I have a large privet which has turned brown with this cold weather

privet is normaly realy quite a tuff plant . i would get a knife and scrape some bark away . if its green its happy but if its brown cut them bits of . its not the vbest time to cut it back but its better than letting it die of even more .i hope this helped and have a happy new year .

I'd be inclined to leave it till spring to see if new growth appears, and if not, test the branches by scraping back a bit of bark to see if its all dead or not.

ours did this last winter too. In march it got its first prune and new growth sprouted. Its done the same again this winter. So it will be left alone until March.

cool march it is then id imagine it will be ok and a happy new year to you all x .

If it actually got frozen back, I would leave the dead parts on until it sprouted in spring, then cut off everything that doesn't sprout vigorously. The dead portions help protect what's still alive from future frosts.

me to
now i know better