All my roses are in pots and do just fine. But it's almost always humid here. Your problem of plants drying out is certainly an issue for potted roses. I find them more vulnerable than in-ground roses to damage from spider mites, which love dry conditions.

My only suggestions for you if you want to keep trying pots would be:
1) avoid all non-glazed clay pots. They let water evaporate too easily.

2) Mulch! Mulch! Mulch! Anything you can do to not only cover the soil, but also block the sides of the pot from direct sunlight helps reduce evapoation. Some people like to put several pots close together and fill in around them with loose mulch of some kind.

3) If possible, locate the roses so they get afternoon shade.

4) Keep watering twice a day during hot weather. But make sure drainage is good.

5) If they don't already have water-retaining crystals in the soil, repot them, mixing in crystals at the recommended rate. (I once tried putting twice as many in the soil because it didn't seem like much. Well, those little crystals can swell enormously. When I was done, it looked like I had little clear jello cubes all over the top of the soil. Not very attractive. lol )

Mike

Hello, Why don't you just plant the roses in the ground and let them be happy? There was a recent thread here about potted roses and it convinced me more than ever that roses are meant to grow in the ground. There are problems such as people having only patios and space issues that I can see their need to grow roses in pots and deal with the problems involved but for most people I think they and the roses would be better off just planted in the ground.

Mike covered it well. Good advise.

My best performers in containers have been polyanthas. Marie Daly in a medium-sized container, Caldwell Pink / Pink Pet in a larger container. Someday I may try 'Perle d'Or in a large container.

Randy

Yes, nothing to add to Mike's advice.

I have Royal William and Scent-sation HT's in pots for 3 or 4 years now, and they are doing fine (in a shed for the winter). Julia Child will be in her third summer coming up, and she is very well-suited to pot culture. In the past, I have potted up many Austin bareroots in the spring, but always ended up finding a place for them in the garden by late summer. Most of us have no choice but to grow roses in pots, since we have limited garden space, and VERY long lists of must-haves!
Good luck.
Judith

I put my only potted rose under a tree where it gets good sun in winter and protection in summer. In your micro-climate you might need those large glazed containers 4+ ft. high. I saw a couple at the Abbey and they were large enough for a decent root system. The roses grew in proportion to the pot. Drip irrigation and dry-water crystals would help with heat and wind.

I had seven in 16" pots for a year, waiting for a home. Didn't work for me, just to hard to get the watering right, a drip system finally worked but ground planting is better for me. They did live and bloom and grow and are now planted. If forced I would do it again, with drippers. A person needs roses.

All great advice.
If you're going to to it, use LARGE pots, and smaller roses.
DO NOT USE CLAY OR CERAMIC POTS.
Polyanthas would make a good choice. (Not Poly-Teas, regular cluster-flowering Polyanthas.)

But the bottom line is that, when Southern California's weather turns hot and dry (which is happening more and more often) roses are better off in the ground than in a pot of any size.

Jeri

I agree with Jeri and the others. I am bad to order more roses than I have beds to put them in. I start out in fall/early winter/spring with them doing just great. New growth, blooms, I am feeling really smug. I order more. Plant them in good nursery pots or the Walmart $5 big square pots - they do great. Then summer hits. Its like a total reversal. They start to go downhill and I have had some losses. But the ones in the ground do great. Even though I pull the same stunt every year and order too many......I am really working this year to get the beds in order and plant them in the ground before it gets too hot. If I cannot accomplish getting them all planted [and I am smart enough to know thats not going to happen] this year I am going to move them out of the all day sun and put them where they will get morning sun only. Mulch well, put in appropriate sized pots. But will work steadily to get them in the ground. I have quite a few that have been in pots for a couple of years and do OK....but they are not in any kind of afternoon sun. Roses love sun, but it bakes their roots in the black pots when they get it in the afternoon. I have a $2 Don Juan that is just fabulous in his $5 big square Walmart pot. Blooms, grows....almost hate to put him in the ground......But I just think they do much better.
Judith

