Roses will sparkle like beautiful gems in your garden. You can find them in a wide range of colours and shapes, and they have longer flowering periods than many other garden plants. Many roses are also delightfully fragrant and produce rosehips as a bonus.
Sold with or without soil
If you want to enjoy their beauty this summer, then planting roses in spring is a good idea. Roses are available without soil (what growers call ‘bare root’ plants) or with soil (in pots). A rose without soil can be planted from October until the end of April; roses in pots can be planted at any time of the year as long as the ground is not frozen.
Sun-worshippers
Roses love the sun. In any case, choose a planting location where they will receive at least four hours of sun a day; the more sun, the better! Practically any type of soil is suitable for roses, but they would rather have a somewhat drier soil than a wetter one. This is why the soil has to have good drainage.
Getting started
- Dig a large deep planting hole. Amend the soil with garden mould if needed.
- If you are planting a rose where roses have previously grown, fill the hole with fertilised soil you can purchase or soil from another area in the garden. Or add a soil improver.
- Either place a bare root rose in water for a few hours before planting it or add water to the planting hole.
- Roses that have been grafted have a slight bulge on the lower part of their main stem; this is where the cultivated rose variety has been grafted onto a rootstock obtained from a species rose. Plant a grafted rose so that its grafting point is three centimetres below the soil surface. Roses without this bulge were produced from cuttings. Plant these at a depth where all of its roots and a small part of its trunk are below the soil surface.
- Tamp the soil gently.
- Work some organic fertiliser into the upper level of the soil.
- Provide the plant with sufficient water during the first weeks. Apply this water to the base of the plant; this way, the leaves will remain dry and fungi will not develop.
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