@Buzzbea4 I just pull out the dead foliage on mine. I leave the healthy stuff until the frost kill it.

Yes I don't cut anything that likes dry winters. It just allows more water to get inside the holes left from cutting. I read this once about Salvia and now use it on anything I am worried about overwintering. I am not sure if the Kniphofias would be fine being cut before winter but I just wait until spring. They seem to be semi evergreen and always have some green left in spring. I just rake them out as much as I can then trim what's left that looks ugly.

I found this that says you should use the old leaves as protection for winter, so definitely wait until spring just to be safe. http://www.missouribotanicalga...

Thank you all for your advice.

I'll need to ask you 5b growers what you're doing with your Kniphofias. We tried Kniphofia caulescens last year and it didn't make it. It was a good sized specimen, but seemed to "wet rot" before it died--and this was in a xeric gardenscape! Although we were watering regularly to establish the other plants.

Trying again this year with "bulbs" from Costco, but it's not looking too promising either. I realize it's a bit early in the season, but we'll hope for the best.

Well my climate is about opposite of yours, GoCart, as I live in Seattle. But I do grow Kniphofias and have made some observations that may help.
I garden on a slope in clayey soil. This means I have problems with things like Kniphofias, but I have some very successful ones.
They are seriously drought-resistant, but only once established. My 'Mango Popsicle' required summer watering for about 3-4 years, it would obviously wilt when thirsty, and has grown quite slowly. Now however it is quite tough in a horrid spot, blooms for many months, tolerates gross neglect here in the summer, where this last year we had about one inch of rain in four months...
I have to plant them fairly early in the year, so they can be well established by winter. Fall planting did not seem to work here.
I read somewhere to NOT cut them back until they are growing strongly in the spring. I believe here that is true. I son't know about Colorado. "They" said if cut back the hollow stems collected water, which freezes or rots. I don't know if this is true but I do better now that I don't cut them back.
My most vigorous plants are "Flamenco". I bought a bunch off a sale rack. This is a seed-grown mix (Ball Seed sells it) and this means the colors and plants are a bit variable, But all are vigorous, hardy, and pretty! You might try them. 'Mango Popsicle' is special because of the really long bloom time, but is less vigorous.

One fall I experimented with one of my plants and tried cutting back the cruddy looking leaves, and most of the clump died that winter. A tiny fan did return, but it has taken it a few years to clump up again. Since them I've kinda fashioned the leaves into a bun (like a hair bun) in fall. It got them out of my way to work around them and is at least a little tidier looking.

I didn't do any of my usual autumn maintenance last fall and the leaves just stayed there all floppy, like they have many times over the years. They now appear to be dead after 10 years in the garden. It has been a cold winter without much snow cover- we had the longest stretch of days of temps under 32F since 1978, and most of that time the temps were in the teens and often down to single digits.

Oh Neal that's too bad. Hopefully they have survived underground.

Well thank you for the insight, Mary! It is definitely a plant that we'd love to have, but since we're still completing our landscaping in stages, it will probably be pushed back to a late stage (a couple of years from now) project seeing as how it's been more finicky than the others that we've had up until this point. A shame, but no point in killing more of them in the meantime.

Hi Go Cart-I just had a thought- I logged into High Country Gardens, a nursery in the SW that caters to high desert conditions. The horticulturist there likes to go to South Africa and plant hunt (I have this terrific little thing he found called Cotula 'Tiffendel Gold', he collected it at S Africa's only ski resort, Tiffendell). Anyway he likes to bring back plants from the high elevations, to ensure that particular strain is tolerant of cold weather. He sells several Kniphofia. One is labeled as "Brought down from the high elevations of South Africa's Drakensberg Mountains". It is a short one called Kniphofia hirsuta 'Fire Dance'. That might be your bet bet. They work hard to pick plants that will do well in climates like yours.
Another inexpensive way to go would be to buy a pack of the 'Flamenco Mix' seeds from Ball Seed and plant this spring, just see if any make it. These are much taller. Many gardeners feel plants grown 'in situ' from seed are tougher. However they would probably need quite regular watering this year. But if you are doing a lot this year in the garden anyway, maybe that would not be too hard.

Mango Popsicle is looking good now, and we see bloom heads just starting at the base of Red Hot Popsicle.

Mary/Pistil is right about Flamenco, and a lot of other things.. They are very tough. This will be this ones second summer. It too is growing in clay-ey soil on a slope. Did no tidying up of it in fall, or this spring. Cold winter with no snow cover and a spring of constant thaw, freeze and frost. I got this one from Dogwoodritter on Ebay

At long last, Redhot Popcicle has put up some blooms.