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Advise on roses please

bethany.s.rex76493bethany.s.rex76493 Posts: 10
in Plants
Hi everyone 

we have three roses in our garden that were there when we moved in. At first I wasn’t that bothered about keeping them as they seem a bit unhealthy but have grown attached as they flowered on the same day that my daughter was born! So want to try and keep them now. 

First of all, what kind of roses are these? I’m unsure what pruning advice to follow as I don’t know that type.

second, how can I prune these to avoid that long stem which I find quite ugly? 

Third, can they be moved? And does anyone have any good ideas for how to incorporate them into a border? 

Thanks so much! 


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  • GardenerSuzeGardenerSuze Posts: 5,692
    @bethany.s.rex76493 Is the soil dry they do like alot of water. There are roses experts on here @Marlorena may be able to offer help. If you go to Roses spring /summer 2023 there are lots of photos with good planting combinations.When a Rose is stressed like any plant say from a lack of water there is a bigger chance of it suffering from disease.
    I have worked as a Gardener for 24 years. My latest garden is a new build garden on heavy clay.
  • bethany.s.rex76493bethany.s.rex76493 Posts: 10
    Thanks for the suggestions for planting ideas. Hmm no they get a decent amount of water…
  • bethany.s.rex76493bethany.s.rex76493 Posts: 10
    The only thing I can think of is that they were under planted with some sort of Lilly - maybe day Lilly - that spread across the whole border. I’ve just dug those out so maybe they were taking too much of the water. They have flowered multiple times this summer tho so the flowering aspect seems healthy but the stems look suspect!
  • WAMSWAMS Posts: 1,960
    It's been a pretty rubbish year for disease (dry spring, wet summer). I would say prune and defoliate them late winter (Feb) then feed and mulch them in spring (March) and they'll be fine. If you need specific help about where to prune them then both @Marlorena and @Nollie are terrifically helpful with advice and even drawing lines on your pictures and showing you exactly where to cut if you are unsure.

    Congrats on the birth of your wee girl! Warning: roses are addictive. Today, "Hmm, I think I will keep that rose that was here"... tomorrow, "Hmm, how did I end up with dozens of these things?"😄
  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    It looks like a hybrid tea rose going by the form of the yellow bloom and bud pictured. The second half of the summer hasn’t been great my roses this year, lots of similarly diseased and crispy leaves due to insect attacks, heatwaves, rainwaves and coolwaves - the temperatures have been shooting up and down the thermometer like a crazed yo yo!

    How much is a ‘decent amount of water’? To me would be three 12L watering cans a week in warm weather and not fighting for it with daylilies 😊 

    I agree wirh WAMS it’s best to leave major pruning until it’s dormant - I do mine in Jan/Feb and with yours I would prune it down hard to 6-12” - but there are things you can do now to improve matters, especially since it’s still blooming. I recently gave this advice to someone with a similarly tired and dry looking rose:

    “ Deadhead the spent flowers, pick off all the crispy and sickly looking leaves and clear up the same around the base. Then give it a couple of large cans of water, poured slowly all around the roots. Finish off with a mulch of fresh compost (MPC is fine) to retain water. I wouldn’t give it any more fertiliser now, just let it recover. It will look a bit bare for a while, but with plentiful water it will grow new leaves and hopefully some late season blooms too. 
    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • bethany.s.rex76493bethany.s.rex76493 Posts: 10
    @Nollie thank you for this! I think they weren’t getting water with all the lilies in there so hopefully will improve now they’re gone. I do want to plant the border again though. Is it just a case of watering more to compensate for whatever is sharing the space? 

    With the pruning, do you mean each stem 6-12”? Would you remove any of the dark/brown stems at all?

    @WAMS thank you! Yes we have an alba rose maxima now too - and another one around the front… 

    Would it be ok to move these roses or do they need to stay put until looking healthier? 

    Thank you so much!!
  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    edited September 2023
    Hi, you can prune off any brown dead ends now as you’re deadheading, back to green. When deadheading, you usually take it back to a set of leaves but if there aren’t any, down to one of those little nubbles on the stem, which are dormant shoots waiting their turn to sprout.

    The 6-12” is to the whole lot measured from the ground, known as a hard winter prune. HT’s and other modern repeat-flowering roses like floribundas benefit from this. It seems severe, but as they flower on new growth it will set them up nicely for the following flowering season. 

    Alba Maxima is an old shrub rose and a different kettle of fish. It will give you one big early show and then won’t repeat flower. They are pruned much less severely, normally just a quick tidy up and pruning out any dead wood. The time to do that is usually midsummer after they’ve finished flowering. I don’t actually grow any once bloomers so this is just stock advice - others might be better placed to advise there.

    Better to move any rose when dormant in winter as it won’t notice or have a hissy fit then.

    I try to keep at least a foot or so clear around the base of a rose, which makes it easier to water, feed and mulch in a circle around it. Otherwise it’s fine to plant nearby but the more densely you plant the more you have to consider the watering needs of everything. Plants will tell you if they’re parched by wilting and/or the leaves turning yellow. Hard to over-water a rose though, unless you’re living in a bog!
    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • bethany.s.rex76493bethany.s.rex76493 Posts: 10
    edited September 2023
    @Nollie thank you, I had no idea about the pruning - tbh I didn’t know about tea roses at all. I don’t think they have been pruned for years so hopefully it’ll make a big difference.

    I’ve attached two pics of the roses to be pruned. Can I check you mean to prune the stems coming off the main stem?

    also, last question hopefully, we want to level the garden this autumn, which would mean bringing this border down about a foot. Would you dig up the rose and just put it back in the same place? I had read that you shouldn’t reuse a spot where a diseased rose has been. But do these just need some love, rather than being diseased?

    thank you v v much for your help!
  • NollieNollie Posts: 7,529
    Ah but Tea roses are a very old class of shrubby roses, you have Hybrid Teas, different beasts so the hybrid bit is important!

    My concern about you reducing the soil level by a foot  is that you lose all the good topsoil and end up with inferior subsoil to replant in, so perhaps it would be better to relocate elsewhere where the soil depth is decent. Rose Replant Disease is what you want to avoid by planting a rose in ground another preceded it. Can a rose get RRD from itself? A good question that I don’t know the answer to!

    OK here is roughly where I would cut in winter, given the length of trunk you have before the canes sprout..



    This one only seems to have one viable cane. I would still risk the red line but if you are worried about it, go for the blue and plant something in front to hide the bare leg. I would also take those dead stumps right back flush with the lower trunk, which might encourage new canes to shoot from there:

    Mountainous Northern Catalunya, Spain. Hot summers, cold winters.
  • GardenerSuzeGardenerSuze Posts: 5,692
    A Master Class @Nollie
    I have worked as a Gardener for 24 years. My latest garden is a new build garden on heavy clay.
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