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How to Prune your Roses

By: Becky Day


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Pruning roses is a must. If you would like to grow roses, you are going to have to prune them. People tend to think pruning roses is complicated. Actually, it is pretty straightforward. The results can be incredible. Roses in fact very tough plants, so much so, if you are making every pruning mistake in the book, your roses are going to be better off than if you had not pruned them at all.

Roses must be pruned for several reasons. The key reasons have to do with keeping the plant healthy, maintaining the plants beauty and attempting to keep the plant from getting out of bounds, which can come about within a fairly short period of time, especially the taller varieties.

Proper pruning practices give you large beautiful flowers on top of strong, tall stems, ideal for cut flowers. A good general rule of thumb is the further back you cut a rose bush, the lesser number of, though bigger flowers you will get, and they will be on taller, stronger stems. Prune less, and you receive scaled-down flowers although more of them.

Pruning removes diseased or damaged parts of the plant. Additionally , it keeps the plant more open in the center, increasing air circulation and decreasing pest problems.

If pruning fails to take place, a large number of rose plants get to massive and monstrous. They can truly take over and swallow up any little plants in its path. Pruning keeps them exactly where they are suppose to be.

So, when is the ideal time to prune you ask. Well, whenever the weather is appropriate and you have the time. It is best to do it yearly and during the appropriate season. Right before growth takes place in late winter or early spring, actual timing depends on where you live and your environment. This is the best season for the significant pruning. If you do the key pruning and do it properly, then you should not have much to do during the remainder of the season past cutting the spent roses off and making the most of the magnificent beauty of the rose.

Where winter temperatures are 10 degrees or lower, you should delay to prune until after the coldest weather has passed and any winter injury to the plant has transpired. March or April are generally the best time to prune for most people.

In pruning a rose plant, eliminate all dead or damaged canes, these are the dark brown or grey colored canes, the shriveled looking and small scraggly looking twigs. Get rid of suckers, vigorous canes will arise from the rootstock below the bud union. You may need to dig all-around at the base of the plant to entirely reveal the bottom of a sucker. Cut it even to the rootstock. Leave the center area of the rose bush as open as you possibly can for circulation purposes. The plant is generally sort of cup-shaped with flowering canes around the outside.

Once you have finished all the removal pruning, now you need to carefully consider what you would like to save. The goal is to save the healthiest canes, these are the flowering canes that bloom in spring. The healthiest canes are the plumper and generally the bright green color. The amount of flowering canes you select depends upon the vigor and age of the plant. Having newly planted roses, leave about three to five flowering canes. Older plants can support more. Prune the flowering canes back by roughly a third to a half.

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