Gareth Carter: Why late spring presents the ideal conditions for roses

OPINION

November is the month when roses start to bloom. What a sight to behold as the tight buds unfurl and burst into colour.

The warmer temperatures of late spring combined with some rainfall result in a phenomenal rate of growth. Roses are rewarding to grow and offer colour for so many months of the year, often from November through until May.

This brings about the ideal conditions for roses, being good fertile soil and good amounts of water.

If you do not have great soil, fertility and structure can easily be improved with additions of high-nutrient organic matter such as Tui Sheep Pellets or Yates Organic Dynamic Lifter or Ican Premium Compost.

Regular deep weekly watering through the dry summer months will keep plants strong and healthy. When the plants are well-fed and watered the incidence of pest infestation and diseases is reduced.

Roses have many uses and are such good plants for picking the flowers and bringing indoors on display. The colour of picked rose blooms offers vibrancy and life, while the scent can bring feelings of tranquility and long-forgotten happy memories from childhood.

Roses can be used to gain formality from a row of the ever-popular iceberg standards, providing a grand entrance to a home or business and offer direction along a pathway.

Bush roses included in a mixed garden planting can be used to bring colour in a more informal way where different plant combinations offer a springboard effect through the year to create continuous beauty and interest.

Rose Iceberg

This must be the world’s biggest-selling rose. Its pearly white blooms have captivated landscape gardeners and non-gardeners alike. The white goes with anything and everything and complements lawns, buildings and any garden colour.

In a row they will tie together a garden where there is no theme, bringing some formality and uniformity.

Intrigued by the popularity I have googled to find where in fact this super rose came from.

Wikipedia says: “The cultivar was developed by prolific German rose breeder Reimer Kordes in Germany in 1958. He and his father Wilhelm had initially specialised in developing bush roses that were suitable for small gardens. The parent varieties of ‘KORbin’ are ‘Robin Hood’, a red hybrid musk rose, developed by Joseph Pemberton in 1927 in England, and ‘Virgo’, a white hybrid-tea rose bred in France by Charles Mallerin in 1927. The plant was registered under the cultivar name ‘KORbin’ by Kordes in 1958 and given the trade name Schneewittchen. The cultivar is known as Fée des Neiges in French and Iceberg in English.”

Having been around for a while Iceberg is certainly tried and proven.

A more unusual rose that is a recent New Zealand-bred release that has been catching the attention of rose lovers is Green with Envy.

Green with Envy is the culmination of 29 years of breeding to market a green rose. The unusual trait of this variety is the length of time the flower lasts, both on the bush and as a cut flower.

You will also find the colour intensifies with age as opposed to fading like most roses do. It looks stunning.

This is a rose for every garden. It’s a compact to medium form which makes it ideal for pots. It looks spectacular in entranceways, or on the patio, and with its excellent display will be an eye-catching conversation piece.

An eye-catching variety is the hybrid tea Night Light with blooms that are lemon yellow with the outer petals ageing to cream. The hybrid tea form will often change to an old-fashioned form as they fully open. It produces large numbers of flowers in a growing season.

The bush is medium height with dark glossy foliage and a compact growth habit. This variety shows very good disease resistance.

A favourite red of mine is ‘Lasting Love’. This has deep dusky red blooms on tall single, hybrid tea stems that make it ideal for picking.

It is strongly scented and repeats flowering for month after month. It is a strong grower and larger than some varieties, it is super healthy with low susceptibility to pest and disease.

As a standard or a bush it makes a great display.

Climbing Roses

Rose ‘Dublin Bay’ was selected by well-known international rose breeder Sam McGredy and named after the bays of Ireland. It is such a good performer it is rated as the number one climbing rose by the NZ Rose Society frequently, with nearly double the votes of the next best rose since 1987.

Its blooms are a very brilliant red semi-double. It can grow up to 2-3m across but while it is a good grower, it is not so vigorous that it can’t be contained and kept smaller when needed. It performs well grown up a trellis, pillar, wall or pergola.

Dublin Bay looks particularly good when underplanted with lavender or catmint, where the blue flowers of these plants provide a complementary colour to both the rose blooms and the deep green leaves.

This highly rated rose is adaptable to many garden situations. It can be grown successfully in a decent-sized patio planter or half wine barrel. It is a strong and healthy grower with dark green foliage and generally good disease resistance.

A top-performing pink flowering climbing rose is Compassion. Part of the world-renowned Austin rose series it aptly meets its description; A very healthy and reliable variety.

Its well-shaped Hybrid Tea flowers are light pink, tinted with coral-pink, and have a lovely strong, sweet fragrance. The growth is strong, stiff and bushy with plentiful dark green foliage.

It will grow approximately 3x3m.

The final climbing rose for today’s column is Uetersen (pronounced ooh-ter-sen).

It is a climbing rose from the Kordes family of rose breeders in Germany and is named for the Rosarium Uetersen, one of the oldest rose gardens in Northern Germany.

Throughout summer, masses of bright pink frilly blooms cover the plant. A free flowering variety, the blooms also have a good scent. It is a very healthy variety with the glossy light green foliage looking good most of the time.

A moderate grower compared to some other climbing roses, Uetersen is ideal for a smaller area or grown up a pillar. For a larger area, plant several to get a mass effect.

A winner of the Gold Star of the South Pacific at the NZRS trial grounds in Palmerston North in 1980, it has been a consistent performer throughout NZ for many years and is a worthy rose to grow in any garden.

Rose Care

Keep an eye on your roses for both pests and diseases. Look out for aphids, caterpillars, scale, red spider mites and thrips. Common diseases include blackspot, mildew and rose rust.

The use of Yates Supershield helps to control these problems. If you notice rose buds going brown and rotting it is quite likely to be botrytis – (brown rot) a weather-related fungi.

Prevent by spraying with Grosafe Freeflow Copper or any spray that controls botrytis and downy mildew. A systemic fungus spray that is effective is Yates Fungus Fighter. Call in and ask at the garden centre if you want more advice.

Gareth Carter is general manager of Springvale Garden Centre.

Source: nzherald.co.nz