Hi!I'm taking care of my neighbors roses while she is away,I can grow just about anything,except roses.?
Question:I tried a few yrs ago but faild.Before I could figure out what they were,they buzzed the whole bush down!My Question is this...Do you dead head a rose?Once it has fully opened and turned rusty to promote growth!Or do you jusy leave it to fall! Help please,I don't want to kill them!
Answers:
Roses are actually one of the easies plants to grow. The answer to your question is Yes, you need to dead head roses in order to encourage growth. Use a pair of sanitized pruners and prune the dead rose stem down to a set of five leaves. Doing this will not only encourage new flower, but new branches as well. Make sure you clean the pruners before moving to the next bush. Improper watering could have been why you lost your rose. So, if you are going to water for your neighbor then make sure that you water early in the morning and at the rose's base. You do it the in the morning so that any moisture that gets on the leaves will have a chance to dry and not cause mildew or mold. If the roses are already established or have been there more than a year then you only need to water once a week at most.
she should have left you directions for how she wanted her roses handled. I wouldn't do anything she didn't tell me to do.
Is is okay to cut back the stem once the rose has bloomed and faded. This promotes growth of new branches and more blooms as a result. If you are going to cut them back, don't cut any further than the lowest leaf on the stem.
Hello
Deffinetly dead head them, it doesn't really take much to maintain a rose as long as you dead head them and feed them every 6 weeks. From the fully opened blossom you want to follow that stem down to the first set of five leaves, disreguard any two's or three's go straight to the first set of five and cut the stem right about that bunch of leaves. Other then that you shouldn't have much to worry about if she is coming back in a week or two or even three. OH! But you do need to watch out for blackspot, aphids, and rose slugs. Black can be treated with a systemic fungicide and the aphids treated with a systemic insecticide containing acephate or non-systemic malathion. The Rose slugs although not really slug can only be treated with acephate. Goodluck.
Greenman
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