So what I'm just going to do is go to a garden center nearby that has won awards in their industry. I'm just going to pick something out there. Makes it easier for me lol...no over thinking AND I can see what I'm getting. And I'm supporting a local small business.

Question - say I end up picking something that grows larger than I would like - I'm looking for something that doesn't get beyond 3' x 3'. Can I root prune and cane prune to keep the size down? This works for other plants so I can't see why not but I'm no expert and that's why I'm here :)

Also, my shopping list for the soil please add suggestions if needed:

- soil
- bloodmeal
- perlite and mulch (already have at home)

And pruners. Got gloves.

Thanks for your help and patience, I know newbie questions can get repetitive, I'm great with houseplants but don't have a garden to call my own yet so am testing the waters with containers. Last year I failed miserably with a tomato plant but I didn't treat it correctly either.

My 13 band-size roses are in Organic MiracleGro potting soil (neutral pH of 7), mixed with a small amount of garden soil, so it's pH is now 7.2. None of them have fungal diseases, including the mini roses (very disappointing TINY).

I recommend Austin roses for containers since they are more disease-resistant than hybrid teas. Mary Magadelene is 1' x 1.5', 100% healthy, and has this magnificant cozy myrrh scent that floats into your window. Grace, Lady Emma Hamilton, Munstead Wood, William Shakespeare, Ambridge rose, Pretty Jessica, Princess Alexandre of Kent are all cute and fragrant in a container. Some of these make good cut flowers too.

If you know of experts who have established beyond a doubt that acidity encourages blackspot and alkalinity discourages blackspot, please do cite them and I will profusely apologize for questioning your assertion.

If your statements are based only or mainly on your own very limited experiments in your own garden, please realize that that proves nothing. In the world of science, that would be considered "anecdotal" evidence, not hard evidence. You may have accidentally stumbled onto something in your own garden, but you should realize that that situation needs to be checked out by many other informed horticulturalists who would need to replicate your "success" many, many times--maybe hundreds of times and in many different geographies and growing conditions--before it could be asserted, with the confidence of a valid general rule, that alkalinity discourages blackspot, etc.

In the meantime, there is nothing wrong with you sharing your personal beliefs and experience about such matters--as long as you add qualifying words such as "in my personal experience" or "in my personal opinion" or "I personally have found in my own garden that. . . " or some such phrase that takes the unproven assertion out of the realm of a recognized and accepted universal truth in the gardening community--because I don't think it is.

I want to emphasize that I really admire your eagerness to try out and experiment with various possibilities, but what one amateur discovers on her own is not the equivalent of a professionally researched and verified truth based on many such experiments and double-checked by other experts in the field. I think that just changing the phrasing a bit to make it reflect your own personal beliefs is all that is needed.

And, I repeat, if I'm mistaken on any of this, I will apologize profusely for sticking my nose in where it doesn't belong.

Kate

Good luck with your first potted rose. Have a good time choosing! :-)

Contrasting Soil pH Effects on Fungal and Bacterial Growth

1. 1Department of Microbial Ecology, Lund University, Ecology Building, SE-223 62 Lund, Sweden
2. 2Soil Science Department, Rothamsted Research, Harpenden, Hertfordshire ALS 2JQ, United Kingdom
ABSTRACT
The influence of pH on the two principal decomposer groups in soil, fungi and bacteria, was investigated along a continuous soil pH gradient at Hoosfield acid strip at Rothamsted Research in the United Kingdom. This experimental location provides a uniform pH gradient, ranging from pH 8.3 to 4.0, within 180 m in a silty loam soil. .. The growth-based measurements revealed a fivefold decrease in bacterial growth and a fivefold increase in fungal growth with lower pH. .. Below pH 4.5 there was universal inhibition of all microbial variables.
1. www.usna.usda.gov/Gardens/faqs/azaleafaq2.html
Black spot of rose. If the disease is ... Black spot, caused by the fungus Diplocarpon rosae (imperfect stage. Marssonina ... Conidial germination is optimum at 64� to 78�F (18� to 26�C). ... The soil reaction (pH) should be between 5.5 and 6.5. e. ...
web.aces.uiuc.edu/vista/pdf_pubs/610.pdf

So I did a pH test using red cabbage juice as pH indicator: banana peels is neutral (safe for compost), lemon rinds is very acidic (nearly pink like vinegar), cantaloupe rind is acidic, but watermelon rind is neutral. The above is from MY COMPOST ONLY.

