Welcome Michiganer...Steveprop. Grand Rapids, Mi

Hello Steve..welcome..Hope you will stop in and tell us about you.. Heheh...lots of people in your area..in here...Any questions about Daves..please ask..we can direct you..lol...Again welcome..

Smiles..Diana

hey Steve join us frozen Michigander -yak with us till the snow melts
welcome to the site
dori

Hi everyone. Well about myself......Im 22. I have a serious passion for plants...it is almost freakish. My stongest interest are in roses, propagation, and grafting

Wowow cool...we need young blood..hehe..kidding...Did you know you can write a piece for Daves Garden..no one has touch on Grafting..need..Never done it myself...well glad to have you..hehe..On this..bottom of the state..we have Great Lakes..roses..Nice place to visit..(I think that is the name.)...We have a member...his nick is PaulGrow..he is a master gardener..and really into Roses too...Might get to know..him..cool guy..hahahaha....well again..glad to have you...

smiles.Diana

Well thanks for the info. Have a wonderfull Valentines Day

Steve cottage_rose (vicky) leaves over your way and she is really a rose gal!

I have several myself these days-but i have several of a lot of plants :)
glad to have you join us here in the mich forum and davesgarden!
We dont have many "guys" here -we need MORE! lol

happy Valentine day to you

What are your favorite roses

welcom Steve we have lots of people that love roses among other things hope to see more of you here!!!!!!!!!!!Gloria

Welcome Steve to the Michigan forum.

I love roses too. I have to fight the rabbits and the deer all the time. I think they love them more than I do.........TO EAT!!

Hope you see you around often.

Brenda

Hello Steve and welcome you freakish plant guy!!! Welcome to meet the other plant freaks who are here!!!
I know for a fact (NotMartha) Dori is a freak....I mean Plant Freak LOL! LOL!
I am a freak too mind you so I don't mind OUTING other freaks who are here!!! Me, I'm a FLOWER freak. If it flowers I want it!! That's it.
So welcome. I don't have many Hy T Roses any more because they don't grow well for me..But I do have
over a couple hundred other roses. What do you have?? What do you like to grow??
You will have to get to the rose forum to find where all the Rose Freaks are!!!
See You and welcome here!!
Julie

Welcome Stev
I'm another plant freak too; anything with a bloom. Also a neighbor to your north. Helen in Muskegon

I like the HT roses the best for looks, but they are a pain to keep alive. The roses I like best are shrubs. There are some really cool Easy Elegance roses out that look a lot like HTs. I just bought my house last year so its new siding and roof. Then it is landscape time this summer. My favorite rose is the Black Baccara by Star roses. It is awsome...great for cut flowers.

I like the HT roses the best too! But i also like english roses-im pretty new at "how" to grow roses. I just keep adding them :)


Cut flowers-i hardly ever have cut flowers in the house LOL
i did make this arrangement last yr.
i have gotten into the last 2 roses co-ops here at daves :)

Nice Pictures Dori!
Well that does bring up the question ...HOW IN THE HECK DOES ANYONE
GET HY TS TO GROW HERE!!! I had probably over 100 at one time. Every spring for the first few years I was in my new house I bought 20-25. And every year I would get them to come back.. but weaker and weaker until they died!! Or they just died because they could not make it over the winter!!
Ok any secrets to share??? I will not try again unless I hear some GOOD fairly easy way to over winter them!! Ok anybody??

What ways have you tryed to over winter them

Well,
I at first rose cones..a disaster!!
Second..mulch (did not work well enough)
third..chicken wire with leaves
Fourth..Soil piled high up the cans
Fifth...OOOPS forgot one plant here or there...DEATH CAME TO THOSE FORGOTTEN!!
Those that even got some winterizing never attained any vigor or width or height. They sort of struggled.
I will admit i used to try to under plant. i now believe that is a NO_NO for a rose in this climate. It saps too much from the rose in the growing season and thus a rose that lacks strength comes back poorly!!
Ok Steve, what do YOU do??
I went to a ROSARIANS house last year and he built FOAM boxes that he staked over several at a time!!
You have to have a garage just for the foam boxes!!
Julie

When I had hybrid teas I would spray them with anti-dissicant spray late in the fall. After the ground would freeze I would pour 4 or 5 inches of bagged fine compost mixed with a fine mulch over the grafted union and then pile leaves over that. I'd take care to remove it in the spring and do my pruning after I'd see the new growth buds swell on the canes. This worked well for me. I also have used the rose cones but I'd punch big holes in the top to allow for air circulation and I'd weight them down with a brick. I never lost one rosebush doing this. It was a lot of work and the bagged compost was expensive. It did help keep the roses healthy during the growing season since I'd just pull it away from the rosebush but it still had access to the rich nutrients. I'd do careful pruning and not be timid about it. I'd open up the whole middle of the bush and only leave 3 or 4 good canes. I'd remove anything older than 3 years old.

