Bluegirl....... I figure it takes two years at a minimum to grow out a band to have a large enough root mass before I can plant the rose in my garden. I now overwinter my roses in a friend's green house, but I think the larger root mass going into the ground makes the plant more heat tolerant in the long run. This is just from my personal observation in my garden. For the first year in the ground, I use the sprinkler to water the bed beyond the size of the rose hole I have dug to encourage the roots to spread into the glacier slurry. When I first moved up here, I had to overwinter my roses outside. I clustered them together and surrounded them with bags of leaves with the largest plants in the middle. None of them died even tho' my night temps are generally around 20F and can get into the low teens. I put some of the roses that were in the smaller cans into larger pots with leaves stuffed between the pots for additional insulation. With my soil, it's a lot of work to prepare a rose hole, so it was worth the wait. Sandandsun ... I am gardening in glacier slurry. There is no way I can possibly prepare a whole bed. Nor can I build raised beds since everything has to be hauled up the gardening area and hauling the amount of soil that would be required is beyond me. My best bet is to dig big holes, amend the soil because it has no natural plant organic material in it, and plant a healthy plant. I mound up the soil in the planting hole so that when the organics break down and the rose sinks, it usually ends up at the height I want. Of course, I keep mulching. Ingrid..... I truly envy your ability to be able to plant directly in the soil, but it just wouldn't work in this garden. I know you grow beautiful roses, so if it's working for you, there is no need to change. Learning to garden in this climate and in glacier slurry has been an adventure. Smiles, Lyn

Judy, I have mine in pots because the place where I want to plant them isn't ready. I'm hoping to get it ready this fall/winter and plant the roses in late winter/early spring. But I still wouldn't plant a band straight into the ground. I guess if I had a nice bed prepared or were replacing another rose I could, but I don't like the idea of those tiny things in the ground. Plus as you say the drought has been horrible this year and I have enough to worry about keeping my established ones watered. I have the pots on my deck (mostly full sun) and it's easier to keep them hydrated and move them out of the sun if I have to (like when I went away for a few days and wouldn't be able to water them). Also if it gets very cold in the winter I can move them to the garage and not worry about having to protect them. I probably could plant them this fall, but as I said, the bed I have in mind is unbroken clay and needs a lot of work. I did put compost down on it and then heavy mulch, so hopefully by this fall it will be softened up so I can till it and add some good soil.

Lynn....... I think you are making the overwintering of these roses too hard. I know you are a planner, but sometimes you just have to wing it. I started my rose life in San Diego and was given the same advice as above. San Diego is also considered to be Rose Heaven. Note the ARS giving that advice in San Diego gave that timing so that the first flush of perfect roses would be ready for the rose shows in early April. It takes about six to seven weeks for a rose once it has set bud to bloom, so if your timing is early April you work back from there. You do not have to follow that timing if you are not worried about having roses ready for a show, but are just growing roses for your garden and don't need perfect roses, but need healthy roses. Cooperative Extensions and Master Gardeners have been parroting the advice given by the local rose societies for more than 60 years. That's because they do not specialize in roses and figure the ARS must know what should be done for their care. In San Diego, we stopped dead heading our roses in October and then began our pruning in December to be completed by Valentine's Day, so that they would be ready to show. My experience and personal opinion is that you stop deadheading in October, allow the rose to set seed and then the rose will go as dormant as nature will allow that rose to go dormant. When we dead head, we are interrupting the plant's natural cycle of getting pollenated and then setting seed, which stimulates the rose to re-bloom. If you don't dead head, the plant will complete it's natural cycle and rest. There is no need for dormant sprays unless you have a serious disease problem or unless you want perfect foliage for a rose show. I believe in leaving the leaves because the rose will abandon them when they no longer perform the function needed for the rose. Studies show that the photosynthesis process stops when temps reach around the 70 degree level. So you can take them off or not. I think they provide a larger mass for the top growth and leaving them on helps protect the canes from the colder temps. Cluster your pots on your patio and surround them with bags of leaves or mulch and stuff the same material in the gaps between the pots to make a bigger mass and to protect the outside pots from the colder temps and to keep the temps within the mass as constant as possible. If you feel you need to protect the top growth from freezing temps, you can cover them just as farmers do with their crops. These are small roses, they don't need to be pruned for the first year except to clean out the rose and shape it. (Note: I don't even shape the rose until it's been in the ground for at least two seasons, but I live where temps get colder.) You want it to grow out of those gallon cans, so you might as well just let it grow. Cutting them back/pruning them when they are small just slows down that process because the roses are storing nutrients in their canes. I now live in a climate with temps lower than you have reported. I over-wintered roses outside for six years in containers before I got them all planted. None of them died. I should have replaced the soil in those pots, but I was too busy digging rose holes in rock. I had to over winter the pots in a totally unprotected yard and I did not go out in the rain or snow to cover them. I also had to maintain those roses in direct sunlight in high temps that lasted for months. The key to my success was the larger mass. Not taking off leaves, spraying or taking off leaves. It kept the temperatures and moisture more consistent. In my best year, I could only get about twenty out of over one hundred roses planted. The only thing you need to do differently than I have done, is to make sure the pots don't dry out while they are resting on the patio. I've been told watering once a month is sufficient, but it doesn't hurt to check and see if you need to do it more often in your climate. Once I got them in the ground, they my roses took off even better than I expected because they finally had a chance to spread their roots. So your choice is to go by the book or wing it. Smiles, Lyn PS ... this rose, 'Kim Rupert', looked horrid in the pot, this is how it looked the first year I got it in the ground.

If you are serious and you want to go "wholesale", try these companies for seed starting supplies. Some deal with smaller companies, some not: Fred C. Gloeckner Company, Inc. 600 Mamaroneck Avenue Harrison, NY 10528 G.S. Grimes Seeds P.O. Box 640 Concord, OH 44077 0640 Park Seed Wholesale Cokesbury Road Greenwood, SC 29647 VaughanÂs Seed Co. 5300 Katrine Avenue Downers Grove, IL 60515 A.H. Hummert Seed Co. 2746 Chouteau Ave. St. Louis, Missouri 63103 Griffin Greenhouse & Nursery Supplies, Inc. 1619 Main Street Tewksbury, MA 01876 Tel: (978) 851-4346 Fax: (978) 851-0012 NURSERY SUPPLIES, INC. E-mail: sales@nurserysupplies.com Phone 1: 1-800-523-8972 (Eastern Sales) Phone 2: 1-800-367-7687 (Western Sales) 1415 Orchard Drive, Chambersburg, PA 17201 534 W. Struck Avenue, Orange, CA 92867 2515 N.E. Orchard Avenue, McMinnville, OR 97128 2050 Avenue A, Kissimmee, FL 34758 HARRIS SEEDS/GARDEN TRENDS INC. P.o. Box 24966 Rochester, NY 14624-0966 Phone: 585/295-3600 Fax: 585/295-3609 GEOSEED 121 Gary Road Hodges, SC 29653 Phone: 864/227-5117 Fax: 864/227-5108 Henry F. Michell Company PO Box 60160 2225 W Church Road King of Prussia, PA 19406-0160 (800)-422-4678 Grimes Seeds 11335 Concord-Hambden Road Painesville, Ohio 44077 1-800-241-SEED (7333) 1-440-352-1800 (fax) Joe