Roses

[Janet Harrington]

When Bud Scott was the U.S.D. #282 bus supervisor, he planted Cocks Comb around the bus barn at the high school.  I don't know if it still comes up or not.

[Wilma]

Thank you all so much for asking how my roses are doing.

They are doing beautifully.  They look really good and are heavily budded.  I counted 23 buds on one of them yesterday.  Some of the miniature roses are blooming.  Can't wait for the others.  I have added a Pope John Paul II to my collection.  Don't have him in the ground yet, but hopefully soon.

[readyaimduck]

Old coffee grounds (not decaf) and/or crushed egg shells will help give them the nutrients.  ready

[Teresa]

I have always been a weird duck about roses.. I hate them! I don't like mowing around them.. I don't like the stickers...so when I moved in here I mowed every single one down.. There were 3.. Well...  they just sprouted back up ..and the first year I mowed them all back down.. Finally 2 years ago.. I let them come up.. I made peace with them.. apologized for being mean to them and they are growing crazy.. the one in front is budding like crazy .. the one in the flower bed blooms almost until November,and the one on the back clothes line is HUGE and already has a zillion buds on it.. So.... I am happy that I am no longer a mean rose bush owner and the roses are happy because I am nice.. LOL LOL (( I will give them some coffee grounds and egg shells as a treat)..  

[Wilma]

I need some help.  As most of you know we are under a severe heat wave.  My roses are suffering.  The first bloom this spring was beautiful.  Since then, the heat has been destroying the blossoms and sometimes the buds.  And they are staying small.  I have watered and fertilized but I can't seem to beat the heat.  My questions are, how do I take care of them during this severe heat, ditto, ditto, ditto?  That is 4 questions.  Please answer all of them.  May be the heat is affecting more than the roses?

[Judy Harder]

Ease up on the fertilizer..........you don't want to burn them up faster.
Yes, the heat is going to fry most of our gardens. If you can keep them watered, but not drowning in it.
Like us, we (and plants) need a drink....but when the drought gets too bad, mother nature knows best and shuts their
growing factors down to just maintaining.
I hope you mulched well and maybe if they are not in shade, you can help with some shade. Not too much or they will fry.
Hang in there Wilma.......the only thing I have producing anything is my cukes. I have a bed behind a storage garage that gets morning and afternoon sun, but are shelded from south......and they are producing like mad. I haven't picked any yet, but if the size of the leaves and all the blooms mean anything I will have cukes. Now, if I remember right if Mother Nature doesn't provide rain, they may not taste good with just watering from a hose.
Ok, at least I know I can grow something.....Starting to run off at the keyboard. Got a huge dose of cabin-fever and have shut up the apartment all ready today. Stay cool!

[Diane Amberg]

Usually roses like the heat and love water, but I think yours just don't like it that hot.  I suspect they will recover on their own when it gets a little cooler. Other than water as usual I don't have any other suggestions. As Judy says ,don't overdo the fertilizer.

[flintauqua]

I don't remember seeing these tips in print, so consider the source:   

Don't water plants directly with chlorinated tap water.  Fill a five gallon bucket (or barrel) with water from the hose, then let it set for a day.  Then use that water on your garden or flowers.  Or better yet, utilize a rain barrel set-up to catch rain-water from your gutters.  (That's if there is ever any rain  )

My parents, uncle Ed and aunt Vera, aunt Metta and uncle Eddie, plus Ed's foreman Bob Kill used to all garden together.  They would never use "city water" on the garden.  Over at Ed's "Pig Parlor" they had the ability to use raw water from the Santa Fe Lake.  When this land was sold and the family garden moved to my parents farm, we had a city water hydrant right next to where the garden was, but had to put in a new hydrant, by re-routing a line from the old well out in the pasture, and put in a new pump so we could use that water on the garden.  I always figured it had to do with cost, but was told it because of the chlorine in the city water.

I am using the bucket method currently as I am having to water some young trees in the yard.  I fill buckets, let them set, and then the next day fill other buckets with a small hole drilled in the bottom at each tree, that way the water will soak deeper into the root zone and won't all go to the bermuda and crab grass.

Charlie

[Ole Granny]

My aunt lived in eastern Colorado, near Calhan.  She would shade her roses in the hot weather with a tarp.  Water was very limited.  She would fill gallons jugs (with holes in the bottom) and plant them by her tomato plants, roses or whatever she had planted. Water would go to the roots only.  Always, she had plenty of produce.  Mainly, they raised cattle so needed the water for them.

[Warph]

To spray, or not to spray - that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in roses to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous insects
Or to take arms against a sea of pestilence,
And by opposing end them. To poison - to be-
No more; and by a poison to cause to end
The heartache and the thousand natural pests
That rose is heir to. 'Tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To kill - to poison.
To poison-perchance to pollute: ay, there's the rub!
For in that death of poison what future comes
As we shuffle on this mortal earth,
Must give us pause. There's  respect of nature
That ought be considered in present times.
For who would bear the scorn of the environmentalist,
Th' accusation of wrong by the politically correct,
The pangs of despis'd horticulture, the law's sanction,
The insolence of organic thought, and the spurns
That sap merit from a worthy task,
When the rosarian himself might make his peace
With bare and scraggly plants? Who would these critics bear,
To grunt and sweat under a heavy Atomist,
But that the dread of something greatly reproductive-
The undiscovered thrips, from whose pincers
No petallage returns - puzzles the will,
And makes us rather fear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Shall conscience make cowards of us all,
And cause the native sense of beauty
To be sicklied o'er with the pale cast of doubt,
And cause the enterprise of great roses
Without regard our resolution to be turned awry
And lose the name of action?

If I were you, I'd try a good cactus, Wilma.