Somewhere between 5,000 and 3,000 years ago, a fellow hoping to impress his lady love was the first to give a rose as a symbol of love. We can only imagine her response, but it was likely enthusiastic enough to make him think “Hey! Maybe I should cultivate these flowers.”

Flash forward to today, and roses remain the enduring emblem of love and romance. Fortunately, however, modern breeding has made it easier than ever to add roses to your garden and landscaping.

Traditional cultivated roses have always required a lot of work – pruning, deadheading, protecting them from disease and drought, and nurturing them in just the right environment to grow. Through careful breeding, easy-to-grow roses were designed to minimize maintenance and effort, and maximize beauty, hardiness and disease resistance.

In fact, the variety that revolutionized the concept of easy-to-grow roses, The Knock Out Rose, celebrates its 10th anniversary this year.

“I was hooked on roses by one plant in my parents’ backyard,” says rose hobbyist Bill Radler, developer of The Knock Out Rose. “Through the years, I figured growing roses should be fun with less work, so I looked for ways to eliminate maintenance demands and bred them out.”

Radler’s brainchild debuted in 2000 and was almost literally an overnight success, earning the year’s prestigious All-American Rose Selections Award. Rose hobbyists, designers, landscapers and virtually anyone who loved the look of roses, but not the work, embraced the easy-to-grow concept.

In honor of Knock Out’s 10th anniversary, landscape designer Susan Cohan, Association of Professional Landscape Designers, offers 10 easy ways to use roses in the landscape:

1. Add a spot of color to the landscape. Could your yard benefit from some pizzazz of color to create interest? Try groups of roses in a perennial planting, around the foundation or elsewhere to add color and texture. The constant blooms of bright showy colors work as a specimen plant or in groups of three to five plants for a big show of color.

2. Use as a problem solver. Have an unsightly spot to cover such as a garbage can, utility shed or pool pump? Cohan loves to plant a few shrub roses to hide these problems because she know in a matter of months the spot will be transformed into a mass of perky flowers creating a gorgeous focal point.

3. Create a “friendly” fence. Do you have a place in your yard where everyone cuts across, where you don’t want them going, or where you need to just keep them out? Colorful rose fences are lovely to look at while simultaneously deterring unwanted pedestrian and animal traffic.

4. Set the mood. Cohan recommends using color to create moods in the garden. For example, red and yellow, and pink and dark blue color combinations have a dramatic effect, while a variety of pink shades such as Pink Knock Out with pink geraniums and pink artemesia can create a soothing mood.

5. Provide a natural habitat. Gardening for nature is all the rage. Use landscape shrub roses to start creating a wildlife habitat garden. Roses provide friendly food and shelter for all wildlife. Thorns keep out predators and rose hips keep animals and birds fed during the harsh winter months.

6. Pot it up for patio or deck. Tired of replanting that container every spring? Pot them up instead with shrub roses and then under plant with vinca vines and ivy. This provides color and subtle fragrance without the work of planting in the garden.

7. Break the rules. Replace annuals with landscape shrub roses. Why plant geraniums or impatiens year after year? For all season, every year, a mass planting of shrub roses is a great alternative. Pick a color that will help showcase your perennials.

8. Paint a colorful backdrop. Too much green in your yard and not enough color? Shrub roses are also the perfect way to create a pleasant border or background in the landscape. Cohan likes to places bright red roses against a stone wall for maximum impact.

9. Pair roses with the right companions. Free your roses from the segregated rose beds and plant them with other shrubs, perennials and even annuals. Here are some great companions: Blue companion plants like lobelia, cornflowers, blue flax, bellflowers, veronica, ageratum and violet companion plants such as heliotrope are good with yellow, pink, and white roses.

10. Use as a tree on patio or deck. When is a rose bush not a rose bush? When it’s grown as a small tree. Known as rose standards, these mini-rose trees make a colorful accent in the corner of a deck or patio.

Not all roses grow well in the same environment. All seven Knock Out Roses, however, are heat tolerant throughout the U.S., and will need winter protection in only the coldest regions. They are available at your local garden center, and you can learn more about adding easy-to-grow roses to your garden at www.theknockoutrose.com.

