Above is a representation of how to shape a climber on a trellis.

 

"Do you prune climbers the same way you prune other roses?" I have been asked this question a great many times.  The simple answer is YES with a couple twist.  When pruning climbers the first step is to remove the 4 D's.  That is any cane that is dead, damaged, diseased, or dinky(smaller around than a #2 pencil).  The next step is to remove any crossing canes that will cause damage and all of the 4 year old wood.  Remember you can tell it is four year old wood because it has bark on it.  Again I must caution you that if 4 year old wood is all you have you will need to leave at least a couple canes to process the food to grow new canes. Once the new canes are grown the old canes can be removed in the Spring of the following year.  Old bushes are easy to revitalize but it takes some serious pruning.  If you are unsure about the task I would be happy to help, just call.  So far every thing you have done is what you do to all rose bushes.  Now the twists come in.  Climbers given their reign will outgrow most trellises so they must be pruned to keep them in limits.  My process for doing this is to leave 4 to six upright green canes and remove the rest completely.  I leave the side shoots about a foot long in the manner illustrated above.  I then cut the top of the 4 to six terminal canes off near the top of the structure that will support them.  This gives them the shape you need to train them further as the spring progresses.  After the pruning is complete I like to hang my ties onto the supporting structure in the design I want the roses to ultimately grow.  On a wooden fence this can be done with the use of a staple gun to hold the ties to the fence where with a metal trellis or fence you can tie the supports to the metal bars or fencing web.  That way I have the finial shape of the bush and when I am out in the garden and see a cane has grown enough to be tied down I can do it without having to go get ties etc.  After the pruning is complete I like to put a cup of magnesium sulfate around the bottom of the bushes on the ground about a foot to 18" inches out and start my fertilizing and spray routine.  Read next month for more on preparing your roses to grow. 

 

 Sometimes we do not have the best soil in our yards or we have other problems that prevent us from making our gardens at ground level.  In these instances we must consider a raised bed for planting.  Last month I talked about some of the considerations that must be taken for the raised bed to accomplish its prupose.  Now I would like to cover the actual filling of the raised bed with growing medium.

Something we can do with a new raised bed that we can't always do with a ground level bed is assure that we have the perfect soil for growing the Queen of flowers. Since we are adding all of the growing medium we can add everything in the correct purportions.  Remember the soil jar test where we put a sample of soil in a jar of water and shock it up then let it settle to see what the soil consisted of.  Perfect rose growing soil would be 1/3 humas, 1/3 sand, and 1/3 clay. In the case of our jar test we would see three distinct layers of approximently the same thickness.  Building our soil from scratch we can simply add those ingredients in the proper amounts.  We can also add extra organics to the soil to make it super soil.  As some of you know my favorite organic is horse manure.  Horses have a digestive tract that lets a lot of fiber pass through whic h makes it an excellant soil builder.  There are others like rabbit, sheep and cow manure but because of its availability and the history I have using it , horse manure is my first choice to make super soil. In the raised garens I just constructed here at Roses inc. I used the following ingredients.  Composted horse manure, composted wood chips and topsoil.  This mixture has worked very well for me and it is like I always tell each of you; " If it is working for you than don't change a thing".

Wood chips left to compost make the richest black soil you can imaging.  Approximately a 1 foot thickness of wood chips will make 1 inch of soil in about a year. The process of making composted wood chip soil is easy.  Layer your chip in the compost bin about a foot deep.  Than add a couple inches of manure and repeat the process until you have filled your compost been.  Remember to keep your compost moist but not wet.  Some will tell you that you should use a nitrogen fertilizer to feed the bacteria that do the job but I have found that going totally organic lets eartworms thrive in the mixture and aide in the process of breaking the compost down.  Many times the compost using the commercial fertilizer will heat to the point that it will turn to ashes on the inside if it is not turned at regular intervals.  The use of manure will provide enough bacteria and nitrogen to feed the mix and kill weed seed without making the mix to hot for the good guys to live in it.  If composted wood chips are not available then Spragum Peat is a good substitue for 1/3 of the mix.  Next use a good topsoil.  Most of the soil you buy in our area will have a lot of sand in it so you must offset that extra sand with more organic matter and yes you guessed it, more horse manure. In building my beds I used a layer of composted wood chips followed by a layer of horse manure followed by a layer of top soil.  You can very the amounts of each depending on the quality of the top soil you use.  It is always best to mix the ingedients with a tiller in the bed and let it set until it has been rained on or just wet it deep yourself with a water hose or sprinkler.  Let it dry and then tiller it again before planting.