Mildly? You must not be in the southeast then.

Yes, you can cut them back even to ground level and they will absolutely re-sprout. I haven't seen anything but herbicide kill them yet.

cant really help w/o a pic.,.

but let me suggest that if you want them at 6 feet.. you prune them back to 5 .. so as to get them to green back over in the center top ...

and while you are interested.. google REJUVENATION PRUNING OF SHRUBS ... and study up on that system ...

what you can do.. is do a couple a year at full rejuvenation ... remaking the whole plant ....it really would be the way to go ....

and if you did say.. every other one.. you would still maintain 90% of your privacy ... and over 3 years.. have a very healthy hedge ...

ken

That's exactly what I'm doing. As I started yesterday, I realized I was going to end up with a row of sticks, so I whacked one back to about 6' and will wait for it to put out some new growth before moving on to the next one.