Courtesy of ARAcontent

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Roses

No other flower can evoke romance in the garden like a rose. As America’s favorite flower, roses can be found adorning homes in quaint coastal villages to rural farmlands, modern cities to quiet mountain retreats.

“Anybody can grow roses, no matter where they live. If you can grow grass, you can grow roses in your landscape,” says James A. Baggett, editor of Country Gardens Magazine.

Whether it’s a prize-winning hybrid tea rose you’re after, the rich colors of shrub roses sprinkled throughout your landscape or containers full of blooms on your deck or patio, with a little know-how, you’ll grow roses that are healthy and beautiful and that you can show off with pride.

Stress buster
It can happen to anyone. Even experienced rose enthusiasts have lost a favorite rose to stressors like powdery mildew, drought, or extreme summer heat.

Now science has come to the rescue to give your plants the fitness edge they need to keep healthy and strong – no matter what unpredictable heat spell, cold snap or disease should hit.

Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned rose gardener, you can enjoy success with a good plant-strengthening spray like Jaz Rose Spray, new this spring.

This easy-to use, safe and biodegradable leaf spray was developed by plant scientists and endorsed by the American Rose Society.

Jaz Rose Spray (www.jazsprays.com) contains jasmonate, which naturally occurs in plants and helps to keep all roses strong and resistant to disease, pests, excessive heat, drought, cold and salt. It works by boosting your plant’s natural resistance to environmental stressors and encouraging vigorous roots, growth and blooms.

Simple tips from the experts
Renowned landscape designer Jon Carloftis plants shrub roses in containers. “I like to give them perfect planting conditions such as good drainage, rich soil and the addition of regular fertilizer that won’t be an overdose to neighboring plants,” he says.

Here are the basics for all those who are a bit rose-phobic and long for rosy success:

* Sunlight: Provide your roses with direct sunlight for at least five to six hours each day.

* Soil: Roses grow best in good soil with a pH ranging from 6.5 to 6.8. Till to a depth of two feet – adding a good organic compost or peat moss for healthy drainage.

* Location: Don’t plant roses too close to shrubs or trees that will compete for water, light and nutrients. Provide them with adequate space for air circulation.

* Water: It’s best to water rose bushes twice a week, thoroughly at the base of the plant. Avoid late-evening watering that can foster powdery mildew. Instead, water early in the morning to allow the leaves to dry before nightfall.

* Fertilize: Fertilize roses every one to two months starting in the spring with balanced fertilizers containing nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Stop fertilizing in late summer or early fall to prepare them for dormancy.

* Drainage: Whether you grow them in containers or the ground, good drainage is necessary to prevent water from pooling at the roots. Improve drainage with tilling or raised beds and containers with drainage holes.

So grab a shovel and get digging in the dirt and get set to enjoy beautiful roses. To learn more about rose care from the experts and Jaz Rose Spray, visit www.jazsprays.com.

Courtesy of ARAcontent

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To save your nerves and to create your own wonderful blend of rose fertilizer, we have provided you with an excellent rose fertilizer recipe that will make sure your roses are big and bold.

This recipe was actually developed by Morris Arboretum from the University of Pennsylvania

The Ingredients:

• 1 part fish meal
• 1 part alfalfa meal
• 1 part greensand
• 1 part gypsum
• 1/2 part bonemeal

Basically, when you are looking at portions, it depends on how much you are planning to make.  If you are using cups, you can make it 1 cup of fish meal, alfalfa meal, greensand, and gypsum and 1/2 cup of bonemeal.  If you are producing a large amount of rose fertilizer, you could use 10 cups of everything except bonemeal, which takes 5 cups.

Once you have the ingredients measureed out, combine them together and they are ready for use.  To use the fertilizer, simply sprinkle on the soil around the rose and gently rub it into the soil.

When it comes to rose gardening, you have probably heard the term, “Fertilize, fertilize, fertilize.”  In fact, fertilizing your roses is an important part of your rose care and properly fertilizing will ensure that you roses are big, tall and beautiful.

