Words of advice for pruning roses

THE GOOD TIME TO prune most roses is when their buds have pushed out a quarter of an inch of new growth. The way to prune any rose depends on whether the rose is a hybrid tea, floribunda, grandiflora, shrub, species, rambler, or climber.

A few general rules apply irrespective of rose type. Always cut a quarter of an inch above, and sloping away from, a healthy bud so the pruning wound heals quickly. Also, cut any dead or diseased stems back to healthy wood. Dead or diseased stems have bark that is brown and dry, or otherwise off color. As you cut such stems back, you will come to portions that have white, rather than brown or black, pith, indicating healthy, living wood. Wherever you note two branches rubbing against each other, remove one of these. And finally, snip off weak, spindly branches.

That done, it’s time to get down to details specific for each type of rose. Let’s start with hybrid tea roses, widely planted and flowering all season. (To my mind, the corpulent blooms overburden roses are similar to hybrid teas, except that floribunda and grandiflora bushes are larger, and their blooms, though smaller, are more abundant. Do not prune floribundas or grandifloras as drastically as you would hybrid teas. Instead, remove on short side shoots that grow from long canes of the previous season or older. I’m not being redundant — “ramblers” and “climbers” are two distinct types. A rambler sends out long, new shoots from the base of the plant, whereas on climbers these shoots originate from older wood a few feet above the ground. Right after flowering, in summer, the long canes that have flowered on ramblers should be cut to the ground to make way for new canes which will flower next season. climbing roses, use your pruning shears mostly to cut back to a couple of buds length the short sideshoots that grow off the long canes and produce flowers.

One problem with all these schemes for rose pruning is that they assume you know what type of rose you have. This isn’t always the case, especially if you have inherited plants on an existing property. My suggestion, then, is to follow the steps common to pruning all roses this spring: Remove dead, diseased, and interfering wood. Watch growth and flowering of the plant this summer. Does the plant produce just a few large blooms, or masses of smaller blooms? Does the plant flower throughout the season, or just in June? What is the plant’s growth habit and from where does it send out new and flowering shoots? Observe closely, and next year you will be an expert in pruning roses. For more details on rose pruning — a most other plants — see my book, “The Pruning Book,” available from the usual sources as well, signed, directly from me at www. leereich.com/books. the plants.) Hybrid teas need to be pruned severely in order to stimulate the new shoots on which flowers are borne. The more severe the pruning, the larger, though fewer and later, the blossoms. Since hybrid teas are susceptible to cold and disease, you may have pruned the plants enough by the time you remove diseased and winter-killed wood. After pruning, just a few healthy shoots should remain, each a foot to 18 inches high.

Any gardening questions? Email them to me at garden@ leereich.com and I’ll try answering them directly or in this column. Come visit my garden at www.leereich.com/blog.

Floribunda and grandiflora very old shoots at ground level, and shorten young, vigorous shoots by about a third.

Even less pruning is needed for some of the shrub and species roses, an admittedly ill-defined hodgepodge, which includes such roses as Father Hugo’s Rose. When branches on these near-wildings become congested, cut some old wood back either to the ground or to a vigorous side shoot.

Each season, rambling and climbing roses bloom once

Reduce the number of new canes, by cutting excess ones away at their bases by this time of year at the latest. Tie those canes you save to some support (a split rail fence is traditional).

Cut back the long canes of climbing roses only occasionally, not every year as with ramblers. This will encourage replacement growth and keep a plant in bounds. When you prune these old, long canes, cut them back to young, vigorous shoots along the cane (not to the ground, as with ramblers). With

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