22,153 Garden Web Discussions | Roses

That would be my suggestion, Dandylioness. If the other roses around it are performing well and this one is the "dawg" of the bunch, imagine how much better the neighbors might do without the competition for light, water and air. Yes, you can try moving it to another spot and that MIGHT help...or it might not. Your choice, but those who refuse to behave in my yard while the others around it remain fine, demand dates with a shovel.

If you have other flowering perennials and annuals in the garden amongst your roses, you'll likely attract bugs that eat the rose slugs -- in particular, yellow jackets hunt them down. My garden is two years old now, and the worst rose slug damage happened the first year, because I hadn't added perennials yet. Last year, I saw some damage early-on, but not quite as much as the year before, and then I saw very little at all after June. This year, the little I see is concentrated on roses which still don't have non-rose companions -- i.e., areas I'm still filling. You can spray insecticides to kill them, but you may inadvertently kill some of the critters that eat them as well, which can lock you in a cycle of HAVING to spray all the time because nothing else will be around to take care of them. It takes a bit of time for a food source to become obvious to critters that utilize it -- rose slugs didn't appear until I had roses, and bugs that eat rose slugs didn't appear until I had rose slugs.
Just something to think about.
:-)
~Christopher

- Use an Insecticide. Chemical controls are also available, but should only be used when necessary, not routinely as a preventive measure. Horticultural oil, insecticidal soaps, neem oil, bifenthrin, carbaryl, malathion, permethrin, cyfluthrin, imidacloprid, and acephate can all be used to control sawflies. Apply pesticides only when larvae are actually present, before infestations reach critical levels. Always be careful to read the label directions fully before applying any pesticide, and follow directions completely. Not effective: Bacillus thuringiensis(Bt), a commonly used biological insecticide that offers control of many caterpillars, is NOT effective against sawfly larvae.
Copied from missouribotanicalgarden.org
Ps rose slug=sawfly
Horticulture oil, Neem oil, Safer soap are easy to use. Oil bases spray only can be used under 80 degrees(cooler weather). Safer soap you can use anytime. I'd go with Safer soap first. You can get them from Lowe's/ HD. :-)


Dr Huey is a rather gangly climber. It only blooms once and then the rest of the season it just black spots. It's not worth good real estate in my opinion. Maybe if you have a spot that's iffy for a rose and you want to see how one would do you could put there just as a test rose.

Kaymarie - to answer your zone question, Belinda's Dream is robustly hardy for me, even on the cool side of my house that is effectively zone 4. I heartily recommend it another time. The Perfume Delight does indeed smell gorgeous, but it's not hardy for me in zone 5. Hopefully it'll do better for you in zone 6. Just remember that if it's a grafted plant, you'll need to bury the graft in the soil (about 2 inches deep). The graft is the knobby bit at the base of the plant where all the canes grow, btw. That way if all the canes die to the ground, the rose you want still has a chance of growing back in the spring.
Have fun
Cynthia

Thank you. I think I have decided on a place for Cornelia based on its size and that is really needs a trellis. So I'll take that out of the running for the pots.
There is a miniature called "Cupcake" that I have seen that looks like it might be good in 2 of my pots but I would really like something bigger for the other 2.

Hi Jenny
I have two Cupcakes, and yes, they'd be good in pots. I am obviously in a cooler zone but virtually all of the ones you list get pretty big even for me. The smallest would be Thomas Affleck (maybe 3-4'), Xiang Fen Lian (new for me, but supposed to be 3.5'), and Paul Neyron (3-4'). La Reine is supposed to be one of the shorter Hybrid Perpetuals, maybe 4', but it may be bigger in your zone. I wouldn't try Cornelia or any of the teas, and Heritage is definitely 5-6' even for me.
Cynthia

Take a look at this YouTube video & see if this helps her out....TRAINING A CLIMBER

It's been several years, probably the second year she had it. she is going to remove the jasmine, but it is planted on the other side of the arbor. Yes, Paul's way is the way she did it the first year, but she didn't when she moved it.

Looks like a balcony or roof garden to me. It is beautiful! Well my garden is a bit different than yours but I usually use peony rings and recently started bamboo canes for staking. If this was my garden, I would let it spill over the railings as it would look heavenly cascading down. Then again I don't know how windy your garden is so that may not be an option.


