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Pruning climbing roses

Hi all,

I've never touched my climbing roses other than thinning an chopping the tops when they get too high. This year though I'm thinking I should, especially as I need to replace the trellis with a stronger one but not sure on what I can or can't cut.

I've watched some videos and they suggest you can go right to the base but I'm conscious that especially on my left hand one, there's a really thick 'woody' stem going up through the middle and if I cut this, whether it would regrow although it doesn't come out there clear in the photos.




Do I just leave the central stem and trim what's coming off of it?

My right hand one has a bit of dead and also a fresh stem that's shot up from the ground over the last month or so


Would be nice to generate some more growth and thicker lower down rather than having all the blooms at the top 

Many thanks
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  • You could hack it right down to below the bottom of the trellis and it’ll regrow from the dormant buds lower down. Then what you want to try and do is tie in new growth and get it as horizontal as possible. Which on a narrow support means bending the canes and getting them to zig zag up at 45 degrees. That way you’ll get more flowering side shoots developing all the way up rather than right at the top.

    However that depends hon your rose having enough flexibility to train that way. Easiest to do with new growth while it’s relatively soft.




    East Yorkshire
  • Busy-LizzieBusy-Lizzie Posts: 24,043
    What variety are they? The white flowers suggest Iceberg to me. They don't look very old.

    I would cut out all the dead. Shorten them by half, you should then be able to pull them away from the wall to change the trellis.Then, keeping the thickest main stems, cut off all the spindly side shoots to 4 to 6 inches and cut off the thinnest ones.

    They look very close to the wall where it can be very dry. Do you water them? Have you fed them?
    Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
  • You could hack it right down to below the bottom of the trellis and it’ll regrow from the dormant buds lower down. Then what you want to try and do is tie in new growth and get it as horizontal as possible. Which on a narrow support means bending the canes and getting them to zig zag up at 45 degrees. That way you’ll get more flowering side shoots developing all the way up rather than right at the top.

    However that depends hon your rose having enough flexibility to train that way. Easiest to do with new growth while it’s relatively soft.




    Thanks and I think we do want to try and train them horizontally. I think we made the mistake of feeding some shoots behind the trellis but I'm looking at getting something like the below so will make sure to tie it all in from the front.

    https://www.bradfords.co.uk/tafs-pressure-treated-square-trellis-1828-x-1828mm



  • What variety are they? The white flowers suggest Iceberg to me. They don't look very old.

    I would cut out all the dead. Shorten them by half, you should then be able to pull them away from the wall to change the trellis.Then, keeping the thickest main stems, cut off all the spindly side shoots to 4 to 6 inches and cut off the thinnest ones.

    They look very close to the wall where it can be very dry. Do you water them? Have you fed them?
    I think it is iceberg, the right hand one I think is school girl. 

    So chop them in half not to the base and the main thick shoot should be ok? Then cut back some decent size ones but remove the thinnest?

    They are against a wall which I've heard is never great but especially the white one, they flower and grow well albeit having. To cut them back regularly as they hang out. Also I don't really water or feed them other than a bit of rose feed at the beginning of the year.
  • Busy-LizzieBusy-Lizzie Posts: 24,043
    Climbing roses are fine against walls but most prefer a wall that has some sunshine so not a north wall. I have a climbing Iceberg on a wall. But it is often very dry at the bottom of walls, rain shield, so you need to check moisture and water when needed, not just a sprinkle, a bucket or 2. They should be fed in March and again after the first flowering.

    When other strong shoots grow from the ground the main shoot can be removed  to rejuvenate the rose, but I don't think I would do it yet. The side shoots off the main stems should be shortened as I said and the dead and very spindly stems removed. I wouldn't normally cut it in half, unless I wanted to try to make it bushier, but you need it out of the way to replace the trellis.
    Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
  • Ok thanks, will try and give it a go at the weekend as it's getting too heavy with the wind pulling it and don't fancy it on my car. 

    Plan is to get a one piece fixed trellis for them both to use rather than the cheap stretchy ones we have at the moment not realising how well they would grow.
  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    edited November 2022
    Both valid approaches. Either way, I would try and keep that healthy green cane that’s shot up from the base and gradually bend it over. A wider trellis will certainly give you better flowering coverage of your wall and make it easier to train new growth. You could set the new trellis a bit higher too, say 35cm from the base of the rose. Edited to say, one rose would would easily fill a whole new trellis, is there room for two of those side by side?

    Another option is to just disentangle the lot from the current trellis, and see what you’ve got and how easy it is to bend. It’s ok to just let the whole lot flop forward, but if it’s all stiffly upright and tight to the wall, you may well have no choice but to go low to get the new trellis in. 

    This is a shorter rose trained more laterally on a low fence, but the principle is the same. Iceberg is more flexible, so should be easier, but my rose had quite stiff canes even when young so I couldn’t do the zig zag thing, just gradually pulled them over and down:



    ^ some canes on the left didn’t even make it to 45 degrees but still produced lots of little flowering shoots along the canes, that later produced roses:

    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • Ok thanks. I think my main concern was the same as some of my older ones in the front and cutting down that big 'woody' stem as it's not green and worried if I did cut it back, whether it would continue growing although it's doing well at the moment.
  • AthelasAthelas Posts: 946
    I know you haven’t asked about it, but I’d suggest to remove all the stone chips from the border, as well as all of the fallen leaves (which will harbour disease and infect any new leaves that come out later). Pretty much all of the leaves are gone and you can cut off any that remain on the stems, again so that blackspot etc. doesn’t get a foothold.

    With the stone chips removed, you can give the roses a regular well-rotted manure mulch, which will help retain moisture and at the same time boost nutrition — just avoid putting the mulch in direct contact with the stems.
    Cambridgeshire, UK
  • I’m not clear from the photo whether it’s a border, a raised bed or a sort of container? 

    Apart from anything else, I’m a bit concerned about a possible breach of the damp proof course. 

    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





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