A Minimalist Approach to Growing Roses

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Posted by @Porkpal on
I have found that the secret to growing roses, with very little time and effort devoted to the process, is to choose the right roses.

I started growing roses quite by accident: My son was selling his house and the buyer was not interested in the roses, so my son dug them all up and gave them to me. I have a farm and I do not have a lot of time for flower gardening, but I planted the gift roses along the fence lines and took care of them to the extent of watering and mulching as time permitted. The plants did quite well for a couple of years, but they gradually declined or were overtaken by their root stock. These were mostly hybrid tea roses and floribundas. They expected to be fed, pruned, and sprayed for insects and disease. I had done none of that, so the lovely gift roses weakened and died -- or turned into Dr Hueys. Fortunately, I quite like Dr Huey as I have quite a few of them reminding me of my lost hybrid tea friends.

By this time, however, I was very enamored of roses and wanted to continue growing them, so I decided I needed to learn more about them.

I read about the Texas Rose Rustlers. These ambitious rose lovers searched out old, sometimes deserted homesteads and neglected cemeteries that were often almost overrun by ancient rose bushes, which had had no care for decades, or even much longer. The Rose Rustlers took cuttings of these immortal roses, mostly with permission, and they rooted and grew them. Partly due to the efforts of these enthusiastic amateur collectors, many antique rose varieties that had seemed almost forgotten were once again available.

As the people in possession of these roses often did not know the names of their plants, the Rose Rustlers usually named them after their owners or the location in which they were found.

They originally named this rose Caldwell Pink; later it was identified as Pink Pet.

I also heard about a project undertaken by Texas A&M University in 1996 to determine which rose varieties might be relatively carefree. They planted over 400 roses of 117 different cultivars in unamended soil with no care except watering for the first year, and mulching. The survivors became the Earth-Kind roses. The first group consisted of only 11 roses, but a "civilian" group of volunteers, the Earth-Kind Brigade, has continued the trials and keeps adding other roses to the list. They are quite a varied group. In addition to the two rustled roses above, a couple of my favorites are:

(I once decided to see whether it affected reblooming if I deadheaded one of my Mutabilis plants. It took about an hour and its sister actually bloomed first.)

Many of the roses that qualified as Earth-Kind are Old Garden Roses, but there are also modern shrubs among them. The landscapers' favorite, Knock Out, is one of them.

I decided that these were my kind of roses! I began growing Antique or Old Garden Roses on my farm. I also bought every rose that qualified as Earth-Kind. I planted them with a minimum of ceremony. I dug a hole larger than the rootball and filled it with water. When most of the water had soaked in, I put the plant into the wet hole at the level at which it had previously grown, packed the soil around it, watered again, mulched, and was done. For the first summer I watered regularly unless there was rain. My soil is sandy, so mulching was also necessary. After that initial season, I rarely watered at all, as many of the roses were planted far from any source of water. We recently have had several years of drought. My tough old roses bloomed away!

I had previously set up a system of soaker hoses to water the earlier rose crop, but the thirsty gophers gnawed through the hoses, ruining my irrigation plans. Now established, these new "old" roses didn't mind. The only fertilizer my roses get is compost, or mulch that rots into compost. On my farm, mulch is anything basically organic: hay, leaves, barnyard manure, pine straw, grass clippings, and wood shavings.  Even the few weeds that struggle up through the mulch get added to it. My roses never get sprayed for insects or disease. They never get pruned except sometimes to remove conspicuous dead wood, of which there is very little, or to keep them from growing so large they get in the way. (Well, the cows do occasionally prune the ones that grow along their pasture fences.) I live in a hot and humid area, so some of the plants are affected by black spot, but it never kills them or even seems to slow them down. I enjoy deadheading my roses, but they will still bloom well, even when I don't have time to do that. My Old Garden Roses suit me perfectly: great variety of form and bloom, wonderful fragrance, and carefree!

I therefore feel that no one should be discouraged from growing roses for fear of it being too much trouble. There is a type of rose for everyone. A great variety of roses that will thrive with a minimum of care, or none at all, is available. There are, of course, other wonderful roses to occupy gardeners who want to coddle their plants; they too will reward their caretakers with the charming and fragrant blooms that only a rose can provide. Go ahead, plant some roses!

 
Comments and Discussion
Thread Title Last Reply Replies
Hello from Willinator, Roses in my current Garden by Willinator Jul 14, 2021 11:20 AM 1
fragrant? by critterologist Nov 12, 2015 5:20 PM 2
A Minimalist Approach to Growing Roses by chelle Jul 19, 2014 6:56 AM 13

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