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Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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Posted by
clanross 8b mississippi (
My Page) on
Mon, Aug 16, 10 at 12:35
| My Chestnut Rose is thriving and I love it. But, I need to prune it. Has anyone else out there pruned a large Chestnut Rose? How did you do it? When did you do it? Did it still bloom well? Also, did you happen to root any of the cuttings? Thank you. :) |
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Chestnut Rose looks beautiful limbed up to show its wonderful bark! |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Connie, what do you mean? Limbed up like a tree? With a single trunk? Multiple trunks? I have one, too, but not in the ground yet, and I really need to know exactly what you mean. :)) Sherry |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Sherry, I have seen this rose (or the single version) at Nick's rose garden in Maryland. It is a TREE. It is absolutley glorious. It's graceful beyond words. I've planted several of them in my yard. I will grow mine similarly to a crepe myrtle; i.e., I will take out/off the lower branches to expose the trunk. The upper branches will create a canopy. I've had success rooting the cuttings from this rose. With roxburghii one really needs to think outside of the box. I do NOT understand why this rose isn't in more gardens where it would do well. Robert |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| What Robert said. The bark on Roxburgii is beautiful, and you can show it off to best advantage by keeping the bottom of the plant free of branches ... just like crape myrtle (thanks for the visual, Robert). This elevates it to 'specimen' level in the garden. Sherry, mine is still in a pot, too. I plan to put it into my 'cemetery garden', but I doubt that will happen this year. Connie |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Robert, how tall is this "tree" you saw? I'll have to consult my local sources. That isn't how I saw it growing here. Don't know if it was just young or what, but it wasn't even a large bush let alone a tree. I know it gets big, so I'm not doubting you. This rose may not be meant for my garden if it's not manageable. Do you know how it handles shade? Does it repeat well? Is it self-cleaning? And thank you, too, Connie. Sherry |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Sherry, I'm hoping that I'm not exaggerating (and I hope Connie and/or Nick will verify), but I think it's at least 15' tall and nearly as wide at the top. It's easy to overlook it as a "rose" so to speak. Now, I do want to emphasize that the roxburghii at Nick's may or may not be the double flowered "Chestnutt" rose. If he has the species version, that may get signifificantly bigger than "The Chestnutt Rose." I really don't have an idea. I am truly hoping that The Chestnutt Rose will get big. Robert |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Robert, dear, you forgot to tell Sherry that everything grows bigger at Nick's house. I'm not sure you can measure any normal garden reaction by what happens there. OT, he has the largest Marie Pavie I have ever seen. The Chesnut rose at the Lynchburg cemetery is a lovely multi-trunked shrub, and it's about 7' tall. There, it is planted beside a brick wall and they keep it to within about 5' of the wall in depth. The one in the display garden at Sherando Roses grew in a bit of shade, but it was still 7' tall and really, really lovely. Mine is from there. It just rebloomed for me, tortured in its little pot like it is. Sherry, sometimes the only way to learn if a rose will do well for you is to dig a hole and plant it. Connie |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Thank you for all the responses. I think I am going to slightly "limb it up" as suggested. (Thank you Connie) The bark on mine is beautiful. My bush is at least 6 feet--probably over 7--I know it's taller than me at 5'9". It is just covered with blooms every year and would be "perfect" if it only had a good scent. Also glad to hear it grows in VA (Thank you Robert)as I will be moving next year to the DC area. Is it possible to attach photos on Gardenweb? I used to do it on Dave's Garden. I would love to show you all the before and afters. Thanks! :) |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Planting must wait for cooler weather. I may be insane for roses but not for digging a whole bed this time of year. I didn't quite hear... does it repeat a lot? Sherry |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| I am in Florida and my Chestnut rose, the double kind, finally bloomed this year for the first time in 5 years. I was about ready to give up but it's healthy and I was really anxious to see a flower. It had 4 flowers that were large and full. I'm not sure about a smell, I don't remember that. It is about 5ft with a few stems that are over that. I would like it to not be over that height so if I can trim it that would make me happy. Also, I would love to see it full of blooms. Shirley |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Mine is LOADED with bloom in summer for a fairly long period. There will be a bloom here and there on the plant later in the summer, but I would call