Spring Rose Care
Spring rose care will help get your roses off to a more enjoyable blooming season. Many varieties start blooming in mid to late spring, with recurrent bloom cycles through late fall. Unless you are absolutely looking to grow perfect blossoms for competition exhibition, roses actually require much less work than you may think. Carefully chosen varieties of shrub roses will yield a full season’s bounty of blooms!
Timing: Spring rose care should be accomplished after winter kill has become apparent, but before the new leaves unfurl. There are several ways to figure this. I’ve found it is most successful to work on the roses just after or on April 15th - barring no snow or hard frosts are coming. After the winter kill is gone, then remove the broken/damaged branches. Then prune or shape the rose bush to the new growth - where green meets old. Next clean up all branches/twigs from the area and put on the compost pile. A clean bed is a disease free bed!
Feeding: If you hilled-up your roses with mulch last fall, the first thing you need to do is tear down the mulch and spread it around the roses so that is is no more than 1 1/2 inches deep. Then you will want to add a fertilizer (mostly monthly under September). Here are some types:
- Organic: Rose Tone 6-6-4 cover 4lbs per 100 square feet. Scratch into top inch of soil. Feed monthly through middle of September.
- Actagro Humic Fertilizers: These fertilizers have three advantages to them. First, they won’t burn the tender new growth, second - they stimulate rapid new growth, and third - they can protect against salt in the soil.
- Bayer All in One Rose & Flower Care: This is a 3 systemic product all in one! Fertilizer - feeds and renews, insect control and disease control. Protects against insects and diseases for up to 6 weeks. no spraying. Just mix in a watering can and pour at plant base. Kills aphids, black-spot, Japanese beetles, lacebugs, leafhoppers, mealybugs, powdery mildew, rust, southern blight, thrips, whiteflies. Use on roses, flowers, iris, hibiscus azaleas, camellias, rhododendrons and other shrubs. 32 oz. will treat up to 16 roses and other shrubs for about 200 square feet of flower bed.
Bed Preparation: Going off a clean bed is a disease free bed, a great statement! You will want to clean up all the unwanted things in your bed, including, but not limited to: leaves, twigs, branches, trash, debris,dead plant materials and weeds. This will give you a good start to a great seasons of roses and less work for you during the summer. This is recommended to do weekly or when ever you have time. The more you stay on top of this, the happier your roses will be.
Equipment: You will need five good tools: sharp by-pass pruners, by-pass loppers, small pruning saw, elbow length (gauntlet) leather or rubber/plastic gloves, and safety goggles. Don’t forget the long sleeved shirt!
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Over pruning roses in spring tends to weaken the rose. Never prune away more than one-third of the live growth.
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Where possible, cut at a 45 degree angle.
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Once blooming, roses require no further pruning in the spring. Do whatever additional pruning necessary after blooming in early July.
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Reduce Hybrid Tea to 4-5 vigorous canes not shorter than 30 inches. Grandifloras should be reduced to 5-6 canes not shorter than 36 inches. Floribundas to 7-8 canes not shorter than 24 inches. In general, try to achieve a vase-shaped plant to most roses in the categories.
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Especially on hybrid teas and grandifloras, cut 1/2 inch above an outward facing bud. Cut so the 45 degree angles allow water to drain away from, rather than into the bud.
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Mini roses, shrub roses, rugosa roses and repeat blooming antique roses just need a haircut, trimming them to size.
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Treat English roses and romantica roses as grandifloras.
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Trim modern climbing roses and pillar roses to shape. Aged canes should be removed, as should those that grow away from the support to criss-cross awkwardly. Massive rejuvenation pruning is best postponed until early July and done, if at all, every 3 to 5 years.
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To discourage diseases and insects, rake up and discard all pruned material, including leaves, with the trash.
Labels: Rose Care
