planted which looked the weaker of the 2 never really got going.  Something is eating the leaves & the new shoots never get a chance to grow.  Im new with flowers so all advice will be great.  cheers guys :)

[Growing4twins]

[Obelixx]

It's probably slugs, snails or earwigs.   

Slugs and snails can be dealt with by scattering wildlife friendly pellets containing ferrous sulphate - not the ones with metaldehyde.   Earwigs can be trapped by putting wee plastic pots stuffed with straw on top of ca,es.  they go in there to sleep and then you can catch them and destroy them.

There are hundreds of varietis of clematis.  Group 1s flower once in winter or spring and never need pruning except to tidy them up or keep them in bounds.   Group 2s flower in May/June on last year's growth and again later in summer if you treat them well.  This means removing weak and dead stems, dead-heading the first flush of flowers before they set seed and giving them a good feed of liquid rose or tomato food.  group 3s flower for several months in summer and sometimes into autumn.  These ar cut back to about a foot above the ground or you can cut each stem back to a healthy pair of buds in March/April.  Feed generously and they'll flower their hearts out.

All clematis are hungry and thirsty so give them a generous dollop of pelleted chicken manure and/or well rotted manure in early spring.  Make sure they are watered in dry spells and given liquid rose or tomato feed between growth starting and late June.   Some clematis take a year or two to settle in and grow well so don't give up on the one that's not doing so well.

[Growing4twins]

Hey obbelix, thx so much for your reply.  I saw some snail slime on them yesterday morning so i put down some pellets last night.

I knew there were hundreds of different varieties but i had no idea they were so diverse.  Thanks for teaching me something new :)

Is there a simple method to find out which group they belong to?

[Obelixx]

You can look up any clamtis on this site by doing a search on either it's name or by enetring tepal colour, stamen colour, flowering time and other info to try and identify it - http://www.clematis.hull.ac.uk/

The site gives info on flowering times, best aspect, size and pruning groups and, in some cases, hardiness.

I have about 40 clematis myself and have very cold winters so can offer some suggestions for hardy clems based on my experiences.