Roses
I inherited 26 unkempt roses (mostly unlabelled) from the previous owners when I moved here. I dug 2 up because they were nothing special and in completely the wrong place but the remaining 24 are looking better this summer.
I have to say though, they are very hard work and I feel that only the ramblers climbing over archways plus 2 others - a pillar box red floribunda and a red and white stripey climber really repay all the effort. A lot of them come out for a day and then die, they are constantly under attack from every sort of bug and beetle and I'm fed up with dead heading
Sorry for the moan, I'll shut up now.
Teresa
0
Posts
You're not a rose grower. That's OK.
If you live in Derbyshire, as I do.
I love roses but they have to be the best roses, I go through the David Austin catalogue and choose only the best looking, most heavily scented, best disease resistant ones.
Any that haven't performed in the past get dug up and put on the compost.
Dig 'em up and put them on the compost. Too many roses don't look good anyway I don't think, a really great rose here and there is a joy.
I agree with Lou 12, I inherited a rose bed at the front of the house I kept it going for about 6 years and then decided it just wasn't worth all the hard work, I now have a few special roses doted here and there, much better. I love roses ,now I have the time to enjoy them.
I visited a garden recently that was packed with roses of every kind and they were covered with flowers. It looked wonderful and the scent was gorgeous. The soil was loamy, well drained and slightly acid and there was good shelter from the wind. I think that if you have the right conditions, there is nothing more lovely but if, like me, you don't, no amount of work will make them look really good. If they give you more grief than pleasure, dig them up and replace them with something more obliging!
I adore roses but I do see their downsides. When visiting Helmingham Hall gardens the other days I found myself wishing I had my secateurs in my pocket as they were a bit behind with the dead heading! I don't let it happen in my garden and that's without a team of gardeners!
It is always worse when many roses are packed together, passing pests and disease to each other all the time. Pull out any rose that is less than lovely, don't manure the plants to much, but molch them diligently, and fill up the spaces around them with DIFFERENT plants; when they are part of a diverse mixed planting roses are far more pest resistant, and theyr "down" periods are less noticeable.
In my rose-packed garden in Italy I had to spray all kinds of horrors to keep pests down, but here, where there are just some roses here and there in very mixed borders they never catch anything.
I don't have a rosebed as such - just loads of them dotted around. Okay they bite the hand that feeds them but if you rub off the odd aphid and feed them now and again. They're not that much work. I suppose disease etc is more noticeable in a mass bed. But the odd bit of black spot etc isn't a problem when there is other foliage etc to distract the dye.
However I would never bother with a scentless rose.
I too don't see the point of scentless roses with the possible exception of Hot Chocolate which is a glorious colour.
Roses are like any other plant we use - grow them in the right conditions and they will grow strong and healthy and perform well and be a delight. Grow them in poor soils or too hot or too cold or too wet or too dry and they will suffer and need constant attention or just look awful. Cram them in packed beds of roses and they will attract all sorts of pests and diseases.
I have mine grown in mixed borders with other perennials including lavenders and alliums which help deter pests. I give them a generous feed of pelleted chicken manure every spring and potash too when I find it and I prune them according to type. They get a mulch of garden compost in autumn if I have some to spare from the veggie beds. This year they've been glorious and I don't mind the dead heading as it encourages new flowers to form and gives you the chance to check they'e doing OK. I never spray them.
"We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing." - George Bernard Shaw
please dont rip them out,verdun how could you say such a thing.lol roses are our national flower after all,they are gorgeous keep some you like ,but dont kill them,lol give them to others who will look after them.