Basil break or suckering rootstock?

9 years ago

How do you tell the difference between a basil break and a sucker coming from the rootstock--short of digging up the rose to see where it is coming from, I mean?

I'm guessing--basil break comes directly from the base of the rose--about where the buried graft would be? Whereas rootstock suckering pops up about a foot away from the rose?

What I've got is an Austin Mortimer Sackler, about 5 years old, grafted (probably on Dr. Huey since I probably ordered it directly from DA). Morty has been a very healthy and vigorous tall bush--but poor Morty is looking rather pathetic after the brutal winter we went through. He is the only rose in my garden that is having trouble recuperating--some blooms, but they droop a bit dispiritedly (but it has been really windy the past couple days, so maybe that is the reason). Anyway, Morty had a number of big canes turn brown; other canes put out some green leaves that rather promptly turned pale--nearly pale yellow in some cases. As a whole, Morty isn't looking that good--but he is still trying and hasn't given up and some of the blooms are looking quite normal. And there are a couple of new canes that look real healthy and have lots of buds on them.

What I have a question about is the two little clumps of growth--one about a foot in front of Morty, the other about a foot to the right side of Morty. I'm thinking the clumps are a response to the not-so-thriving condition of Morty as a whole, but I'm not sure if it is a good response or a bad one. In other words, how do I determine if the clumps are more Morty growing there or Dr. Huey trying to take over? Do I just have to wait until the clumps form buds and then bloom? If it's Dr. Huey, I'd rather rip it out right away.

Advice? Any input is appreciated.

Kate

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Comments (10)

michaelg
9 years ago
Rootstock suckers can come from the middle of the plant, and scion shoots can come from farther away. Basically you look really carefully at the leaves and thorns, comparing with scion shoots of similar age. More than leaf size, look at leaf serration and gloss, color of new and mature leaves, leaflet shape.

If you are unsure and don't want to dig, wait two months from the onset of the shoot and see if it has a flower bud.
malcolm_manners
9 years ago
Basal breaks come from above the graft, and their leaves should look like those of the scion variety. Rootstock suckers come from below the graft, and while they MAY be away from the main plant, they often do come up right next to it, just as do basal breaks. So if you plant the rose with the union buried, it may be a bit of a challenge to tell for sure. Depending on your scion variety, the leaves of a rootstock sucker will often look quite different from those of the scion. 'Dr. Huey' will be more like the scion than would multiflora or Fortuniana, but still, often sufficiently different to recognize that it is not the same rose. Check leaflet shape (long and pointed? round? strongly serrated edges?) and color of the new growth (green? copper? purple? yellowish?) for comparison.
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Maybe 12 years ago, I wrote the article linked below. The 3. at the end is a foornote to the 3 after susceptibility. George Mander "has made arrangements with a wholesale rosegrower, Jan Verschuren, to graft his budwood on R. canina. Jan prefers R. canina currently. R. canina is what was used there before WW2. The original canina was notorious for suckering. There are new canina selections since then. R. canina cv. "Inermis" is the most widely used variety. Much less suckering takes place, but it still suckers. R. canina cv."Heinsohn's Rekord" is regarded as the very best for Hybrid Teas (Jan agrees out of experience). R. corymbifera cv. "Laxa" or R. dumetorum cv. "Laxa" is more and more being grown on Europe's mainland. It was always used as a rootstock for Great Britain only. Because it suckers little and is, therefore, a cheaper way of growing roses, the mainland now also grows more and more on Laxa. However, Laxa is not as winterhardy as R. canina. For treeroses, R. canina cv. "Pfander" is the best one (his family has a well established R. canina cv."Pfander" weeping treerose of The Fairy in their garden at home surviving at some -24 degrees C unprotected, its budunion up in the air). Cheap fast production for big box stores has opened a market for multiflora cutting rootstocks for treeroses in Holland, but they have little winterhardiness. He also points out that R. multiflora is softer and the grafts a little more likely to be weak during the first year (Brad had one of George's Canadian White Star break right at the bud union; it can happen in a strong wind). Multiflora is much faster in production, but has a shorter lifespan than canina. Brad's experience is roses grafted on R. canina suckered freely and didn't produce as many basal shoots as R. multiflora or own-root roses. However, Jan points out that multiflora was shipped to Sweden because they had guaranteed snow cover in their winters. All other parts never wanted multiflora because of its frost susceptibility 3. Obviously, there is great debate going on here concerning the relative merits of various rootstocks." "3. This has always been a hot topic for Jan. Another former local grower here lost his crop on multiflora when temperatures went down to minus 24 degrees C. "I should have put more straw on" was his thinking... Jan hills up his budunions in fall and sleeps easy, even with minus 24. In his opinion, multiflora is never as winterhardy as R. canina selections are. As his father mentioned when he said to him that all growers use multiflora in Canada. " What?! Are they backward there?" The name Verschuren is closely related to rosegrowing in Holland. They are rootstock specialists. They produce seed, stratify and produce rootstock (about 6,000,000/ yr); and are only a medium size rootstock grower! Combined with Germany and the huge rosegrowers, competition is immense. Out of the competition, the best emerges because of the scale in which things are done there. The scales are different in Canada: here, rose production is done on a hobbyfarm basis. Multiflora is easy to grow; that is why it is used here; that is Jan's conclusion. When he met Otto Palleck, the just retired Ontario rosegrower, Palleck said, "What? You grow on canina? That is the best rootstock there is, but we cannot get No.1 quality here...." That was most likely not his only problem, as seed germination with canina requires 2 years of stratifying. Brian Minter told Jan initially when he started out doubtfully here with canina rootstock, "Do the best you can and grow the best product possible, and you will succeed" Now, Jan has customers who are coming back raving to buy more. His treeroses did not blink their eyes at the cold last winter." Here is a link that might be useful: A Visit with B.C. Rosemen
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Dmore66, One other thing I want to tell you about, that some old timers are said to have done to stimulate basal cane growth. It is taking a wire brush, the kind that is used to remove loose paint and rust, and scrubbing the woody, knobby crown, to rough up the surface in order to remove the barky pieces and scar the living layer beneath the bark a bit. This was reported to help invigorate a bush, and cause basal growth production. Please do not think for one minute I advocate this practice. I have never done it myself. Personally, I would try it experimentally, if a rose bush seemed to be a good subject, but would never recommend anyone do the same. I am just sharing this with you, informationally. I remember this procedure being discussed some years ago. Don't go outside and wire scrub your roses! I would imagine that this wire brush treatment was/is reserved for very old, gnarly crowned rose bushes. Perhaps this treatment was/is limited more to grafted roses whose crowns are congesting because of the confining effects the shank of the rootstock has on it. I do know that in bonsai culture, wire brushing the trunks of some species of trees (I believe mostly evergreens), stimulates increased trunk development. Moses
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michaelg
9 years ago
Well, Malcolm, perfect overlapping both in time-stamp and in content!
dublinbay z6 (KS)
Original Author
9 years ago
Well, this is fine--two knowledgeable posters posting almost at the same moment. I appreciate how promptly you two responded.