Now that I've moved away from my HT's I want simple easy no work no fuss no muss gardening. I buy mostly hardy stuff that can fend for itself. I now prefer to spend my gardening money and time on the vegetable garden which is a newer venture for me.

There are Canadian roses bred specifically for cold winter climates. I'd rather buy something that I know will grow where I live than try to grow something fussy that I have to practically put in bed with me for the winter to keep it alive.

Oh............the rabbits and deer. They are my biggest challenge. Last night as we drove up in the driveway there was a big fat rabbit right in the middle of the drive. I yelled for hubby to not hit it and he said why?? I've been wanting it dead for a while since he eats my roses. ha ha ha I told hubby I didn't want to murder him with the car. I'd prefer someone eat him. ha ha ha

Loon has given about all I could tell you. But there is no need to use expensive mulch. You can mix grass clippings you collect in the summer with leaves that you collect in the fall. Pile the mix on them thick like a foot and a half. Then remove the mulch in the spring and trim them back to 3 or 4 canes about 6 inches long each. The trimming is very important they need all the juice they can get and it will make a much nicer looking rose.

Steve, Thanks and you too Brenda.
But I have done some of those treatments and what I found is that you CAN keep them ALIVE but can you keep them VIBRANT!! Flowering and multi-caned is not enough. I want nice decent size bushes that flourish. I find I can't get that here.
I am more on the side of Brenda every year as I head toward 60. I want trouble free blooms. I can't work that hard to get nice looking plants. But Steve I admire your persistance to grow Hy T's.And look forward to pictures of the beautiful roses you may want to share with us!! For me I have put in about 55 Knock-out singles, 15 doubles, 6 pink and 3 blush knockouts. Those are MY kind of roses!! Trouble free and people stop all the time and ask me what kind they are. I live on a large corner downtown Fenton on a main st.
I want to grow so many things maybe I don't have enough love an persistance for the Hy T's. But I will say this there is no more beautiful a plant than a full grown Hy T rose bush!!
So share pic's please so I can drool and maybe give me courage to try AGAIN!!!
Brenda thanks for the winter run down it may prove useful in the fall, who knows!!!
Julie

Julie,

I just bought a dozen of the double red Knockouts on the co-op sale here at Daves. I have never grown them so I'm glad to hear you are happy with them. I have to spray all my fruit trees every four weeks or so and I just spray the same stuff on my roses. I've found out from someone in the tree forum that aphids and ants go along with each other so I spray my lawn and around the house for ants and by getting rid of them I don't have aphids. My one tri colored beech tree was prone to them but no more.

Yes, everyone please post pics of your roses. I love to look at the pictures. One of my favorite roses that was very hardy was called Sunsprite. It was a fragrant yellow rose and of decent size. No black spot. I always got compliments on it. I don't have it any more. Moved away from it. :)

Brenda

Brenda,
I'll share a picture of my bed of knock out road roses! They are planted near the road under 2
"Forest Pansy Red Buds" and one Eastern red Bud and one Columnar purple Beech. It looks a little different now as I planted a double row when I got the sales in the late fall!!
You are going to love them. They do take 3 years to come into their own. And from growing them for 4 years now I saw a HUGE difference in the size of the roses planted in partial shade. The ones in FULL sun do not reach full maturity as fast and do not look as good or free flowering. I would definately try them in a shady spot!! i want to do it just to see how well they do. I went back to look at the site for these and they do say they do well in partial shade. SO!!
I have lots of them and I really like them i know you will too!!
Julie

Julie
The KO roses are definatly awsome. The original is by far the best. I think this year Star is releasing, or has already, the double pink and also a Sunny KO. The Sunny is really cool but it fades a lot like the blushing. Im sure they will keep there color a lot better in the shade. Have you ever tried the Easy Elegance Roses by Bailey they are very cool shrub roses. A lot more choices as far as growing habbits, colors, and flower styles.

they just added roses to the yahoo co-ops! oh my!

I don't believe i have ever tried the Easy Elegance roses. i will look for them based on your recommendation!! I do like the original Knock out rose best. the double is smaller and a little bit "tighter" plant not as free flowing as the single original knock out ( they call it a single but it doesn't look like one )
It is so floriferous from June through almost Oct. if the weather permits!!
I also did not know about the KO Star or Sunny KO. I will have to look for them. But like all roses you can't tell much without growing experience and these roses have no experience on them!!
Just like the carpets when they first came out.. The pink was the big hit!! The Coral apple blossom and
even yellow carpet had some different habits than the lovely pink variety!! The red had the same growing
arching mounding canes but grew at such a SLOW rate!! If you bought pink you loved them. if you bought the other colors as i did you wondered why???
I will look at the catalogues for the new KO's and YEAH Dori!! I'll go look in at Yahoo for the buying co-op for plants.
Julie