If the choice is between nice fertile well drained soil and a pot I'm sure most roses would welcome being in the ground. Of course if you have that kind of soil in our area you also have gophers, voles, mice, prairie dogs and other animals tunneling through your yard and eating or disrupting rose roots. Personally I have heavy clay soil, so only a few of those critters have the tenacity it takes to dig through my soil (but a few still do). For those reasons and others I've turned to containers to satisfy my yen for a few more roses then what circumstances dictate. They are a pain in our hot/humid summer when you have to water them every day. They are a pain in the spring and fall when our Oklahoma winds kick up and knock the pots over. But they are great when it comes to deadheading, fertilizing etc. I just perch on my garden stool and do my chores in relative ease. A blessing as the years march on. As with most of life there are often trade offs... As to the age of my pot roses, Tamora is the oldest having been in a pot since at least 1991. She seems happy enough.

I have some in pots and they do fine. I usually use them for an accent in the garden or to see how they'll do before they get permanent ground space. I have to water daily in summer.
Hoov, have you tried Wilt Pruf? It's a great product and helps protect against drying winds. I use it 3-4 times a year.

Carla

All of my roses are in containers and they do great. They're in 25 gallon black nursery pots which I bought online. I drilled extra holes in them so they would have adequate drainage. Also, they're on dollies so I can move them as necessary for sunlight. The bottom of the container is a layer of mulch which helps keep the roots cool. It works for me!

Roses usually do well in pots for me. I had a large potted Garden Party standard on my porch for eight years where it did well. I have a Crepuscule in a big pot by my front door now...it has climbed up and through a metal thing above my door and hangs down from that. It blooms well there. I had a huge Lavender Lassie in a big pot but didn't need such a big plant there. The reason it did so well in that pot is because the roots went through the hole. I didn't have to water it much because of that. I have a Thomasville Old Gold in a big pot under a tree..it gets light from an angle and blooms well there. I have a pretty big Louis XIV in a pot.

The reason I grow a number in pots is because my soil is not consistent. One area of my yard tends to stay much moister, and other areas have competition from tree roots. If I start a plant in a pot it gets established, then roots through the hole. I use Miracle Grow potting soil and sometimes mix in some garden soil. Some advise against that but I think it makes a more nutritious mix, has more body to the soil, and retains water better. Plants do well in it. I have used terra cotta pots at times and painted the insides to prevent so much evaporation.

I grew a tomato in a pot this year and two in the ground. The one in the pot produced the most tomatoes. Hoov, I wonder if those watering globes would help you, that keep a steady supply of water coming into the pot. Or maybe a heavier soil or a little shade in afternoon. If you grow them with saucers underneath you might try letting them root through the holes.

Linda

I get the worst Santa Ana winds. Still, I grow roses in pots because.......

I have a great rose growing spot outside the door that is covered in brick

I have some really pretty big pots

I like to try out new roses for a year in the pots and if I don't fall in love with them, they are easy to share if they are in pots.

I like to sell older named roses at my spring sale and if I plant deeply in a pot, I can often split the plant in two or three at the end of the year.

They look so cute in the pots and I can plant strawberries at the bases and I get double use from the pots

I can move the roses around the yard. They even came in the house for a party one time and were the most popular guests there.

What I do for them is double pot them. The first pot is large and around that goes a whopper pot and between the pots goes bark or mulch. This keeps the heat of the sun from bothering the roots. I think you could make pot shades from wood or anything you like as long as it keeps the sun off.

I like the water holding crystals when I find them on sale.
Use the best potting mix you can and add good organic foods that will last a long time.

When the winds blow, I move the ones I can to the protected side of the house or under the bamboo to help them. I keep them watered and I have a mister on a stick that they sell in summer for the kids that I can turn on if I need to.

If it's not windy, just baking hot, then I put up a cheap beach umbrella and give them shade for the 4 or 5 days that the temps are in the 90's or hotter. Sometimes, I give them morning sun and them put up the umbrella for the afternoon. Shade cloth works nicely too. I have a pipe frame like the swap meet sellers use and I can set it up in 15 min and throw shade cloth over it. It's not as pretty as the umbrella, but it shades more plants.

