Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Gave my roses a haircut...

Last chance to prune your roses!  At least for those of us who live in more temperate climates.  For those in even warmer areas then mine, your roses might actually still look pretty good.  However, your roses will benefit from a good haircut as we approach the end of Winter.  You might have heard you should cut the roses back by Valentine's Day.  It's good advise -- and easy to remember.  If it takes you until later in the month -- that's OK too.

I like to really cut back my roses -- from 1/3 to 1/2 of their height.  And, I strip every single remaining leaf off the shrub.  Why do I do this?  Not because I enjoy getting stuck by thorns, which, by-the-way is awful.  But... because it's the best way to get a head start on organic disease prevention.   The leaves harbor black spot and rust -- two diseases that don't really kill the rose bush, but make it look horrible.  The winter rains will spread the disease from the old leaves to the newly emerging buds.  Why start Spring with a problem?

This is how my white Iceberg rose looked pre-pruning.  It was 6 feet tall.


This is how it looks now - 2 feet shorter:

Pruning roses isn't too difficult.  You need a sharp pair of by-pass pruners, some gloves (unless you are a glutton for punishment like me) and a few tips.  There are tons of "how-to-prune" rose websites.  Just Google away.  But here are the nuggets you should know.

By now, the leaf nodes will be swelling on the plant -- and maybe even budding out a bit.  This is where a new branch will form on the rose bush.  This is where you will be cutting.

Here is an example of a node -- plus a visual of how and where the cut should be.  There are two nodes in this picture.  They are the little pink bumps.


Your goal, should you choose to accept it:

1. Remove any dead or diseased canes (see below for description).
2. Remove any canes that are crossing and/or are in the center of the plant.
3. Remove any canes that are teeny-tiny (smaller than the diameter of a pencil)
4. Remove all the leaves both on the plant and on the ground.
5. Use bypass pruners (not the anvil type).  Cut with the blade on top.
6. Cut using 45 degree angle about 1/4" above the nodes.
7. Cut at the outward facing nodes (When you cut back the rose, you will want to cut just above an "outward" facing node. You want the rose to grow away from the center.)
8. Remove 1/2 to 1/3 of the height of the shrub
9. Aim to have an open form.

Dead/Diseased canes:
The dead canes are brown and dried out.  Simply cut them out as close to the plant as possible.  The diseased canes are dying back from the tip toward the center of the plant.  If you want to keep that cane, then you will need to cut back a few nodes to get ahead of the disease.  You can tell if there is disease because the cane will have a bit of gray coloring inside the stem.

Happy pruning!

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