Update on my roses with blackspots...As Dave suggested. Leaves stripped, cleared the ground. New leaves started appearing and looking healthy. I've sprayed all the new leaves and the surrounding area where the plants are, fed the roses and mulched the area and watered the plants. Extra bonus...it has started to rain!!
I know they are a little more work than some plants but roses do repay your kindness 10 fold over. If you get the right varieties they flower from may through to the frosts and the scent they provide cant be beaten.
When I bought my current house there were a few desease ridden specimens lurking under trees. All I did was prune them spray them and feed them and they are now beautiful again. I have no idea how old they are and I'm not even sure if I have identified them properly but they are stunning. Theres not many plants that can perform in this way.
The start of the rose season and the beauty and perfume is so breathtaking. Then comes the horror of black spots!!!Oh how I sigh!!! It's beautiful again.. I must prepare my mind mentally next year and hope to cope with ease. Tks to you and others for the encouragement.
I pruned some roses very hard in early July. Wrong timing I know but they were stopping me get into the bed to dig out all the other plants and change the overall design. Big feed, loads of watering and a good mulch and they are growing strongly. Will report on whether they flower again this year. My guess is yes and that I will have a good flush later than usual. Also will they still be healthy? Not sure if I will spray or leave them to see what happens.
Hi Salino, Sorry for the delay, had loads of visitors. My Margaret Merrill rose as promised. Looks perfectly healthy - not even black spot! apart from some nibbled leaves by tiny green caterpillars. Don't think it's got any suckers and looks perfectly normal apart from its height - now 7ft and no flowers or buds. It has got, though, funny lateral shoots in the corners rather like tomatoes get which I haven't noticed before.
I did prune it a bit hard hard early this year, to about 1-2 ft if I remember to try to control its size as it's always been a bit energetic. Any ideas anyone?
thanks for posting.... that doesn't look like Margaret Merrill to me... the leaves don't look right.... MM has dark green leaves, more rounded, and heavily grooved... I grew it years ago...it has a gorgeous scent... yours looks like something else....so I'm guessing it was wrongly labelled.... did you say if you've ever had any flowers on it at all? placing it in front of that hedge wouldn't be ideal either...but I've done that before and still got flowers to at least prove it's the right plant, and if anything tends to stunt the growth...
be interesting to see if those reddish new shoots produce flower buds before end of the year... but I'd be very surprised if it's MM.... let's hope it's worth waiting for and happy to be proved wrong....
Hi Salino, Thanks for posting back. Unfortunately I don't have a photo of it in flower although it have lovely creamy flowers with a beautiful perfume the 1st couple of years after planting (about 2010/2011 from memory). It was a "freebie" from one of the magazines advertised as a Margaret Merrill but not having seen one anywhere else, I've had nothing to compare it to. Interesting! I wonder if it is a climbing sport? Does anybody know the parentage of Margaret Merrill please?
I know the hedge background is not ideal (nor the box hedge in front!) but I have been very careful to feed, mulch and water the 3 roses very well. The other two, Gertrude Jekyll and Winchester Cathedral are doing well, although the WC is also behaving oddly having part reverted back to its parent, the pink Mary Rose so I have white, pink and striped pink & white flowers all on the one bush
...that sounds like fun..lol... a strange mix... I have a similar thing happen to one of my Camellias...
..the parents of Margaret Merrill are the well known Pascali... which provided the pollen...one of the other parents is the Kordesii floribunda 'Rudolph Timm'... and the foliage of your plant does look like that one... however it's flowers are pink and white..
by the description you've given of the flowers you've had so far..it does sound like MM...must say that... scent and all.... so...perhaps that's what it is, but I've never seen one so underperforming as regards flowering habit... so I'm at a loss as to why that should be... you're not pruning off those reddish side shoots are you..? you did mention something akin to tomato sideshoots that we normally remove...
No Salino, I'm not pruning anything off at the moment but I did read this afternoon when I googled "Margaret Merrill" that it flowers from July to October - so watch this space!