Everybody gets repotted with fresh soil at the end of the year except the camellias which grow super slowly. The roses like the fresh soil and I usually prune them if I am going to repot. Usually, they only spend one year in the pots and then I get new ones to try in the pots.

One last good thing about the pots is that you can see how a location will work out. Does the spot have enough sun? How does the color look? How is the fragrance? If it's not a good spot, then you can just move the rose easily to a better spot.

Wow, some very practical tips here. I can't add anything. But I believe (I know for me)
The number one reason why people plant in pots:
Drumroll please...
Ran out of rose real estate.
Nancy

To add to Nancy's reason. People also grow in pots because of problem with poor or no soil, fighting with trees, and live in a condo or apt.
I have the majorty of my roses in pots and they do just fine. And I also agree the bigger the pot the better. The pots I use are wide and deep and can hold 2cubic ft of potting mix.

I have found a lot of good general information about growing plants in pots on the container forum. You would be amazed at what some people can grow in pots.

Liz

I am enjoying reading all the replies, thank you! To clarify, I was more interested in reading about different experiences in different climates than looking for advice, and perhaps to give those who are thinking of growing roses in pots some information about how to do it successfully.

I'm not planning on any more roses in pots--actually I'm putting every potted plant I have into the ground except echeverias, house plants that spend the summer outside but the rest of the year inside, and a few other succulents. We get 90mph swirling, twisting winds here, strong enough to knock over the largest pot, smash it, and slam it into surrounding plantings or against the house. Sometimes the plant will literally be pulled out of the pot by the wind and it will be completely dessicated and dead in a few hours. Sometimes the wind will blow all the soil out of the pot and then the plant will fly out and never be seen again.

From reading all the comments it does sound like a shorter growing season and a higher-humidity area with summer rain provide a better potted environment than we have here.

Some excellent tips and experiences here, again, thank you!

I agree that roses are best in the ground, but my foray into permanent growing of roses in pots came in 2002, when my front yard was diagnosed with oak root rot fungus (Armillaria melea). It is a 25' X 60' garden that was lovingly planted with all roses and hydrangeas and delphiniums and foxgloves, etc. in 1998, the year after we moved into our first owned house. it was my dream garden. But then the roses started dying in 2002. So (without giving the long details of what transpired in the meantime), I now have ~180 roses in big pots in that same garden. I also have a number of roses in pots in various other areas. I have about 300 roses total, and only ~50 of them are in the ground. My pots of choice are either 15 gallon talls or 15 gallon squats, both black plastic. Get the high quality ones, not the blow-molded ones. I have about ten in half whiskey barrels. I grow everything from minis to full-size climbers in these pots, and they do fine. I have most of them hooked up to an irrigation system, and for most of the year when it is warm and the roses are blooming, I run the irrigation for 3-4 minutes on each leg every day. I use Osmocote every 2-3 months and mulch over that. I add alfalfa pellets twice a year. When I get really inspired, I'll do fish emulsion and/or MiracleGro by hand on everyone. In some ways, roses in pots are easier, but in many ways, they are way more work. But it's definitely do-able, and they don't have to be mere shadows of what they could be in the ground if you pay close attention to them.

Susan

Here in Northern Michigan, the only way I can grow some more tender hybrid teas is to grow them in pots and over-winter them in my unheated garage. I've had some for 8 years, still going strong in pots. I'm always amazed in spring when I bring them outside. They break dormancy quickly and are leafed out and blooming about two weeks earlier than many of my other roses. Most of my rose beds are in a large open yard that gets the brunt of the North/NorthWest winds and even with a great snowcover, the hybrid teas often do poorly. Those are the ones that go into a pot. So nice to have both options.

