Researched Works

How to Care for Roses

Roses Care
Roses are great for personal, social, and business uses. They also give people more reasons to take care of the environment.

Four Steps to Rose Care

When it comes to looking after roses, it's important you do four key things:


Watering Roses

It's important to water your roses weekly, especially during the growing months. The growing period depends on the location of your roses though.

You should also consider the soil's drainage capacity and pH (potential of hydrogen). You either need soil amendments or flower beds which are built to help drain the soil well. Try to aim for a soil property of 6.0-7.0 pH, as this is ideal for a rose plant.

Take care when watering your roses. Seasoned gardeners prefer to do this in the morning. However, if you want to do it at night, it's best to water at the roots. This is because leftover water on the leaves can lead to black spots.

During summer, it helps to have a good shading structure. It's also good to give your roses once-a-month or regular irrigation, depending on the temperature. This is to remove the salts that could affect the leaves and the soil. This can also help prevent too much sun and windburn on the roses.

Mulching Roses

Apart from nourishing your roses, mulching during the growing season helps the soil retain moisture. It also protects the roses from weeds. Mulch can be made up of cut dry grass, wood chips, straw, pine needles, chipped oak leaves, peat nuggets, and other shredded materials.

Fertilizing Roses

You should also add fertilizer to release nitrogen as the mulch decomposes. As the mulch is consumed throughout the year, you should replace the fertilizer.

A good fertilization schedule is important, based on the particular type of rose. Fertilizing roses requires lots of organic material and some superphosphate. Organic fertilizer can contain aged animal manure and natural wood ash, among other things.

Rose gardeners in temperate or cold climates stop fertilizing six weeks or two months before winter begins. You should also burn any brown leaves or other rotten plant parts to prevent diseases spreading.

Pruning Roses

Pruning involves removing dead or sick rose parts to keep the rose healthy. How you should prune your roses depends on the type of rose and its blossoming season. You need gloves and sharp and long-handled shears to prune roses.

Like spacing, pruning improves air circulation. It also shapes and preserves roses, as well as promotes flowering wood growth. Of the rose varieties, hybrid teas most need regular pruning.

Types of roses

Researchers at Purdue University's Department of Horticulture wrote in 2003 that roses can be classified into three types, based on their growth characteristics:


Bush Roses

Bush roses vary in length, from inches to a maximum of six feet. Bush roses are also self supporting and the rose flowers grow mainly at the top of the plant. There are seven kinds of bush roses:


Climbing Roses

Climbing rose plants need support because of how high they grow, as the long canes or branches of climbing roses can reach over 20 feet. Climbing rose plants can either be grafted or "grown on their roots". There are four categories of climbing roses:


Shrub Roses

The foliage of shrub roses has a smooth surface and shrub roses can be used as hedges to fence off areas, as well as view buffers or screen plantings. Shrub roses do not require much maintenance.

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