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| I love roses but am new to rose gardening. Last fall we planted 3 carpet roses in a mostly sunny location (zone 6B). They are lovely and are doing well so far, but I have little experience with roses and want to ensure I'm doing all I can for them. Below are a couple of questions, and any advice at all that you can provide will be very much appreciated!
1. We tilled and amended soil before planting last fall and fertilized this spring, but the soil is already much lighter in color and looks depleted. We feel it needs more compost (or other amendments?) and am not what what is best for the roses. Also, we're not even sure how to add it or how much to add now that the roses have grown so much. 2. Do carpet roses root where the shoots touch the soil? I've heard for some plants that placing a brick on shoots helps the shoots to root - is this true for carpet roses? 3. Will pruning spent blooms encourage new ones? Any info on pruning them in general will be appreciated. Many thanks in advance for your help. |
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| Congratulations! You'll like your roses. They bloom very well and are fairly disease resistant. Have you done any fertilizing? You can work in some more soil amendments if you want to but they probably still could use some fertilizer. Any good well balanced one will do. I use a dry time release one like Osmocote, scratched into the surface of the soil, in the early spring and then liquid fertilizers about once a month after that. I've used Miracle Grow, Peters, Spray n Grow and others and they're all fine. I've had my Appleblossom Flower Carpet rose for about 5 years and I've never had it root to the ground from the long canes it sends out. So I wouldn't worry about that. I think you could get it to if you took a cane and buried part of it below ground but not if it's just lying on the top of the soil. Yes, pruning the spent blooms will encourage it to grow and produce more blooms. It's a big job on mine because it blooms so much so I generally wait until the flush is completely over and just prune the whole bush back some to take off the spent blooms. In general you can prune out dead wood at any time. Early spring (April here usually) is the best time to do any hard prune back. Otherwise, you can prune them for shape and size to some degree as you do your dead heading. Any time you prune you are encouraging new growth so if you have very cold winters don't prune back in the late fall or you will lose any new growth that happens afterward to the cold. Hope that helps, enjoy! |
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| I've had great success with Flower Carpet Red and FC Coral since I bought them 7 years ago. My secret is to do nothing. No pruning, fertilizer, water or spray. By the way, the term "carpet" can be deceiving. FC gets 5' tall and 6' wide. FC Red
FC Coral
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- Posted by flaurabunda 6a, Central IL (My Page) on Wed, Jun 6, 12 at 12:44
| That's some high-pile, heavy-shag carpet, Harry. Nice pics! |
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