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If you are an avid gardener, or even not so avid, you probably have your own type of fertilizer that you prefer to use and probably something that it has in common with mine is that it is expensive.  It is almost alarming at how expensive a fertilizer can be. Sure, we all want big and beautiful blooms but does it have to be so expensive to create those blooms.  The answer, of course, is no, it doesn’t need to be that expensive.

Instead, you can make a number of fertilizers using everyday items that you find at home.  Not only is it more inexpensive, reusing, and recycling the materials around your home is a great way to be a “green” gardener.

Tip #1:  It’s all in the grounds

The first time I heard this being suggested, I was a little surprised.  After all, doesn’t coffee stunt growth, I mean, that is what happened to me.  Fortunately for my plants, coffee works as a great fertilizer for gardens and instead of throwing your leftover coffee away, why not save it for your garden.  With this fertilizer, you actually don’t use the grounds but you use the coffee that is brewed from the grounds.  Once you have a pot of coffee, add it with another 4 pots of water for a 1:4 ratio.  This will give you your fertilizer and you can use it on your plants every other week to see some pretty amazing results.

Tip #2: Apples aren’t just used to keep the doctor away

Okay, maybe it’s not apples exactly but using a homemade fertilizer that has 1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar and one gallon of water, can add a definite boost to your plants.  This fertilizer is great for house plants and it does an amazing job at boosting those green leaves.

Tip #3: Keep your fish tanks clean

This may seem like a strange tip but if you have a fish tank, your dirty fish tank water works as an excellent fertilizer since it is chalked full of nitrogen, which plants need in their soil.

Tip #4: A little Epsom for you and me

I love having baths and nothing is as nice as a bath with Epsom salts.  It can clean those pours and relax those muscles after you have spent a day out in the garden digging up that new flower bed.  What is even better, a mixture of 1 tablespoon of Epsom salt and 1 gallon of water can really help your tomato plants and other plants that require a higher level of magnesium to thrive.

Tip #5: Get cracking

The last tip that I am going to recommend as a homemade fertilizer is egg shells.  Whenever you make some eggs, save the shells until you have a fair amount. At that point, simply crumble them and then sprinkle them in the soil around your plants.  This provides your soil with much needed calcium carbonate.

And there are a few tips to get you on your way to not only saving a few nickles and dimes but also towards being an organic gardener.

Sirena Van Schaik

photo credit: © Fallsview | Dreamstime.com

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Tip: Trim off flowers and buds. This will encourage the plant

For many gardeners rose bushes are a prized possession. As the gardening season comes to a close, it’s time to prepare your roses for the cold, harsh Canadian winter ahead. Knowing the best feeding and prepping techniques will ensure your cherished roses survive the winter and bloom beautifully in the spring.

Proper feeding is the first step in putting healthy roses to bed for the winter. Remember to continue feeding the plants every seven to 14 days with a specially formulated plant food for roses, such as Miracle-Gro Water Soluble Rose Plant Food 18-24-6. Once temperatures fall below 1°, switch to plant food containing only phosphorus and potassium to help strengthen the plant over the winter.

Other preparation secrets include proper cleaning, pruning and inspection to ensure roses are strong, as well as insect and disease-free. Here are some more simple tips to prepare your roses for the fall and winter:

• Rake leaves and mulch away from the base of the plants as disease spores or insect eggs may be hidden there.

• Examine roses for any insects or diseases – especially rust and black spot.

• Trim off flowers and buds. This will encourage the plant’s energy to go into underground growth for the winter.

• If you live in the colder parts of Canada, cut roses back to 30 to 36 inches, tying the longest canes together to protect them from wind damage.

• When regular frost begins, mound several spadefuls of soil over the base of the plant and extend the soil up at least a foot above the graft (bud union). When the ground is thoroughly frozen, cover the mound with a thick layer of mulch, such as straw or compost.

For more information about roses or to speak with a Scotts Garden Expert call 1-866-436-8477 or visit www.Scotts.ca.

- News Canada

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