Probably a Rugosa of some sort, since you are in zone 6 and need something cold-hardy. Many of them sucker quite a bit...do you have lots of room?

OK, I just had to remove this one rugosa because it had outgrown the garden. But if you want a serious boundary rose: Polareis is it. it is a tall rambler that blooms very nicely in the early summer then very sporadically after that. The leaves are very shiny and dark green for a rugosa.

This thing has some serious serious thorns all over the entire cane.

And rugosas do sucker a bit,so maybe you could dig up suckers after a while and make your hedge. I never tried to propogate a rugosas with a cutting.

Plain old rugosas get big, have lots of big thorns, and millions of tiny prickles that come off easily if brushed against. They're the devil to remove.
I planted three foot whips two feet apart along my property line to keep the kids out of my shade garden. It took a few years but I now have a solid rugosa fence that's over 6 feet tall. The rugosas sucker readily and will spread but the suckers can be mowed down with a lawn mower/garden tractor.
Another plant that will form a dense barrier is Rose of Sharon. It seeds readily and the seeds drop and develope into new plants that can be transplanted when they get larger. They get 7-8 feet tall for me. Mine have been in the ground for 6 years and some have main trunks as big as my arm right now. Last year my back neighbor got several of the seedlings and planted his own barrier to hide his neighbor's (not mine) yard from his view. It'll be another two years before they get big enough to serve that purpose.

I have a catalog for the Rugosas that can be purchased as low as 31 cents each depending on the size and quantity.
If Rose of Sharon will work, I can send you hundreds of volunteers from mine for the cost of shipping.
The only problem with either would be the four wheelers would run right over them until they got larger. Meanwhile a taunt wire or rope stretched across the boundry marked with white rags every few feet might act as a deterent.

Here is a link that might be useful: Engels Nursery catalogue.

ok, thanks everyone. I have info to now make a fairly decent decision. I have lots of room, but I really don't want anything that will sprawl. I have farm mowers that will shred two inch thick branches if I need to do that to keep it from spreading. but it would be best if I can get what I want and it will keep itself to a somewhat manageable size.

Hi,

I'm trying to find an alternative to deer fencing. Do you think that this will work:

Plant hawthorns (particularly long-thorned ones like Crataegus crus-galli) in a row around the circumference of a property or orchard spaced-out at around 15' apart between each hawthorn; then plant native Virginian rose (Rosa virginiana) right underneath all of the hawthorns so that they fill-in the clearance underneath the hawthorns, since the hawthorns maybe often have around 3' to 6' clearing from the ground up to the first lateral branches, being grown in near full-sun; Rosa virginiana grows into a mess of about 6'. Or, if the thorns are nasty enough, maybe I can plant Rosa carolina, as long as they will definitely get to be a little taller then 3', as deer are not going to jump in between the 2' to 3' gap that would then be above the rose brush and bellow the hawthorn spread.

Do you think that, once the hawthorns spread out to 12' and lock together, the rose brush will be an effective deterrent against the majority of deer and raccoons? I know deer will graze on rose buds, leaves, and some stems, but I don't think that they will each clear through them?

What do you think about this plan? I'm hoping you will say it might work, but have a feeling that your'e laughing as you read this. Ken Asmus (Oikos Tree Crops) told me the idea should work with rose, but I think he's talking about the invasive Rosa multiflora, which I will not plant. I also considered American plum, but I'm thinking that there's just not enough thorns and that that many plums would eventually fall host to a blight, even though in nature it is said to be a species of Prunus which is asymptomatic of x-knot.

Thanks,
Steve