Greta,

You need to get uncertified; not having bands as a resource is not good! :) What did you do with the new bands?

Mine go immediately into good packaged potting soil in one gallon pots, first few days in semi shade, then in a bit more sun, but usually not full. Of course, my climate is sunny and hot. You might need full sun. Water enough, but not so often that you force out all the oxygen.

When the roots show at the bottoms of the pots, they go into two gallon pots. When they are well established in those pots, they can go into the ground.

Sometimes I have to fence the rabbits and ground squirrels out of the little plants. That's about it. You can do this!

I know some people have good success planting them directly in the ground. Not here. The above method works reliably.

Regina

Reggie and I live and garden in places that could not be more different -- But our way of dealing with band plants is almost identical.

I think the only problem I have with all of that is that I've always got a group of little 1-G's sitting around growing roots.
We finally put them all in one spot, and put a cute little fence around 'em. That does look tidier.

The main thing I did different was that I did not pot them up right away. I left them in the band pots for a couple of weeks. They were on my deck and I watered them if it didn't rain fairly often (they have to dry out a lot faster in the little pots). So I'm just not sure what happened.

Maggie was a VERY small plant, and Gen. Gallieni was also small. M. Tillier was quite a bit more robust (though still not nearly as fluffy and full as some of the just-shipped Vintage bands I've seen photos of here) -- I am surprised that he has succumbed. Well, he hasn't succumbed, but he doesn't look good, lots of dieback.

The speed of death was inversely proportional to plant size.

-Greta

Greta

I have to agree with Regina and Jeri, The key to sucessful growing of bands is exactly as they described. I have had bands arrive that are tini-tiny to over a foot tall. And by repotting right-a-way into 1gal pots and then stepping up, I have never lost one. The longest I have ever kept a rose in the band pot they came in was may be a day or two.

I love ordering bands as this way I am not paying to ship dirt.

Liz

Greta,

When you take the little plants out of the bands, you will typically see lots of roots right on the outside of the soil, just under the plastic of the band. Because these plants have been growing all side by side together, these roots are not exposed to heating and cooling, or drying out.

I think the fact that you waited so long to repot is exactly the problem. And the fact that the largest plants were the most damaged makes sense - their root mass would have been larger and the effect of letting the roots sustain so much damage would be greater.

Now that you know why this happened, you can be officially uncertified as a Band Hazard. Congratulations.

Regina

I find that teas in bands can really go downhill quickly if not coddled a bit. I agree with Jeri and Regina I get my bands into gallon pots ASAP.

OK.... maybe I can gird my loins and try again. First I have to recover from my broken heart -- boohooo!

The ones that made it are going to be in pots for a while because the city has decided to perform some kind of sewer work across the back of my property. Until I figure out what they're going to dig up, I can't be planting anything new.

-Greta

Greta,

I had a very similar problem. It was my first order from Vintage, and my first attempt at teas. Most of my 100+ (maybe 200? I'm afraid to count!)roses are from bands. I generally get them, give them a couple of days of babying in the pot to get over shipping and acclimate a little bit, and then stick them directly in the ground. They've all survived and almost all have flourished until now (some succumbed to other problems, but I've had a very high success rate this way.) Anyway, the stuff from Vintage got here, and of course we had some really nasty cold weather at the same time, so they didn't get put in the ground immediately. Now Lady Hillingdon is almost dead (and may be gone already), and Duchesse de Brabant and Mme Joseph Schwartz are really struggling. Mme Berard is creeping along, but I think she'll be ok. However, Clementina C and G. Nabonnand are doing really well, as are all the other non-teas I got at the same time. It was the bigger bands that seem to be struggling.

In my case, I don't think it was the fact that they didn't get in the ground right away; I think it was the screwy weather. The larger bands that are struggling were completely stripped of leaves for mailing. When I got them in the ground, we had a couple of weeks of overcast, misty weather--virtually no direct sun. They were leafing out just fine, then we had a couple of really bright, warm days and those little red new leaves sizzled away to nothing--I think they sunburned since they'd never seen direct sun before. ARRGGHH! The teas that had leaves when I got them got sunburned a little, but weren't hurt as badly and have done just fine. Some teas that I got later that spent a little while in their pots have also done well--it's just those poor guys who got the big weather changes.

I think DdB is going to make it, I have high hopes for MmeJS, but I think Lady Hillingdon is toast. Maybe I can give her another chance this fall when it starts to rain again.

So don't give up yet--we can always blame the weather!