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Greetings!
What a beautiful day today was! Makes you want to go out and prune Roses doesn't it? Read "It's not Time Yet" before you grab your gear and head for the roses. In the mean time be sure your roses are getting enough water. Some of us have been dry for a long time and the roses need extra moisture to break for Spring. If the soil around the rose will not hold a ball when released after you squeeze it in your fist it is too dry. If I need to cover a subject for the first time or just a refresher please send me an e-mail or give me a call and I will include it in a coming addition. Rose questions only please. If you need some help with the upcoming pruning of your Roses please let me know and I will get you on the schedule. I will begin pruning around the 15th of March and finish up by April 15. |
| When to Plant in Spring | | | How Early is too Early
Each year when the roses hit the big box stores and supermarkets I start to receive calls from people about planting roses in late February or March. Some of the calls are from people standing looking at the $8.00 packaged roses available at these locations. Other calls are from people who see the roses for sale or feel the warm temperature and wonder if it is time to start planting and call Roses inc. to see what we have ready.
Those of you who know me have probably heard me say that it is important to me that my customers are successful growing roses. If I wanted to make a little early cash there is nothing stopping me from buying packaged roses and having them available to my customers in February and March. The roses are available to me at a cost that would make me a tidy profit selling them for $8.00 each. So why do I not do it? Remember, it is important to me that you are successful growing roses. February and March is too early to plant roses in Green Country.
A gentleman recently called and ask what I had available and I told him; nothing at this time but check back with us the second week of April. I could hear the disgust in his voice as he told me that he always plants his roses this time of year and they do great. He plants them and covers them up with a mound of soil and then when it starts to warm outside he removes the soil from them. If we have a cold night he covers them. What he is doing is exactly what you need to do if you decide to plant bare root roses early and if that is your desire I have bare root roses available right now with no guarantee to grow. Remember, I want you to be successful growing roses.
I have written many times about the problems with roses that are covered in wax. The wax is there to help prevent the canes from drying out during their time on the market shelves, which can be a very long time. The wax does help. The problem arises when they are planted and the sun hits them while the wax is still in place. It burns the canes in our climate and is likely to kill any that the wax is showing. I could write a page on how you can make these roses work for you providing they are the correct roses for this part of the country. My directions would include cutting them way back or leaving the soil piled over them until new canes emerge and then cutting off the waxed canes. I could tell you of the likelihood of the first growth freezing off and dramatically slowing the roses development. Yes, with the proper attention and a lot of work they may grow. The main problem I see with it is, I want you to be successful growing roses.
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| Is it time to Prune yet? | | |
Nope, not yet!
But the good news is you only have a couple of weeks to wait. When the Forsythia starts to bloom you can cut away to your hearts content. I hope you take solace in the fact that you aren't the only one who feels an almost overwhelming urge to prune your roses. I stood out in my garden this week where new buds are breaking in abundance and yearned for the time when I could prune them. I receive calls daily asking if we shouldn't start pruning because the new growth has started. I know it is hard but understand that winter is not over yet. If you prune your roses now they will be stimulated to grow even faster and that new growth, which is very sensitive to cold temperatures, will be frozen off by one of the cold nights yet to come.
It takes a rose bush longer to recover from frozen foliage than it does to grow after a prune. If you look at your rose bushes now you will see that most of the new growth is at the top of the bush. This will be cut off when you prune so it doesn't matter if it gets frozen.
Pruning later may mean that your neighbors who do not prune may have roses sooner but trust me when I say that when your bloom a week or so later you will be happy you waited.
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| Principles of Pruning | |  - The main objective of pruning is to encourage and direct new growth, remove dead, diseased, or out of place canes, and optimize your plants flowering potential.
- Generally, the best time for Spring pruning is late March (or after your last hard freeze.) We prune when the Forsythia bush blooms.
- The following steps offer an organized approach to Spring pruning.
- Identify good, healthy canes. Good canes are usually at least 3/8" to ½" in diameter, relatively young, active and free of disease. This is the growth you will try to save. Before cutting good canes, proceed to the next step.
- Identify poor canes using the following criteria: The 4 "D's"
· Dead: Those canes that are black or brown that when cut have no green or sap inside. · Diseased: Those canes that have a canker on them (brown or tan, with a purplish area near the connection to live wood) · Dinky: Weak, spindly canes, "blind shoots" (sometimes caused by frost after new growth starts, other times by disease or insect damage) distorted canes, and suckers on grafted bushes · Damaged: Canes that have been damaged by the elements, yard tools or crossing canes that rub each other causing damage. - "Thin-out" poor growth back to a good growing point (a good cane that you wish to keep). Prune back to the bud union on grafted roses or to the ground on own-root roses, if necessary. See item 4. "How to make good pruning cuts."
- Reduce the number of good, healthy canes by selectively thinning-out the less valuable canes. Open up the center of the plant by thinning-out crossing canes, and distributing remaining good canes as equally as possible around the center. I suggest a maximum of 6 canes remaining on your Hybrid Teas, Floribundas, and Grandifloras after pruning. Shrubs and miniatures may have 10 or more depending on the bush size you want to achieve.
- Reduce the length of remaining good canes by cutting them back to the desired length, preferably at a bud that faces away from the center of the bush. The "finished" height of the bush depends on several factors including: your reason for growing roses (i.e. whether you grow roses for landscape, exhibition, cut blooms, etc.,) the rose type, and your desired result. As a general rule when pruning shrubs, leave 2/3 of the cane which will produce a large bush with many smaller blooms. For Hybrid Teas and Floribundas leave canes a foot or less for larger flowers and more manageable cane size in our region. NOTE: Almost no one ever cuts off too much!
- Many people worry about how much cane to cut back. Actually, this seems to be less critical than how the cut is made. Cuts should be clean and leave a minimum of cane behind to die or become diseased. Die back and disease can be almost eliminated by putting a drop of plain white glue on the wound at the time of the cut. This is especially helpful in our area after April 1. When reducing the length of a cane, cuts should be made at a 45-degree angle ¼ inch above a good, live bud. This is the same angle in which new growth is leaving the main cane. Always be sure to hold your pruners with the blade toward the bush. When completely removing a cane, the cut should be made as close as possible to the healthy cane that it is attached to or the bud union on a grafted bush or to the ground on an own-root bush. In either case, do not leave stubs. Leaving stubs will invite disease organisms into the plant, which could seriously damage or ultimately kill the bush. About 90% of dead wood in a bush can be attributed to poor pruning cuts made during the Spring pruning season. Good pruning cuts can be made with "by-pass style" pruners. "Anvil-style" pruners, which have a tendency to smash canes, are not suitable for pruning roses and should not be used. Keep your pruners and loppers sharp and properly adjusted so that they make clean, smooth cuts. The use of a fine metal file is actually preferred over a stone. The rough edge left from the file actually aides in cutting. Razor sharp pruning tools dull quickly and are not necessary for a proper cut.
- Remember I am just a phone call away should you get confused once you have began the pruning.
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