Roses are a quintessentially English thing. Although introduced from distant shores hundreds of years ago, the Brits embrace roses like few other countries.
No wonder they are often voted the UK’s favourite flower.
Strange, then, that they are also often voted the UK’s least favourite flower.
‘I don’t like roses, they’re too difficult’. Really? Please read on…..
Time to dispel some myths…
Let’s hear it for the rose!
Pests on roses
Is it a big deal?
So, let’s be honest, we’ve got millions of pests in this country. Whether or not you choose to grow roses or not, you’ll be faced with pests of some sort on each and every plant you choose to grow, at some point.
In their favour, they rarely attract Vine Weevil, the bane of all gardeners lives these days….tick!
They’re rarely attacked by scale insect, causing horrible black sooty mould which is a pain to control…..tick!
Slugs and snails generally leave them well alone…..tick!
They do attract the stunning Leaf Cutter Bee without causing any significant damage….tick!
Seriously, they do attract greenfly and blackfly, but are they really reason not to grow them? Nah of course not, they’re a doddle to control.
They don’t like my soil
Really?
We’re often asked by our customers which plants are best for the soil which surrounds us in the Leicestershire & Northamptonshire areas. Particularly around us, is predominantly clay soil.
Guess what? Roses LOVE clay soil, and they’re in our Top3 of plants to grow in clay. So if you live round here, in our opinion you should be giving them a go as you are only playing to their strengths!
Given a sandy soil, you’d need to bulk out the soil with lots of organic material, compost, manure, etc. That way they’ll stay nice and moist and not dry out, which causes perhaps the biggest reason people don’t like roses…..
They get diseased!
which spreads to other plants…
OK, so do they? Yes they do. They can get Mildew. Black Spot. Rust. There’s no refuting that.
Is it enough of a reason to not grow them? Well, not in my book.
Roses aren’t the only plant in this country to get disease, not by a long chalk. Most plants will suffer from time to time, but it helps to know that a little like us, diseases will take a hold when we’re not at our best. We’re far more likely to come down with something when we’re a bit run down, and roses….in fact, all plants…..are much the same.
So, how to avoid diesases? Well that’s actually quite easy. Firstly, position roses where they want to be….
We love the sun!
We hate the shade.
If you plant them in the shade, they’re going to get disease. Plain and simple. If you have a shady wall, and you plant a ‘shade tolerant’ rose, chances are you’ll get disease. When we ‘tolerate’ something, we’re not loving it, are we?
So if you take my advice, ignore what the books tell you. If you want a problem free rose, put it in the sun. If you only have sun for part of the day, put it where it gets sun in the afternoon. Agreed?
Keep me happy!
And I’ll put a smile on your face
If you’re planting your rose in a heavyish soil (with a bit of compost please!), and you’re putting it in a sunny spot, you’re more than halfway there to a very happy rose. A happy rose is a healthy rose and that means it’s less susceptible to disease. So the only other things you need to do really are….
Don’t overcrowd with loads of other plants and roses around it. Give each plant a chance to grow, unhindered.
Keep them well watered. The second a rose dries out too much, it’ll succumb to disease much quicker.
Pruning helps!
We'll show you how; just ask!
So once you’ve got your position right, your soil right, and you’re keeping your rose well watered, there’s still a couple of tricks to keep disease to an absolute minimum. Pruning has to be right up there.
The days of hard pruning roses down to ground level every year, should be long gone by now. And like it or not, I’ll tell you why….
Pruning, amongst other things, encourages growth. You prune it down…it grows back stronger.
So the harder you prune something back, the more growth it will try and recover.
Roses will grow back quickly once pruned, and the harder you prune them, the faster they’ll want to grow back. Quick isn’t great though, it means the growth will be soft and susceptible….that means it’s more likely to get disease.
So the advice of the 60’s and 70’s isn’t great any more. Back then, when the pollution in the air was greater, things like sulphur in the air meant that diseases didn’t cause much of a problem, no matter how hard you pruned your roses.
Now, of course, with the clean air act, the contaminants that kept diseases at bay have all but gone. So hard pruning is bad.
Instead, prune your roses lightly, taking off no more than a third of the growth each Spring, and taking out central growth so you’re left with a nice open shape where disease won’t get a hold. We like to call it ‘goblet’ pruning, so your shoots are on the outside, and there’s nothing on the inside….
Pruning a rose
to keep it open and disease free
So when it gets a little congested, you help keep the air flow through the plant by taking out the central stems. The more air moves through the plant, the less problems you’ll have….
Perhaps the final thing in your armoury as a gardener, is the use of sprays and chemicals. Now we stopped using lots of these a long time ago, but in the world of disease, prevention is better than cure.
Why? Easy. Chemicals can no longer cure diseases. If you buy a bottle of fungicide now, I PROMISE you it won’t cure a disease. They are a little misleading because you’d expect them to, right? Wrong. They are designed for you to spray regularly as a barrier, to stop them getting disease in the first place. That’s why we don’t use them, it seems like an unnecessary use of chemcials.
Instead, we use a fertiliser to combat disease called Uncle Tom…..
A Miracle Cure
Recommended by British Rose Growers Association
So instead of a chemical, what this actually does is to create disease resistance by making the plant healthier. It slows the growth rate down, so the plant produces stronger, healthier leaves and shoots which creates a barrier against fungal infection.
We use it here on all of our roses. It’s wonderful stuff and lasts for years in the bottle. One bottle would last a couple of seasons at least!
A disease free rose?
They do exist….
I’ll leave with one last thought. Much as there ARE disease free roses like R. rugosa, a pretty hedging rose, most roses we all know and love will, at some point, get a disease of some sort at some point in their lives. It’s important to understand that at the end of the season, as the plants get ready to drop their leaves, disease will become more noticeable, and really does no damage at all. Once the leaves drop, sweep them up, and the rose will be clean from anything as it re-grows the following Spring. Easy!
As always, the team is on hand to answer anything you’re not sure about. You only need to ask….