Nothing is more satisfying then heading out to your landscape and snipping a beautiful long stem rose from your very own plant growing in your yard.
Roses are the queen of the garden. President Ronald Reagan signed a proclamation certifying the rose as America's national flower in a ceremony at the White House Rose Garden back in 1986. It's no surprise, millions of roses are planted in gardens across the U.S. Many think roses can be fussy and hard to grow. Given the right conditions, roses can thrive and add beauty to your garden for years to come.
Here are 5 tips for growing healthy roses from Weeks Roses (weeksroses.com), the premier grower of rose bushes in America.
Follow these tips and you can enjoy these beautiful flowering shrubs in your own garden year after year.
1. Select the rose that's right for your garden
There are over 2,000 varieties of roses-and new varieties are introduced every year. Different roses have specific needs and behavior. You might be tempted to select a rose solely based on its flower appearance, but a rose's hardiness, disease resistance, bloom time and other factors are important to consider, too.
Roses come in basically six forms.
Hybrid Tea-Hybrid Tea Rose has a large bloom or flare at the end of a long cane. They are the most popular roses sold at florist shops.
Floribunda- Floribunda were once called hybrid polyanthas. In the 1940s, the term floribunda was approved. They can be shorter bushes with smaller blooms in beautiful clusters of vibrant colors.
Grandiflora-roses are a combination of hybrid tea roses and floribunda with some having one-bloom stems and some with cluster blooms
Shrub-Shrub rose bushes are defined by the American Rose Society (ARS) as "A class of hardy, easy-care plants that encompass bushy roses that do not fit in any other category of rose bush.
Miniature or Patio -these are true roses bred to stay small or miniature.
Climbing-Climbing roses grow more aggressively and can be trained to climb on trellises and arbors.
2. Plant your rose in the right location
The first step toward a healthy, beautiful rose in the garden is planting the right rose in the right place. A rose will never perform well if planted in a poor spot, no matter how much you pamper it.
Get your rose off to a good start by first selecting the right variety for your garden's climate, and carefully planting it in a sunny location with good soil. Roses prefer locations that receive 6-8 hours of sunlight in order to produce the most blooms.
Roses do not like wet, poorly drained areas so make sure they are planted in well-draining soils.
3. Prune wisely
Some roses bloom with a great flourish and they're done for the season. Other roses are repeat bloomers that flower continuously throughout the growing season. Once-blooming roses (such as antique rose varieties) should be pruned after they flower. Repeat bloomers can be pruned in early spring before they bloom. I like to remove spent flowers or deadhead roses weekly. By removing blossoms, the plant will steer its power back into the plant instead of focusing its power into producing seed from the spent flower. This means more blooms.
Remove the spent flower and prune above the first set of 5 leaves on the stem beneath the rose. This will generate new growth and new flowers the quickest.
4. Water deeply
More roses die from over-watering than from under-watering. Once established, most roses only need to be watered once or twice a week. For the healthiest plants, make sure to water deeply to encourage healthy root growth. Avoid watering with sprinklers or spraying the foliage with a hose, because wet leaves can invite diseases such as black spot and powdery mildew.
5. Fertilize (but don't overdo it)
Roses are heavy feeders, but many gardeners use too high a concentration of fertilizer, which can damage plants. I love to use Espoma brand Rose-tone every six weeks. This organic product offers the perfect balance of nutrients to keep roses looking their best!
Leave a comment