A Strong Start for Roses

While roses are among the most beautiful and desirable flowers in the garden, they do require some special care, especially at this time of year. In fact, the steps you take now to care for your roses will determine, to a large extent, their health and appearance for the summer. Specifically, I’d like to touch on pruning techniques, proper mulching practices, fertilization, and disease control. I know these may sound obvious, but they are vital parts of your rose care program and should not be ignored.

When pruning your roses, the type of rose determines what approach you will take. Basically, I deal in two types of roses when pruning: climbers plus old fashioned roses and almost everything else. The important thing to remember when dealing with climbers and old fashioned roses is that you don’t want to prune them clear or near the ground since the blooms come from the stem tissue of last year. It will not kill them to cut them down hard, but the plant simply won’t bloom. With all other types of roses, namely miniatures, Florabunda, Grandiflora, the new knockout types and hybrid tea, you can cut the stems to the crown and others to between four and twelve inches tall and still enjoy a full plant with numerous blooms.

To do the most for your rose bush when pruning, always remove any dead, badly crossed, or very old stems. Then, prune so that stems radiate from the center. This opens the center of the bush to air movement and reduces the chance for disease to take hold by allowing the plant to dry off more quickly from the morning dew. This done, you should have approximately only one half to one third of the above ground stems left. The last cut on each remaining stem should be just above a bud that is pointing away from the center so the plant will stay open well into summer. Based on weather factors and personal preferences, the pruning should be done April 1 to April 20.

Next step: mulching. First, any mulch that you had to remove from your roses before pruning needs to be moved to a different part of your garden. Old mulch that is perfectly harmless around your shrubs can be potentially disastrous left around you roses due to diseases that affect only roses, such as Black Spot, which may be lurking about. After pruning, fresh mulch needs to be applied. The mulch should be placed up to no more than two inches thick underneath the branch spread and some beyond, with the four inches around the crown left exposed. You should also begin a fertilizing program as soon as we’re safely past any deep freezing. Fertilizing should continue approximately until the end of July or, at the latest mid-August.

Finally, I’d like to add a few words on disease prevention in roses. It’s important to know that we must deal in disease prevention rather than cures. Furthermore, I firmly believe that you can manage many disease problems very effectively between pruning and mulch removal. In fact, I would say that between forty and sixty percent of disease can be managed this way. In my case, it is working quite well. I do not spray my small quantity of roses with anything except as a last recourse. For those of you who want that extra assurance, though, an appropriate pesticide program should be started just as soon as new leaf tissue shows, applying it as a protective coat. Refresh the coating after each rain or at 7-10 day intervals without rain. When you can control it, always water your roses at ground level to avoid as much wet foliage as possible.
Check with your garden center for specific products. I know we keep losing favorite fungicides and insecticides over the years, but the experts at the garden center can direct you to some remaining old stand-
bys and at least one or two great new products.

These steps should get your roses off to a strong start and help later this spring to produce those magnificent flowers we all enjoy.