It depends on how you set it up. You can have the emitters only at the rose base, or you can have them all along the water line.

I use a soaker hose which waters the whole bed.

Yes. You can weave 1/4" line with built in emitters at 6" or 12" intervals ad/or you can use small spray heads. Both are attached to the same 1/2" main line. If your 1/4 line islonger than 10', it should re-attach to the mainline so it doesn't lose power towards the end.

However, annuals generally need more water than roses or perennials. They are shallow rooted and dry out faster. If we get enough rain, they are okay, but if not you can supplement by hand. If you are using a timer, you could try setting up two times: 1 at 45 min one day a week and a second every other day for 10 minutes. I use perennials that require the same water needs as roses, so avoid the problem. I use a separate line, including timer, for vegies, strawberries and other thirsty plants.

If you are using Dripworks (www.dripworks.com) I can tell you the part numbers. I'm in Roanoke; depending on where you are, if you like, you can come see my system or I can visit you and help you set up a system.

I use a Dripworks system for both needs. Dripworks calls the little sprinklers that go right under the rose "shrubblers." They also have a variety of small sprinklers that go on stakes that I use for nearby annuals. They both attach to the same tubing, using the same system. If you look at the Dripworks catalog or website, they have a kit called "Glorious Garden" which gives you both kinds of sprinklers.

Drip irrigation isn't shrubblers or soaker hose, really. Drip irrigation is individual drip heads that drip a measured quantity of water per hour. Drip heads use a lot less water than shrubblers or sprayers.
We have one place where drip heads also water the area down hill from the roses: the soil is especially free draining there. Elsewhere, a cone under the drip head is the main place that gets water and in clay soils, the clay wicks it outwards.

anntn,
Soaker hoses are not drip irrigation, but shrubblers are. Like the drip head, they are calculated to deliver x amount of water per hour. The difference is that they spread theirs and can be adjusted from 0-13 gal/hr. Drip is the most efficient system because it iis a calculated system; all the different kinds of emitters give a precise amount in a precise form, so that there is no waste. Spray heads, for instance, are meant to be used with shallow rooted plants that like their foliage wetted--a lot of annuals or patches of the low-growing sedums. Unlike sprinklers, which are not calculated, the sprays are used low to the ground, thus limiting evaporation. They come in various degrees of spread and different gal/hr--again, very precise.

13 gal per hour?
When I think of drip I think of a quarter of a gallon up to two gallons per hour (which works with wells that aren't tapping major aquifers).
Do you have a feel for how accurate the shrubblers are when clogged with lime deposits or sediment? And how hard are they to take apart and clean? I've found precision suffers with sediments and lime deposits.
(Do people really water sedums?)

What a kind offer to help, Catrose. I've always used soaker hose very successfully, but I'm interest in water conservation, so I may try the drip if it isn't too complicated to install. I'm excited that you are from Roanoke. What annuals do you grow with your roses? What roses do you grow? I'm a non-sprayer, so my limits are large.

Thank you everyone for explaining how it can be done.

Shrubblers are easy to take apart. If you use a filter, you have fewer problems with sediments and deposits. And a pressure regulator helps with pressure.
Drip is very easy to install--tinker toys.
People who garden in the desert water sedum. If the dought continues here, you will, too. I did 20 years in Santa Fe before moving to VA, which is where I learned drip. I'm a landscaper by profession and if the drought continues I'm going to make a killing putting in drip systems here.

The only annuals I grow are pansies, johnny-jump-ups and snapdragons, which for me usually last 2-4 years, so they really aren't an annual. Most of my roses are OGR, but I have a bit of everything. I started close to the house with fragrant, repeat bloomers and am working my way outward in no order whatsoever.,My own garden suffers from "shoemaker's children" syndrome.

I water my few big sedums on drip with x-sm drippers. But it's pretty dry here (15" avg. per year on decent years).

Just curious - what's the annual rainfall average in TN?

Cheers,
Michelle

Last year with a serious drought 28.4". Sedums thrived unwatered across our land. So did all of the native small shrubs by their look this spring.
This year we've has 12" to the beginning of April and an additional four inches through yesterday afternoon (and more last night). This year's rainfall is two inches below normal so the fifteen inch hydrologic deficit from last year is only slowly being replenished.
A friend from uptown New Orleans called last night. They had rain two days ago and the Gretna/Algiers gauge(across the river from him. Audubon didn't report.) was 8.64" for that six hour storm. (The gauges are important and news down there because they determin the rate the pumps are worked in different sectors of the city.)

Yes, catsroses, you ARE going to make money with the installations and with their maintenance. Because people have forgotten that they can reason things out themselves. But it will keep gardens going and that will interest gardeners of the future (not just their yardmen).