<p>What does it take to start a rose garden? I have a free space, facing east, about 5’ by 30’. A rose garden would look good. I am afraid it may require too much attention. Any thoughts?</p>
<p>They need full sun for most of the day. I have a bed of roses (and peonies) and after having trouble with regular roses I put in only Knock Outs. Nothing except being fed every once in awhile is needed.</p>
<p>Lots of sun, lots of air circulation, deeply dug/amended beds that then are left alone. And easy to access so you can pick the Japanese beetles off in July!</p>
<p>Luck. You need luck. Sometimes roses die. Sometimes you can’t kill them. I have an old fashioned rose bush that climbs the side of my house in direct sun. I think I could hit it with an atom bomb and it would survive. But lots of others have died. Try to pick hardy varieties and be prepared to replace until you get a bunch that cling to life.</p>
<p>Is there an arboretum or horticultural club nearby? Roses are fickle and its best to get growing information and advice on varieties that thrive locally from local experts. What thrives in my foothill community is different than what thrives thirty miles away near the ocean. We have a neighbor who has 400 different rose bushes in his vast garden. He is my go-to rose guy.</p>
<p>It’s been a decade since I planted roses. Ever since I got poison ivy I just start itching whenever I’m digging and planting something. Our gardeners do the pruning for the roses to prepare them for winter. I feed them though with Bayer All-in-One Rose & Flower Care every 6 weeks during the growing season. </p>
<p>The suggestions so far are great. At least 6 hours of sun, amended soil such as adding peat moss and bone meal and going to a local grower. I bought all my roses though, groundcovers, hybrid teas, floribundas via Jackson & Perkins. You can specify your growing zone and also pick disease-resistant roses. I never had a problem with their roses. I like the Rose Tropicana Hybrid Tea for the color and 6” blooms.</p>
<p>It depends on your climate too. Here where there is humidity, your best bet is to seek out varieties that are resistant to leaf spot. It’s a fungus that is nearly impossible to combat. Most Rosa Rugosa species are at least a bit resistant - that’s all the shrub roses including the Knockout brand. </p>
<p>On the plus side, roses can be completely defoliated by leaf spot or Japanese beetles or whatever, and they will still leaf out again. </p>
<p>Contact your local cooperative extension to see which varieties are easiest for your area. I would stay away from Bayer and other chemicals which include imidicloprid. It’s effective (but not perfect) but it’s very toxic and gets into groundwater. Some places have outlawed it.</p>
<p>Greenwitch, I didn’t know about imidicloprid. Thanks for the heads up. Now, I have to look for something that is good for both insect control (Jap beetles, aphids, etc.) and disease control (black spot, powder mildew). :(</p>
<p>Wow, it really depends on where you are. In the Boston suburbs, my roses were time sucks and pesticide hogs. I mulched them and burlapped them and still they never really looked that good. In the Seattle eastside suburbs, my roses looked pretty good with way less care, but still nothing like the pictures.</p>
<p>Here in Portland (OR), the Rose City, roses grow like weeds. We plant them in highway median strips and sidewalk areas. My neighbor has 75 feet of Knockout roses in red as a hedge. I have about twenty roses in my garden and all I do is whack them back in the spring. And sometimes in the summer. </p>
<p>So don’t ask us how to grow roses. Find someone in your neighborhood, the closer the better, and ask that person. They’ll know how to grow them in YOUR AREA.</p>
<p>Sounds tough. They do get leaf spots around here. The soil is hard clay type. The best ones they recommend here too pretty.</p>
<p>Krlilies - Espoma Rose tone is a good fertilizer, or any compost. You can spray (and spray, and spray) with sulphur and copper and they are considered organic fungicides. I don’t know about insect control, but I’ve heard people recommend hand picking - eww.</p>
<p>I’ve used the “messenger” brand of harpin protein and sprayed it on plants. It somehow mobilizes the plant’s immune system to fight things off. Roses, tomatoes and other plants that seem to always be under attack can benefit especially when it seems like there’s nothing else you can do.</p>
<p>If all else fails, roses are great at regenerating!</p>
<p>I love roses and have about 30 bushes around my yard–mostly hybrid teas. It really depends where you live. (Where I live the climate and soil aren’t that good for roses. A lot of clay, so I used peat moss when I planted some of them.) My motto is “Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.” (G.K.Chesterton) Just try and see what happens.
I really don’t spend a lot of time on them. Most survive, and whatever dies gets replaced. I buy plants from local stores–I figure they sell what will grow here. Sometimes I fertilize and spray for pests, but I’m inconsistent. Last summer the drought was so bad I thought everything was just about dead. But they came back nicely in the fall. When I saw some beautiful rose gardens in CA, I went home and cried because my plants looked so sickly. . .but I always have plenty of roses to cut and put around the house–especially in the spring and fall, and that’s what matters to me.
BTW, a lot of the Knock Out roses in our area got rose-rosette disease–watch out for that.</p>
<p>Oh yay. I was afraid I was too late.
[time to cut back /those roses, that is | Living | The Seattle Times](<a href=“http://seattletimes.com/html/living/2020500474_ciscoe07xml.html”>http://seattletimes.com/html/living/2020500474_ciscoe07xml.html</a>)</p>
<p>Roses are actually fairly easy to grow. The most important thing is to select cultivars that are suitable for your climate - that’s where most people fail. Try to get roses grown on their own roots rather than grafted to root stock (although I have a lot of these too.) After that they need lots of sun, water, and air circulation.</p>
<p>Where are you? I had roses in my nice sunny (not too much fog) part of the Bay Area in California, and really did not have to maintain them at all except for cutting them back. Several varieties, all did well there. </p>
<p>I want a rose bush here in Minnesota, but I have my doubts . . .</p>
<p>I understand that many true rose aficionados look down on Knock-out roses, but I’ve found them very easy to grow, and I’m not a greenthumb. They like sun and well-drained soil, but with one annual pruning (early spring) and some fertilizer, they’ve grown like crazy for me. I bought bargain bin cut-price specimens from Lowe’s two years ago. I cut them down to 12-15 in. in very early spring and they tripled in size from spring through fall.</p>
<p>Sun. I was fine in our old house, though I got some black spot. I never used anything stronger than organic insecticidal soap. In the end I decided I didn’t love them or their thorns. If it were me, I’d have look for ones that smell good and not just hybrid tea roses. There’s someone in my old neighborhood who has gorgeous climbing roses on his fence that seem to stay in bloom forever. I’d grow those!</p>
<p>After reading comments here, I gave up on the idea. I am in mid-atlantic. We can’t get away from black-spots.</p>
<p>“Oh yay. I was afraid I was too late.”</p>
<p>When I saw this earlier decided this afternoon was as good a time as any. Then I got carried away and went after the dead branches on some of my rhodies and as I was turning away poked my eye on a dogwood bush branch. Did the exact same thing a few years ago and scratched the heck out of my cornea. So I called my optho and now he wants to see me at 7am tomorrow before he goes into surgery. Couldn’t quit while I was ahead. <em>sigh</em></p>
<p>There are some varieties with little or no thorns. And I went for the smelly ones. Also, mine got pruned whenever. They didn’t seem to mind.</p>