SPRING NEWSLETTER
SEPTEMBER 2020
Rose Growing Advice
As we say goodbye to winter, we welcome the beginning of spring!
The COVID19 pandemic has challenged all of us but also allowed us to enjoy the simple things in life, in particular spending time in our gardens. In fact, during the past six months garden centres and rose nurseries have experienced an unprecedented growth in sales! We have been extremely busy endeavouring to keep up with demand for roses through winter.
People have rediscovered the joy of cultivating beautiful gardens and growing gorgeous roses. Its peaceful and therapeutic strolling around a rose garden and very rewarding picking a bunch of your home-grown roses to take inside.
Here are come top tips for growing roses:
- By now, you should have finished pruning and new shoots will be appearing on your rose plants with the usually warm start to spring.
- Give the roots “a boost” by applying a soil tonic or root stimulant, such as Neutrog Seamungus. This seaweed-based soil and plant conditioner, recommended by Rose Societies, stimulates and supports root growth and development. It is also ideal for establishing new plants, particularly bare-rooted roses.
- We recommend fertilising with Neutrog Sudden Impact for Roses when the new rose shoots are about 2cms long. Water the fertiliser in after application or, better still, apply prior to forecast rain. This fertiliser is specifically tailor-made for roses and has a high potash content to assist in boosting flowering and offering improved disease tolerance.
- Mulch your rose garden. The benefits of applying mulch include:
- Weed suppression
- Reducing the amount of evaporation and watering needed
- The mulch breaks down and adds organic material into the soil
- The introduction of beneficial bacteria
- Encouraging earthworms that aerate the soil
- Regulates soil temperature
- helps to prevent erosion from heavy rain
We and the Rose Society recommend Neutrong ‘Whoflungdung‘ organic mulch. It is a biologically activated, nutrient rich, weed free, absorbent super mulch. Apply the mulch in late winter or early spring, according to the manufacturer’s directions. Remember to keep the mulch away from the actual base of young roses in case it burns.
5. Watering – It is important to water your established roses with one good soak per fortnight as we have had a very dry spring. Roses in their first year may require supplementary water as their roots are not fully established and the young plant can dry out more quickly than well-established plants.
6. If your plants are healthy, you will see strong water-shoots emerging from the base of the plant. These are typically rapidly growing and soft. They may need staking to prevent them from snapping off in strong winds
Question Time!
Do you have a question for our experts?
Please send us your questions for our experts to provide advice. We will select one or two of the best questions and answer it in each newsletter. If yours is selected, you will receive a free rose from Knight’s Roses.