it a once bloomer. No scent, or at least not a "rose" scent. Mine actually has a rather strange, not particularly pleasant, smell, but most people don't seem to smell anything, so I'd just call it unscented. I will try to figure out how to attach photos. Mine has put out a few suckers which I have transplanted. They are doing fine. I've not tried rooting cuttings--yet. |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Hmmm, I'm panting for pics. Sherry |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| The rebloom on Chesnut/roxburghii is dependent on sunlight. Ours came with the old farmhouse and was getting only four hours of noon sunlight a day, then we lost trees to a tornado (roxburghii outlived its tree enemies) and fall and then midsummer bloom began. Same plant, just more sunlight. Then a very nice summer for rainfall, and even more bloom. The tallest roxburghiis I've seen are Stephen Scaniello's in New Jersey that was approaching at least nine feet tall and one in Columbia SC (the single form) that was up on a berm that was probably eight feet tall, which is the height of the longer trunks on mine (which would probably be taller if it weren't in a really acidic red clay. |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| We grow the regular double chestnut, a single-flowered seedling from China, and Carl Cato's "spineless" chestnut (spineless on the sepals -- maybe we should call it the pecan rose...), all in a large bed in nearly all-day sun. They're all on 'Fortuniana' roots, which normally makes a rose more vigorous than normal. But I don't think that's the case here. Our seedling does get huge. We prune it severely, but still, it will go 6-7 feet tall by at least 10 feet across in a year. My dad used to grow it (in High Springs, Fla.) without pruning, and it was probably 8 feet tall by 12-15 across. However, the spineless one is much less vigorous for us -- perfectly healthy, but seldom reaching 5 feet tall by 6 across. And the regular double chestnut, I'd say, gets no more than 5x5 for us, in a year (we do prune all of these severely each spring). We get continuous bloom on the double chestnut, but only a few flowers at a time, other than spring, so right now, it's blooming but far from covered with flowers. Still, I did notice a couple flowers today. The spineless chestnut (which is also very double and deeper in color) repeats, but not as well. And the single seedling almost never makes a flower other than spring, when it really loads up. Ann, was it you who suggested an ID for the spineless one? If so, please remind me -- I've lost that info. Thanks. Malcolm |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Sorry, Malcolm it wasn't me. I'm still wondering if the single and the more common double are all that closely related because mine just don't do things at the same time (like leaf out, put out buds, and I think the single may prefer to be a tree like form.) |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Here is a photo of my Chestnut Rose earlier this year. 
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RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Chestnut Rose bloom. 
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large Chestnut Rose
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| Here's another shot of my Chestnut Rose. 
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RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Tell me, Clanross, does your bush demand any care from you? I could plant mine across the field from me but there's no water over there. I'd have to lug water until it got established, and after that he'd be on his own. Do you think he'd tolerate that kind of neglect? BTW, that's a gorgeous plant. How big is it? Sherry |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| I have not watered it much at all for the past 2-3 years. (Maybe in a drought, if I remember.) I did prepare the soil very well with all sorts of organic amendments and then with fish emulsion/bone meal, manure (black cow and farm manure when I can get it). I try to give it some organic "food" every year--compost, manure or just fish emulsion, but it got nothing this year. I do mulch heavily as I hate weeding it--very scratchy. Every year, in the winter, I wonder if the cold has killed it, but every year since it matured, it has looked like the photos above. |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| It's at least 7 feet. Gets bigger every year and it's about 6 years old now, I think. Someday I'd like to have a long hedge of Chestnut rose. :) |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Thanks, Clanross,I thought maybe it was 10' across!! Glad to hear that it thrives on neglect. Sherry |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Yes, it probably is 10 feet + across and 7 feet+ high. :) |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| I wanna see it pruned as a tree! There's no pics of that on HMF either! |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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I know this is an old post but I have really enjoyed it, and thanks for the photos. My husband was given a cutting of this by an old classmate of his. I am so anxious to see it thrive. Can they take full sun.
