View full sizePeter and Susan Schneider grow numerous varieties of roses at Freedom Gardens in Portage Co.
Here are tips that home gardeners can use when closing the rose garden for winter from local rose experts Patti Jacko and Peter Schneider. We also interviewed two experts at the Cleveland Botanical Garden, grounds manager Mark Hoover and horticulturalist Deyampert Giles.
Stop fertilizing roses six weeks before the first frost.
Stop deadheading, since it promotes flower production.
Make sure that the graft point on grafted or hybridized roses is completely covered under soil. Otherwise, the thaw-freeze cycle in winter will kill the plant. You can tell if your rose was grafted – a propagation method in which the roots of one variety are attached to stems from another variety – if all of the branches are coming out of a golf-ball-sized root. That graph point must be well protected from winter weather.
Put down mulch to help keep moisture in the soil.
Rose hips – a swelling where the petals used to be – are actually seed pods that can be saved for next year. Collect the hips and place them in a cool, dry place during the winter. Do not refrigerate or freeze them.
Fall is a good time to plant new roses. They will put down new roots during the fall and winter, and be among the first to leaf out in spring. This is also a good time to transplant.
Keep watering up until the first frost if there isn’t much rain.
There’s no need to cover roses with burlap or Styrofoam.
Rake up leaf material that could harbor diseases. If you use any products, check first to be sure it does not contain fertilizer.
Expect your rose garden keep flowering through the first or second frost, depending on soil and air temperatures. “Roses can take a freeze,” Jacko said, but “don’t expect them to look gorgeous.”
This week’s series: Rose Gardens in Fall
WEDNESDAY: Two local rose experts give advice on putting rose gardens to bed.
THURSDAY: The Rose Garden at Cleveland Botanical Garden.
Speak Your Mind