22,152 Garden Web Discussions | Roses

Well, it's done. It was too late to hold the order and they arrived on Friday. On the bright side, Hortico is quite close by me, so the plants hadn't dried out at all.

There were two About Face plants and one Hot Cocoa. I've changed around my bed design plan since placing this order, and since I have other roses coming in the spring, I only had designated ground space for one of the AFs - so, an experiment:

The Hot Cocoa and one About Face, I put in the ground - buried deep and mounded high - then mulched and burlapped. The other About Face went into a large pot in the unheated (but large) shed for the winter. I'll remember to water it once a month or so.

Now I just have to wait and see if the ground or the shed works better. I'm hoping they all make it! :)

Well, it's done. It was too late to hold the order and they arrived on Friday. On the bright side, Hortico is quite close by me, so the plants hadn't dried out at all.

There were two About Face plants and one Hot Cocoa. I've changed around my bed design plan since placing this order, and since I have other roses coming in the spring, I only had designated ground space for one of the AFs - so, an experiment:

The Hot Cocoa and one About Face, I put in the ground - buried deep and mounded high - then mulched and burlapped. The other About Face went into a large pot in the unheated (but large) shed for the winter. I'll remember to water it once a month or so.

Now I just have to wait and see if the ground or the shed works better. I'm hoping they all make it! :)

I would think that coffee grounds would be considered compost not fertilizer. Most everything I've read has said that using compost is something you can do all year long.

In a colder climate than you, I put a couple inches and compost topped by a couple inches of mulch in late fall after several hard freezes to put my gardens to bed for the winter.

For some reason, this idea appeals to me. I have used coffee grounds all spring and summer but stopped due to the earthworms attracting moles that destroyed my lawn. Maybe a winter application would be better. I think coffee grounds are an excellent soil amendment ..if you can tolerate the side effect of mole tunnels. That probably would not be the case in winter.

Lovely! Always good to add one to the "when I buy 10 acres" list! And always good to know your thoughts Pat, since we're "neighbors".
Susan

Hi Michaela,

We planted CS in our present home around 3 years ago. This is a spectacular rose in our garden and it produces enormous flowers in the fall,at least 6 inches across. I grew it when it first came out around 15 years ago in a different location. I know some criticized the fragrance of this rose, calling it "phenolic". The leaves are dark green and waxy and does not suffer from any foliar diseases that I can remember. The plant itself is vigorous and grows around 5 feet high and across. When I bring flowers in to the lab at work, most of the lab technicians think the blossoms are wonderful.

I agree about putting them into the garage. Those green leaves are not working to produce food for the plants. Photosynthesis slows down in roses at about 70F.

Smiles,
Lyn

I have to leave my bands outside - my greenhouse wont hold them all [however, I have several really special ones from Vintage that I do take inside]. Our temps can fluctuate here in east Texas - earlier in the week it was nearly 80 - now its in the mid 30's. Our winters usually can go down to 25 for a few hours occasionally. Mine have wintered fine - although I worry. In spring, they revive and leaf out beautifully. Since you only have a few, what can it hurt to bring them in the garage? Some of my smaller bands that cannot be replaced are going inside - then out again when its warmer. Really wish I had a huge greenhouse where I could house them......I always worry when they look like sticks - I do top the gallon pots with mulch, don't know if this helps. Would like to hear how others overwinter their bands.......
Judith

You're welcome, Jasminerose. Of course you can have "just one". You can have all you want. It's simply the more you let her expend that energy flowering, the longer you WILL wait for the climbing growth. She's like any other climber...she's going to follow that three year cycle of "sleeping" the first year; creeping the second then beginning to leap the third. Own root, she'll take longer and the more you let her flower, the longer she WILL demand before she begins climbing. So, let her flower all you want and enjoy the dwarf plant. Eventually, she will develop all the roots needed and she'll start to climb. Preventing flowring simply gets her up on the wall or fence sooner. Kim

Sounds like a good plan, Kim. Three years sounded like such a long time when I was a child, but really goes by so quickly.now. I'm looking forward to the beautiful investment in my garden.

Might be cheaper to drive to Tyler - Chamblees charges $9-12 for their roses. I used to live in Dallas and frequented North Haven Gardens - always a class act. When I was going through my begonia stage, I loved going there as they had so many unusual varieties. If you want roses early, ordering is fun. I am looking at the new David Austin catalog and see a few I want. Have fun!
Judith

Judith, thanks for the idea. What I was thinking of is slightly nuts: I'm planning on being in Dallas in April, when bareroots are just hitting the nurseries here in NY & the selection is very limited. I don't want to order in advance as I've been disappointed in the past when I got puny plants in the mail; I want to see the plant in person to check out the canes & blooms. It's also much more fun to make a selection that way.

SO I got this idea of shopping in Texas & either shipping them back home to NY or somehow pack them up for travel & sneaking them into my suitcase. DH thinks I'm certifiable. It might work. or not.

My vole, mole, etc., damage has been more of a one day just found them dead lying on ground. Agree with hoovb..as usual.

Thanks, this is very helpful. I'll pass it along!