The second article is on blackspot, but I can find no where in it where it refers to the negative or positive effects of soil PH on encouraging or discouraging blackspot, so once again, I don't think it is safe to conclude from this article that there is a direct connection between soil PH and blackspot on roses.

There may (or may not) be a connection between the two that has not yet been proven by scientific studies, but until that happens, we still can NOT safely conclude that soil PH affects blackspot--in my reading, at least. : )

Kate

Maybe dublinbay-Kate, would like to start her own thread on why soil ph is not important for rose growers with blackspot or fungal issues. This would be a good place for Kate to post links to her source of information. Rather than hijacking and making further searches for information on the subject hard to find.

Enjoy the new roses Mojave, I know I am! (and off to repot a rose in the biggest pot I can find-in rose mix and our native soil)

There's the Cornell formula of baking soda (pH of 9) for blackspot spray. As to putting a bit of garden soil into the potting mix, that's Douglas Green's idea, who wrote the book "Tender Roses for Tough Climate" - the idea is to put beneficial bacteria into potting soil.

As to the other issues brought up by a couple posters, I have no opinion on those matters, but you should feel free to debate them among yourselves. My one and only reservation has ONLY to do with the idea that PH encourages/discourages blackspot. It does not, as far as I know, nor have I yet seen any evidence that the professional community believes there is a connection.

However, if you thought I was objecting to having good soil, why would I object to good soil? Nothing I said even remotely suggests I disapprove of good soil.

I'll sign off now. Didn't mean to get others in an uproar.

And welcome to the newbie, mojave. I think you will find growing a rose is easier than growing a tomato plant, at least according to several of my gardening friends.

Kate

Thankfully I didn't end up getting a pruner yet. The plant was $40, a lot more than I was expecting so I'll get the right pruner in a few weeks or so.

I was pretty surprised at the lack of choices. There were 10-15 different roses however once you take out the Knock Outs (which I didn't want, just my preference), the trailers, the climbers, the very tall hybrid teas and reds and one orange (don't like those colors) I had about 3 choices. None of them yellow or white which I wanted lol.

I ended up with a pink Easy Elegance called Kiss Me. It was one of two own root plants and it was the same size as all the grafted ones so I went with the own root. As soon as I got home though, it started raining! So until tomorrow it is sitting by the patio doors. Anyone else have it? How well does it bloom throughout the season? It was one thing I couldn't find on their tag. Help Me Find says it has two flushes and then sporadic blooms afterwards.

It's kind of awkwardly growing to one side.

Also, what's this? This plant was the healthiest looking of all but there's also this.

Back to basics (my comfort zone): MojaveLove - As a lazy but ever-experimental rose person, I like to try anything that smacks of less labor for greater results. Last season I tried a pre-mixed bag of blood and bone + potash, Yes, I know that it's easy enough to mix your own, but this Betty Crocker-style all-in-one sounded even better. Results were amazingly good. Empirical data only goes to far as comparing four bareroot Paroles from one bareroot order, two with the mix, two without. Striking visible difference in the growth and bloom of the two sets of test roses. Long and short of it: You might wish to add some potash to your shopping list, or get a bag of 5-1 premixed stuff.

What rose(s)are you leaning toward at the moment, btw? Colour? Fragrance? Like a few firsts in life, you never forget your first rose ;-)

I love the old rose look, compact, very fragrant, max number of petals possible, always in bloom, light green foliage, yellow or white or "sunset" colors. And no maintenance at all but that last one is not realistic! But hey, if I'm dreaming...lol

I'm with you on "keep things easy".

Comparing the correction of a misstatement to the Thought Police is unfair. Evoking that emotional response, however, could serve the purpose of making people think twice before pointing out those errors.

I just find the "logic" provided to be so....illogical.

Soil should be alkaline because citrus fruits cause mold and your cabbage proves it because of baking soda?

Good lord, if we haven't talked enough on here about throwing cake ingredients all over our foliage.

If Kate or I came here & said that insecticides increase healthy bee populations on our blooms, IN OUR BACKYARD, would everyone nod or would someone's head explode?

Made me laugh, indeed.

Back to the question in the original post--
I've never heard of or done root pruning, but then I don't have any roses growing in pots. I know there are quite a few folks here who DO successfully grow roses in containers. I know that mini's would be quite lovely in pots and it is possible to find some that have scent.

Hopefully a couple of the folks that containter-grow their roses will chime in soon. I know the 2 biggest questions are usually: Which rose are you trying to grow in a container(answered), and What size is your container?