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jessaka

rose bush turning black

jessaka
10 years ago

my b.r. cant rose bush is really dying. i can't find my old post on this, so i am posting anew. but the one next to it is doing the same. it starts at the top and keeps dying all the way down. i have next to nothing left of the first rose bush that is almost all black. i am afraid to dig it out and replace it if this is going to happen again, if it is in the soil. how can i find out what is wrong with them? thanks so much.

Comments (11)

  • hoovb zone 9 sunset 23
    10 years ago

    Well, we need to go through a list of possibilities and eliminate them until the culprit is apparent.

    Any abrupt freezes, snows, heat-waves in the past few days?

    Any possibility of a chemical thrown on it lately?

    Is it getting enough water?

    Have you ever had a soil test?

    How is the drainage? Is it sitting in a pool for weeks and weeks and weeks?

    Does it look like stem canker? (Google up some photos)

    How did the root system look on the one that died?

    What generally is the soil like? Concrete? Glue?

    How long was the rose planted there? Planted from a band? Grafted or own root?

  • jessaka
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    i have yet to pull up the one that looks dead, just pruned it a lot.

    it isn't sitting in a pool of water. my roses on the other side of the house look good. they are facing the same sunlight.

    it has been dying ever since we put in a trellis behind them. the roses on the other side do not have trellises. the trellises are plastic. i pulled up the branches and tied them to the trellis.

    have not been sprayed.

    no freeze or snow. getting water though.

    it doesn't look like stem canker.

    have not tested the soil. the soil is rocky but should be good soil. i had pine mulch on them over the winter.

    these bushes are are 3 years old. they all have had some problems with black spot, not really bad though.

    i pulled it up and it looks like a normal root system. i had transplanted one several weeks ago, and it is doing fine, and the root system on the dead rosebush looks the same.

    i don't know what you mean concrete or glue soil. just good ole oklahoma soil.

  • nanadollZ7 SWIdaho
    10 years ago

    It might be bacterial cane blight, which we have here. It causes the canes to blacken and die. It often occurs after a late freeze which has damaged the cane. It's worse when the spring is wet and cool. When it heats up and dries out, it seems to go away. Removing the affected canes down to the non blackened wood worked for me, and I've never lost a rose to it, but others in this area have lost lots of roses to the blight. Prune late or not at all, and clean your pruners in alcohol before pruning the next rose. Diane

  • jessaka
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    hi nanadoll, i looked it up and it doesn't look like can bright. could it be too much rain? or not enough water?

  • jessaka
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    hi, thanks.

    i have a rose bush that i transplanted recently that i can put in its place, but i am afraid that something in the soil may kill it. i could be very wrong. but i will wait and see if the other one dies first. i am remembering that i had a new dawn rose that died, and i felt it was overwatering. we have fixed that area so water won't run there during a rain, and so my last new dawn is okay, so far. we have had so much rain this spring that we went from extreme drought to no drought. and here i am watering the roses thinking they need water. it was really easy to pull up that dead rose by hand, which makes me think it was getting too much water. the main root was about 2 foot long, but it came out easily.

  • roseseek
    10 years ago

    Isn't it Downy Mildew turns black from the bottom up, while Botrytis turns black top down? Kim

  • nanadollZ7 SWIdaho
    10 years ago

    Jessaka, check out the thread entitled "any thoughts on what this is" which I just brought up. There might be some info in it of interest to you. I posted more detailed info on cane blight in this thread. Diane

  • jessaka
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    thanks. if i plant another rose in its place will it die?

  • michaelg
    10 years ago

    Bacterial blight is not a soil disease. It is mainly in the top growth.

    Verticilium wilt is a soil disease that produces dieback of individual canes one or two at a time. In my experience, (some?) roses can fight off this disease in time. A characteristic symptom is yellowing of one side of leaflets, then leaves die from the bottom upwards and the cane shrivels. Tips may wilt with some blackening, similar to bacterial blight.

    Botrytis canker or cane blight blackens canes and can travel quickly down the cane, especially when the plant is semi-dormant. This fungus is very widespread, but as a disease of the bark, it comes and goes depending, I guess, on weather.

    Since we don't know the cause, we can't tell you whether it will affect a new rose in the same site.

  • jessaka
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    thank you so much everyone. i moved a rose into the dead rose's place, and then i saw that all the rain water on the south side of the house was running into that bed, so i made a ditch around the rose and put up a stone barrier and will keep an eye on it. the black was starting from the top down or just an entire branch would be dead. not sure. but leaves on the other rose bush are yellow and falling off. yellow on top and dying from the top down.

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