Posts
Update on my roses with blackspots...As Dave suggested. Leaves stripped, cleared the ground. New leaves started appearing and looking healthy. I've sprayed all the new leaves and the surrounding area where the plants are, fed the roses and mulched the area and watered the plants. Extra bonus...it has started to rain!!
I know they are a little more work than some plants but roses do repay your kindness 10 fold over. If you get the right varieties they flower from may through to the frosts and the scent they provide cant be beaten.
When I bought my current house there were a few desease ridden specimens lurking under trees. All I did was prune them spray them and feed them and they are now beautiful again. I have no idea how old they are and I'm not even sure if I have identified them properly but they are stunning. Theres not many plants that can perform in this way.
The start of the rose season and the beauty and perfume is so breathtaking. Then comes the horror of black spots!!!Oh how I sigh!!! It's beautiful again.. I must prepare my mind mentally next year and hope to cope with ease. Tks to you and others for the encouragement.
I pruned some roses very hard in early July. Wrong timing I know but they were stopping me get into the bed to dig out all the other plants and change the overall design. Big feed, loads of watering and a good mulch and they are growing strongly. Will report on whether they flower again this year. My guess is yes and that I will have a good flush later than usual. Also will they still be healthy? Not sure if I will spray or leave them to see what happens.
Interesting!!! like to know the outcome.
Hi Salino, Sorry for the delay, had loads of visitors. My Margaret Merrill rose as promised. Looks perfectly healthy - not even black spot! apart from some nibbled leaves by tiny green caterpillars. Don't think it's got any suckers and looks perfectly normal apart from its height - now 7ft and no flowers or buds. It has got, though, funny lateral shoots in the corners rather like tomatoes get which I haven't noticed before.
I did prune it a bit hard hard early this year, to about 1-2 ft if I remember to try to control its size as it's always been a bit energetic. Any ideas anyone?
hi Lizzie,
thanks for posting.... that doesn't look like Margaret Merrill to me... the leaves don't look right.... MM has dark green leaves, more rounded, and heavily grooved... I grew it years ago...it has a gorgeous scent... yours looks like something else....so I'm guessing it was wrongly labelled.... did you say if you've ever had any flowers on it at all? placing it in front of that hedge wouldn't be ideal either...but I've done that before and still got flowers to at least prove it's the right plant, and if anything tends to stunt the growth...
be interesting to see if those reddish new shoots produce flower buds before end of the year... but I'd be very surprised if it's MM.... let's hope it's worth waiting for and happy to be proved wrong....
Hi Salino, Thanks for posting back. Unfortunately I don't have a photo of it in flower although it have lovely creamy flowers with a beautiful perfume the 1st couple of years after planting (about 2010/2011 from memory). It was a "freebie" from one of the magazines advertised as a Margaret Merrill but not having seen one anywhere else, I've had nothing to compare it to.
Interesting! I wonder if it is a climbing sport? Does anybody know the parentage of Margaret Merrill please?
I know the hedge background is not ideal (nor the box hedge in front!) but I have been very careful to feed, mulch and water the 3 roses very well. The other two, Gertrude Jekyll and Winchester Cathedral are doing well, although the WC is also behaving oddly having part reverted back to its parent, the pink Mary Rose so I have white, pink and striped pink & white flowers all on the one bush
...that sounds like fun..lol... a strange mix... I have a similar thing happen to one of my Camellias...
..the parents of Margaret Merrill are the well known Pascali... which provided the pollen...one of the other parents is the Kordesii floribunda 'Rudolph Timm'... and the foliage of your plant does look like that one... however it's flowers are pink and white..
by the description you've given of the flowers you've had so far..it does sound like MM...must say that... scent and all.... so...perhaps that's what it is, but I've never seen one so underperforming as regards flowering habit... so I'm at a loss as to why that should be... you're not pruning off those reddish side shoots are you..? you did mention something akin to tomato sideshoots that we normally remove...
No Salino, I'm not pruning anything off at the moment but I did read this afternoon when I googled "Margaret Merrill" that it flowers from July to October - so watch this space!