Sharon |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Katladie, Yes, full sun. This year we have had so much rain that virtually every other rose I have looks sickly. (They'll recover for the most part, but not pretty) :( All except the Chestnut Rose -- it is lush and beautiful. It is a once bloomer (late spring), but the foliage and bark is beautiful, so it really is decorative year 'round. If you give it good soil/manure/mulch and a little water until it gets big, but year 3-4, you should have something similar to mine. Good luck with it. :) |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| I've visited old houses in LA and MS, where all that remained of old rose gardens was Chestnut Rose. It is lovely out here, but it seems to be particularly well suited to the South. Jeri
(In Dry, Dusty, SoCal) |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| I have a four year old Chestnut rose that bloomed for the first time this year. It would be quite huge except for some reason about 1/4 of the plant dies suddenly each year. Gophers? Anyone else have this problem? |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| I found a pic on the web! (I love this rose -- the foliage is so ferny.) Unfortunately, the picture is not very detailed. |
Here is a link that might be useful: bigger than a house
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| my chestnut is a little bigger than clanross's and has the same shape .. wish i could see it shaped as a tree so i could do mine like that.. how can i root chestnut? i can root other roses but have had no luck with chestnut |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| ClanRoss, I'm puzzled why you'd need to prune that lovely plant. Maybe I'd trim the lowest limbs to within two inches of the ground - instead of their trailing the ground as they currently do - to neaten that one edge. But it's beautiful and graceful as it is. Why mess with perfection? Limbed-up, the mature specimens I've seen are almost the size of an Ornamental Persimmon. Same umbrella shape, although with much more character than an umbrella. I don't know if you go to Jackson much, but in Belhaven (a university district dating mostly from the 1920s), people have started skillfully limbing-up some of the camellias. (security concerns necessitate editing the streetside vegetation, in many cases, these days. Limbing-up spares these venerable plants. The Wackenhut Man can drive by and see that no zombies are lurking on lawns, waiting to invade homes... But Camellias planted by the friends and neighbors of Eudora Welty are spared.) All through fall and winter, you have these wonderful little blooming trees, now. Quite lovely. Chestnut rose would have the same effect (although smaller than a nonagenarian Camellia). |
This post was edited by plan9fromposhmadison on Fri, Aug 9, 13 at 6:03
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| Thank you everyone for all the compliments. Since my earlier posts I have moved with my family to Williamsburg, Va and have had to leave my garden. :( (sniff...sniff...) The reason for the trim was that it was crowding the drive and was difficult to mow around. Also, the squirrels were continually "planting" little pecan and oak nuts that would grow through the rose and look sloppy. You cannot see it, but there is a brick edge around the flower bed that holds the Chestnut Rose and several other roses. It did look beautiful before the trim, but it was also beautiful afterward -- and you could see some of the lovely, peeling bark on the trunk, as well as the brick edging. I will try to post another photo of it. I do not know what the new owners will do with my old garden. I try not to think of it as I fear that they are more of the "mow 'n blow" gardener variety. If anyone is in the area, it is 411 West Michigan Street in Poplarville, MS. Less than 10 minutes off I59 on your way to New Orleans. :) Easy to see from the street. Hope it fares well under the new regime. I am super-anxious to start my new garden in Virginia, and I will certainly put in the Chestnut Rose. :) |
RE: Chestnut Rose--what to do with a huge plant!
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| I brought home a plant of the spineless chestnut. After seeing the picture Monarda found, I have no idea where to put it. Thank heavens Malcolm says it is not as big as the regular one. Still. I guess it can wait in the pot for a while. I will need to think it over. Rosefolly |
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