I have very few roses in pots. I only put a few small growing roses in pots so that I can raise the flowers to nose level, such as Marie Pavie and Ebb Tide. I just use a normal potting mix, nothing special.
I picked another few blooms yesterday afternoon and turned the triple decker to a quadruple decker arrangement:


I did a talk yesterday in Asheville and Thrips came up. The consensus was that they are worse this year in our part of the world.
Lots of us live near hay fields and untended lots.
What may be a hint is that the first cutting of hay was especially productive this year because of the heavy rain we (almost) all had in April followed by a dry May that really got the grass growing and that's where most of the Thrips originate.
The predaceous thrips are coming, they are just having problems keeping up.
The dates that thrips first appear need to go on your rose calender along with first Japanese Beetle date.

I did see a JB the other day. Just the one. They usually coincide with my Magnolias blooming. And they love to hang out in the magnolia flowers, but don't eat them.
It does seem that the thrips get worse each year. As I said, we were fine this year and roses that usually get their first flush ruined by thrips were ok, but they arrived in the 2nd week of May, so the first blooms were ok. I'm hoping by getting rid of most of my blooms/buds that were damaged that I can get rid of some of the thrips.
The timing of the April rains and dry May make sense.

Wow! So many good ideas. I was thinking about posts or some way to get climbers going, but I definitely like the wire idea best. Thanks toolbelt. I'm having a hard time planning this and I've decided that's ok I have my HT right now and I've got 11 plants (including a climber) coming from Brecks (thanks to the deal hunters here). I'm just going to start with those around the fence on the right of the house by the trees. It gets afternoon and evening sun, though, so now I'm questioning my choice. Ugh! I don't have the perfect spot for them. The front of the house gets morning sun, but not enough. The HT has looked sad today. I'm hoping it's just because I moved it. I move it Friday night. Saturday it had two of the most impressive blooms I have seen. Today all the blooms are droopy. Aren't they supposed to last more than a day?

This year, my only losses were among the HTs I kept in pots, unprotected outside all year. I don't think it was the cold so much as it was all the snow that piled on them. I left it, thinking it would provide some protection, but I didn't think about the melting. We had a couple of warm days right after the last snow, and that was enough to melt all the snow -- except what was at the base. This meant that most of the pots were flooded for a few days before I realized what was going on, and managed to shift them enough for the water to drain. Three came back to life -- 'Velvet Fragrance', 'Mirandy', and 'Big Ben'. The rest -- 'Chateau de Clos Vougeot', 'Chrysler Imperial', 'Crimson Glory', 'Heart's Desire', 'Mister Lincoln', 'Night', 'Nigrette', 'Nocturne', 'Oklahoma', 'Red Masterpiece', and 'Rose of Freedom' -- have yet to show any growth. I have other roses coming which I'll keep in their potting-up pots and tuck them in the garage or my enclosed back porch for Winter, and will pop them in the bigger pots and barrels whose roses don't wake up.
Well, I definitely learned a lesson about what I do with my pots from now on. But at the same time, I also learned last year that the roses I picked can't handle full-sun -- or, at least, their blooms can't. And I really didn't have enough places to put them that would offer midday shade, so I have other things to try this year. I already have replacements for 'Chateau de Clos Vougeot' and 'Nigrette' coming, and will likely re-order 'Crimson Glory' 'Heart's Desire' and 'Night' again, but as I refine the "look" of this garden, I think the others were just a bit too modern to blend in well.
Last year, I had only two losses -- 'Jaune Desprez' and "Secret Garden Musk Climber". The former was replaced with 'Baltimore Belle' as I was leery of trying another Tea-Noisette in such an exposed position. The latter was replaced with a more mature specimen of the same, which seemed to whine and complain about this Winter, but made it through and is pumping out new growth.
:-)
~Christopher


Thanks everyone. Diane, love your picture of Love Song, it's gorgeous! Love Song is a remarkable rose, IMHO. When I look at Melpdee Parfumme, it seems to look more purple as it ages, but then when I photograph it, it still looks magenta! I still think it is a lovely rose and has a nice fragrance, just want the purple to be more prominent.







Hi Diane,
Thank you for saying this so eloquently and so much better than I could say this.
Hello Chris and Diane,
Thank you both for this information.