Rose Cultivation: Summer Care

Once your roses are planted, they will need occasional maintenance. Keeping roses healthy is not as difficult as some people would have you believe if you put them on a regular maintenance schedule, and stick to it. The three main things that have to be done are: feeding, spraying, and pruning of the spent flowers. I have outlined the procedures below:

While there are a lot of fertilizers out there, we always recommend using Miracle-Gro^® rose food, or Peters^® rose food. Both have nearly identical formulations, are water-soluble, and we have used both with great success. Through much experimentation, I have found that one of the best ways to feed roses is to mix up one TABLESPOON of rose food in a gallon of water. Once that is mixed, dump one QUART of that solution around the base of each plant every 10 days. Try to feed the plants when you know that there will be no rain for 24 hours afterward. This will allow the fertilizer to get down to the roots, and will allow the plants time to take up the fertilizer. By putting roses on a schedule like this, it will keep them in tip-top shape, and will enable them to fight against diseases such as Mildew and Blackspot with their own, inherent disease resistance. It will also aid in producing high quality blooms and luxuriant foliage. During periods of extended drought, I would recommend watering the plants mid-way between feedings with approximately a half-gallon of clear water - maybe a little more, if rainfall is in really short supply. Try to keep the foliage as dry as possible when watering - again, this will help guard against fungus diseases. Note: It is advisable to cease feeding roses during the last week of August. This will give any new growth time to harden before the onset of first frost.

The next item on the agenda is spraying. If you keep your plants fed (as outlined above), fungus diseases really shouldn't be too much of a problem, but insects will be. Again, there are a lot of pesticides out there, but the one that we use with great success is Orthene.^® It can be tough to find, but it does a good job. It is a systemic insecticide, meaning, that it is absorbed into the plant's system, and enables the plant to fight-off insects from within. Use it at the maximum recommended dosage, at the recommended spray intervals (per label directions), and spray in the evening, after the sun has gone down. Spraying plants in full sun is a sure-fire way to burn the foliage. I recommend spraying in the evening (as opposed to the morning), because the plants will still be in active photosynthesis, allowing them to absorb the pesticide more readily. As with feeding, try to spray when you know that there will not be any rain for 24 hours afterward, otherwise the pesticide will be washed away. It should be noted that overdosing plants, either by using too high of a dosage or by spraying too frequently, can result in a condition known as phytotoxicity. When this condition occurs, the plants will be defoliated. It is usually not fatal to the plant, but it will definitely set them back, and will make them look hideous!

One insect that can be a real problem in our part of the country is the Japanese beetle. They are especially attracted to the light-colored flowers, and there really isn't any pesticide that I know of that will control them to any great degree. About the best thing that you can do to control beetles is to use Japanese beetle traps, placing them well away from your plants. Placing them too close to the plants, naturally, will just draw the beetles to the roses.

As I mentioned before, if you keep your roses fed, and keep the foliage dry, fungus diseases shouldn't be much of a problem. If your roses do develop Mildew or Blackspot, one of the more commonly recommended fungicides is Funginex.^® Again, follow the label directions, and spray in the evening, after sunset. It may require several applications (following the label's recommended schedule) to eradicate the disease.

If all of this sounds like a lot of work, it really isn't, when put into practice. If you would like to try cutting down on the time involved in caring for your plants, there are combination products on the market. These products consist of a time-release fertilizer combined with a pesticide, and you apply them around the base of the plants every few weeks. Personally, I prefer using separate fertilizer and pesticide because it allows me to fine-tune the growing environment a little better. This is a matter of personal preference, ultimately.

NOTE: ALL PESTICIDES AND FUNGICIDES ARE POISONOUS TO HUMANS AND ANIMALS. HANDLE THEM WITH CARE, AND ALWAYS FOLLOW LABEL DIRECTIONS!

The last part of the summer-care routine is the pruning of the spent flowers. The professional cut-flower growers usually cut the stems back to the second five-leaflet leaf from the bloom. Starting at the bloom itself, follow the stem down until you encounter the first five-leaflet leaf. You would then make your cut below this leaf, about a quarter-inch above the next leaf. This is the point from which the next stem will grow. Another easier-to-remember way is to just cut the stem to half of its length, about a quarter-inch above a strong leaf. Both of these methods will work well. With English and Old Garden roses, you can prune back to the first five-leaflet leaf - they are happy with a little less pruning.

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