In my experience, the secret to successful roses in pots is to fertilize weekly with Miracle Gro for Roses. Watering everyday leaches out all the nutrients so I fertilize them every Monday. I also dose them with alfalfa tea when I feed my other roses. My Hermosa, Valentine and Fisherman's Friend all did well this year after I began this regimen. Buff

Does anyone have pictures of how they arrange their pots? Mine always look like they were just thrown together.

I grow lots of roses in pots. We have a deck where they can be enjoyed better up close. Over the years, I find it essential to pay attention to the following details:

1. Watering. Inconsistent watering is probably a container rose's worse enemy. I have a dripper system with a timer - I can set the timer to water once every few days, or a few times a day. Over the hottest days of summer, it's at least 3 times a day of watering.

2. Feeding - it's true, with all that watering, fertiliser leaches out quickly. My container roses get an application of slow release pellets (3 month) in the spring. The conditions in containers invariably mean that even the control release pellets doesn't last three months - I give it a second application after the first flush. The dripper irrigation system is hooked up to a siphoning system which adds a weak dilution of soluble fertiliser into the water - I get this system started once they are at the peak of blooms.

3. Drainage and aeration. Which invariably means repotting once every two years for containers less than 5 gallons, and 3 yearly for containers 5 gallons or larger.

4. Keeping the roots cool. I suspect that this is a bigger problem than we think. I have documented soil temperatures as high as 40-50 degrees C in pots exposed to late morning sun. A pot-in-pot system seems to be effective in keeping the media cool.

5. Keeping the size of the roses appropriate for the size of the containers. For me, the limiting factor is the size of the containers. Large containers are too heavy and cumbersome to be lugging them up and down the stairs. I any case, I worry that I may overdo it and overload the deck to beyond it's engineered weight capacity. So, I am mindful of keeping the plants from outgrowing their containers by careful pruning. For the same reason, I select the roses carefully. Most of them are miniatures (which seem to thrive better in containers where they don't have to compete with other plants for sunlight and sustenance), the smaller HT's and shrubs.

What the above adds up to is that it needs a lot more work than planting the roses in the ground, and often for less blooms. But if you need your roses up close, then, nothing beats having them in containers.

One more thing I have learnt is that the mortality rates in container grown roses is much higher than those in the ground. So, I treat them as "throwaway" plants. I.e., I won't grow the only specimen of my most treasured rose in a container - it will get a spot in the garden ASAP. But I accept having to replace the container roses on a regular basis. I don't shed any tears on the miniatures - they are cheap, and there are so many varieties that it's fun to try new ones on a regular basis. Other roses are usually rooted off what I have in the garden. I usually have several rooted "copies" of my favourite container roses on standby to replace sick, dying or dead one's.

Answering the question, no, I have no success with roses in pots, for all the reasons listed by Cactus Joe. Roses are much happier in the ground here.

cactus joe, I am tired just reading your points ;-)

But I must agree with everything you said. I'd say I have limited success with roses in pots. I don't have the ground space and must resort to planting roses in pots that would admittedly be much happier in the ground. But I make do.

I do need to accept that this situation is not "temporary" (as I have told myself every year for the last 8 years) and put together a drip system for them. I don't have the time I once did to handwater in the morning and evening.

The biggest pointer besides watering-oscmocote, osmocote, osmocote. Get the pink container (19-6-12.) Use a lot of it. Make sure it is mixed into the top layer of the soil and/or topdressed with compost or those little buggers will float away with all your daily watering.

Hope that helps...Dawn

Oh, and one more important lesson - don't overdo it. A few well tended container roses goes much further than too many to care for optimally.

There was a nationally successful rose exhibitor that lived on the other side of my hill. He grew a lot of his roses in large pots that were specially insulated to keep the roots cool. He was an engineer so he really went all out to figure out how to keep the roots at a cool even temperature in any kind of weather. Since he was a very successful exhibitor, he obviously knew what he was doing.

cactus_joe, outstanding advice, except, my goodness:

Oh, and one more important lesson - don't overdo it.

Come on now, people on this forum overdoing it with roses? You MUST be joking! ;)