Thanks to all for your really helpful suggestions - it looks like it's either a Crimson Glory or a Chrysler Imperial, I'd like to take a cutting to a rose garden as obviously photos aren't colour perfect and Luxrosa made the point that the colour etc is only part of the ID but unfortunately our Rose Garden has only been going since the 1970s so may not be the ultimate source.
At least I've now got it narrowed down (and yes, Tasmania does tend to have wonderful roses)
Thanks again :.

That form is not Chrysler but it could be Oklahoma. Also Tasmania has to be a cold zone and Chrysler is weak and probably wouldn't be doing that well.

I also think fall/winter is the best time to transplant. Dormant means the plant is not putting energy into new growth. But plants do grow their roots during the winter, so getting them established during that time is much more efficient. When spring comes, they can put their energy into new top growth, including flowers.

I think it would be challenging to transplant an established rose without cutting it back. That heavy pruning may result in new top growth and canker. I wait until February or March.

One more question & comment:

Question - who? What rose is it?

Comment - like others here, I have many many times replanted roses in my garden in the same place as others, and no problems. For some reason I do not understand, this is apparently a problem in the UK, but not elsewhere, absent obvious diseases.

Jackie

If the other two roses are different varieties you can't compare them. Each variety of rose grows at it's own pace. That one Austin may just be one that is a slower grower and will take longer to develop. If the canes are plump and green and the leaves are not wilting the rose is fine. Just be patient with it.

Lyn,

This is how I interpreted my bad experience with early-winter topping: the plants were semi-dormant and so didn't have their immune systems active, but it was just warm enough that botrytis fungus (my guess as to what it was) could germinate and spread. It started in the cut cane ends and ran a foot or so down the canes, blackening the bark. It wasn't a big deal because I would have pruned that much off in spring anyway, but it scared me away from the practice. (I might do it again only if a heavy ice storm impends.) If I had pruned severely instead of topping, I might have lost some plants in this episode.

As you say, the conditions that led to the problem are not going to occur everywhere and often.

Personally I don't plant or move anything in the fall or winter. I wait for early spring. I've had very bad luck with them dieing over winter when I did try it. For some reason they don't seem to settle in very well and never come back in the spring. Don't ask me to give you a scientific explanation because I can't. I just know from my own experience that it has never worked for me. Fall planting is money wasted for me.

I don't prune anything in the fall either. We bounce back and forth from warm to cold for a long period of time. For example, today the high is 55, veritably balmy, Saturday our high will be 26. It's been back and forth like this for weeks now. Every time it gets too warm for a few days they try to grow which isn't a good idea because then the temps drop again suddenly and that new growth is toast. I want them to store energy not use it on useless growth the will surely die off. Pruning them makes them want to grow even more so I just don't do it.

I think some of you are HT-aphobic, lol. I have dozens of them, both in pots and in the ground, and they winter very well. The pots do get protection but none of the ones in the ground get any protection at all. Many of them are green to the tips come spring. They're like any other class of roses. Some of them are quite hardy and some of them are tender. Not even all OGRs and shurb roses are winter hardy. The trick is to find the ones that are hardy for you and that takes time and trial and error. I could tell you what winters easily for me but it might not in your yard. And what winters blissfully for you may croak it's first winter in mine.

Michael is correct, of course. Less water evaporates, so the roses need less watering to get the same amount.

It is, also of course, important for roses and other garden plants to be well hydrated to survive sudden freezes, at least in warm climates where they are not dormant.

In my warm climate, we just got a warning that our nighttime temps are going to plunge from the low 50s/high 40s to the high 20s tonight. That is not unheard of, but the last time it happened was years ago. It kills citrus, and melts many tender perennials we are accustomed to overwinter in our gardens. 25 years ago we had nighttime temps in the 20s for two weeks without stopping, and it killed whole hillsides of eucalyptus trees and ice plant growing along the freeway all over the county - we are just not set up for that cold of temps.

So, last evening there I was in the dark, frantically watering pots and bringing a couple of beloved succulents (like the Christmas cactus which is in full bloom right now) into the glassed in back porch.

Those of you who live in colder climates will laugh, I know, but people here are not accustomed to the cold either - my DH and I are going on our normal three times a week bike ride today, and I plan to wear my one and only snow parka!

Jackie

Michael,

Thanks. I didn't realize that the difference could be so great.

Jackie,

We got down to mid 30's last night. Suppose to be colder tonight....So, I have already planned to go home this afternoon and water. I only have 30 bushes, so it probably won't take as much time as yours take to water.
Thanks a bunch,

andrea

Our winters are rather wet--I've had the best results just wrapping our roses with burlap in late November or December. I no longer have to worry about the filling material freezing into a solid block of unusable material since I no longer fill the burlap with anything. With more than 200 roses that survive every year, I've been paring down my winter tasks so I can grow more roses.

Yep, I definitely agree with Zac - I have protected tender palms and have simply used hessian or fleece on its own without any organic filling. Horticultural fleece alone raised the temperature by 3 degrees.

Great job Seil!

Thanks, redwolf!

Your roses should be fine at 36 degrees, Ingrid. That will hardly slow them down. You really don't get much damage until the temps get down around 25 degrees.

Diane, the teens will do some damage but if it's not for a prolonged period your roses should survive it. We get weeks of temps in the teens in January and February and that's what can cause a lot of cane die back.

Thanks, Jim!