hibiscus

I've discovered I have Hibiscus, or Rose-of-Sharon, growing in my yard.

It's all along my back fence. Tall, skinny woody plants with spindly arms that look like awkward young trees. I thought they were trees, having come up as seedlings too close to the fence to get hit with a lawnmower and left there to grow weedy-looking. But then I noticed on the end of those long branchy arms they have these beautiful purply-pink flowers.

I still didn't know what it was and was cutting some out, because I'm trying to clear that back area of brush and weeds so I can see clearly to dig out the poison ivy (which I got into a few weeks ago and suffered a rash. Now the project is to kill it all- by brute force). Then I read somewhere about Hibiscus and wondered what it looked like, found a picture online and had a shock: that's my gangly-tree plant!

So now instead of trying to cut it all out, I'm trying to improve it. It doesn't make many flowers, I'm hoping if I clear out the weeds, feed and mulch it, and prune it so it grows a fuller shape like a shrub instead of looking like a tree (not sure if this is possible as it's grown untended so long like this) that i can get more flowers out of it, and a pretty sort of hedge across the back. I'm assuming that was someone's intention in planting it there, as it all grows in a straight line just a few inches off the fence (causing some of the branches to strangle themselves in the chain-link).