Caring for Your Roses

Proper planting, care and protection are all that is required for beautiful, healthy roses.

Taking Your Rose Home:

1. Select a sunny location for your rose. Roses require at least 6 hours of sunlight.
2. Dig a hole twice the size of the rose pot in well drained soil. Carefully remove the rose from the pot. If the container is decomposable, cut ½ moon slits in the side and remove the bottom.
3. Put the rose in the hole and fill in with a soil mixture of ½ topsoil and ½ existing soil.
4. Gently tap down the soil to remove any air pockets.
5. Water your rose thoroughly after planting. Unless it has been raining heavily, water once a week, deeply at the base of the rose.

Care of Hybrid Teas, Grandiflora & Floribunda Roses

Winter Protection

1. Wait until there is 1” of frost in ground before hilling up. Clean up any rose leaves on the ground to prevent a wintering site for rodents and diseases.
2. Cover with a mound of peat moss to a minimum depth of 10 inches(25cm). To prevent peat moss from being blown away, sprinkle a bit of soil overtop. Spray the surface of the mound with water, which will eventually freeze to form a crust. Keep the underlying peat moss and soil dry to prevent the build-up of ice around the graft. Do not use leaves which encourage rot.
3. Climbing roses need to be hilled to 2 feet. Do not prune until the spring.
4. Hardy Shrub, Old English and Wild roses do not need any winter protection.
5. Do not use a rose collar. This may create a hot environment too early in the spring, which can kill your plant.

Spring Care

1. A warm April day is the prefect time to prepare roses for the summer season. Using your hands, (gloves are great!) carefully remove the peat moss from the base of the rose.
2. Use a fine mist on your garden hose to spray away the last of the soil.
3. Prune away any dead wood, broken or damaged canes, weak or crisscrossing canes. All season remove any suckers which have 7 leaves as they will take over the plant.
4. Roses need air circulation so prune them back to 3 to 5 canes that are all facing outward. Prune unwanted branches at the base of the rose.
5. Your cuts should be made on a 45-degree angle to the bud. The bud should also be facing away from the center of the plant.
6. The final product should look like an outspread hand.
7. Water and fertilize your rose. Continue to fertilize once every two weeks until the end of July.

Watering Your Rose

1. Do not over water! Many a rose has been killed by too much love!
2. Water at the base of the rose, not over the leaves, to discourage diseases.
3. Water deeply as required.