It's raining right now, so I will have to wait until tomorrow, but I just remembered where I saw a Dr. Huey put out a bud back in a corner by the house. I'll take a couple twiglets from it, plus a couple twiglets from Morty and sit down in front of those growths until I'm sure which twiglets they match.

Thank you for the information.

If I determine that the growths are Dr. Huey, what do I do? Dig up the whole plant and put in a new one? Or can I somehow just dig up the Dr. Huey part and leave Morty to do his thing? I seem to remember it is rather hard to get rid of Dr. Huey--which is why I have a stray one with a bloom over in the corner--it has been dug up several times--and a couple years later always faithfully returns.

Kate

This post was edited by dublinbay on Wed, May 21, 14 at 15:54
malcolm_manners
9 years ago
Kate, just dig down to where the sucker attaches to the main plant and cut (or even better, break) it off at that point, leaving no stub (which would resprout immediately). No need to remove the whole plant.
seil zone 6b MI
9 years ago
I've only had it happen once before but I did what Malcolm said and tore it off and it never returned. So I'd give that a try first before giving up on Morty.
michaelg
9 years ago
Kate probably knows this, but I should have clarified in my post that a new shoot of Dr. Huey (or multiflora or canina) will not set flower buds until next season, after it has gone through a winter. A new shoot of a repeating bush or shrub rose will set a bud usually within two months.
dublinbay z6 (KS)
Original Author
9 years ago
Well, I finally found enough free time to go out and check the new growth against a Dr. Huey sample and a Morty sample--and it seems to be Dr. Huey! I'm not real good at discerning minor differences in leaves, etc., but Morty's leaves seem to be a tiny bit more elongated and Dr. Huey's leaves seem to be a bit more roundish or have a fuller width (I'm not sure how to say that). Morty's leaves also seem to be spaced slightly wider and to be a tab bit lighter green (not sure if that last one is a definitive trait or not). The differences are really slight, but I'm going with Dr. Huey. I'll go out early in the morning before the heat returns (it has suddenly become quite hot here!) and rip off Dr. Huey from Morty's roots, as Malcolm and Seil advise.

The one thing I'm wondering about is the new growth in front of Morty doesn't look quite like the Dr. Huey growth to the side of Morty, but neither does the front growth look like Morty. It is a lovely burgundy red dark green growth--but again, I don't know if color is that significant. The shape and spacing of the leaves looks more like Dr. Huey than like Morty--so I'm assuming the front growth is Dr. Huey also.

And thanks, Michael, for the clarification. I did understand the point you were making, but I'd rather you take the time to clarify rather than assume--while I go off blithely and do the wrong thing! LOL

Thank you, everybody, for the help.

Kate
michaelg
9 years ago
New foliage of Dr. Huey is quite reddish. Again, if you are not sure, wait till the other roses all have buds and see if the suspicious shoot has one.
hoovb zone 9 sunset 23
9 years ago
if it doesn't bloom this year, it's rootstock.

Basil break or suckering rootstock?

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