Rose black spot
kylieprosser
Posts: 4
in Plants
Good evening all,
I'm hoping you can help!
my rose bush that has always done really well year after year but this year it has serious black spot - everywhere!!! It's had a serious infestation of aphids this year too - is this what caused it? By weakening it and allowing fungal attack?
is there any hope of saving it or is it a goner?
0
Posts
The Black spot shouldn't kill it but it does have a weakening effect.
The Aphids are responsible, it's the Honeydew that gets splashed on to the leaves thats the cause of Black spot.
just spray the Aphids off with water.
Hi Musher,
thanks so so much for your response. I've been blasting them every day but within 30 minutes of doing it they are back with a vengeance! i don't use chemicals, is there any hope?
I should imagine so, just do what your doing. Next year it will come back. Perhaps put some Rose feed down to give it a perk now.
The blackspot spores remain in the leaves after they're fallen to the ground at the end of the season. If you don't remove the leaves (burn them or put in the rubbish, don't compost them), then the spores are ready and waiting for the new leaves to appear next year.
If you can get rid of all the infected leaves at the end of the season and dispose of them then you may have better luck. But it is still likely you'll get some BS, it's a case of damage limitation. The spores are in the air and just take advantage of any weakness on your plants, e.g damage caused by aphids.
Give the bushes a good mulch with rotted compost in autumn or spring (or both). Keep the plants strong and healthy and they can resist the disease much better.
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
Thank you all, I'll take off the damaged material (which will basically be a full prune it's that bad), dispose of it, and mulch mulch mulch and hope for the best!
If you prune now, chances are you'll get a lot of new growth that'll be damaged by winter frosts.
I also get BS on my roses. During a dry spell usually around November I clear the infected leaves and prune back some stems to prevent wind rock, give them a mulch, then prune 'properly' in early spring, give them a handful of BFB each and another mulch.
I've got bad BS on a climbing New Dawn but about 15 other roses are still BS free at the mo.
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
hi Pete8 - no I definitely won't be pruning yet, I still have some flowers on it (but goes to show how weak it is - I had flowers into November last year).