Welcome Bob:
Paul Zimmerman of Ashdown Roses has done a series of vidoes regarding rose care on You Tube and I think some of his videos will answer your questions. You can access them through their website at ashdownroses.com. The videos are really good!

Hi, I have ZD in ground for a year now and you should consider the Xmas tree in REVERSE (narrow on bottom wider at top) at least from my experience with ZD, it's going crazy up against my house and I need to doing something just as you are about to as well. Mine is kind of weeping outward in both directions like a spray of flowers in a vase, and has already reached up to under the bottom of the garage/roof line. Let us know what you do, I'm curious. Nicole

We did exactly this to train our ramblers onto our 4-board pasture fence. All of ours are trained as horizontally as they'll go. The canes of Leontine Gervais and Francois Juranville, which are very flexible, are parallel to the ground. Albertine is much stiffer, so it's more of a fan shape.

We used galvanized electric fence wire. It's available at any farm supply store, and it's not expensive at all. A roll of 1/4 mile was about $13, if I remember correctly. We stapled it to the fence posts with a pneumatic stapler and 1" staples. You could also use electrical cable staples, if you want to hammer it by hand. Our wires are about a foot apart, because we have a wire between each board of the fence. If I were to do it from scratch, I'd probably space them every 8" or so.

You can tie the rose to the wire using jute twine or pieces of panty hose. The jute will rot as the rose grows, so it won't strangle. The panty hose is very flexible ... same result. The tie needs to expand as the rose grows. (I have dozens and dozens of climbers and ramblers, so I use a vineyard tool that staples the roses to the wire with green tape ... my husband gives the BEST birthday presents.)

Here's a picture of a few of mine.

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(Alberic Barbier, Francois Juranville, and Aviateur Bleriot)

Connie

Thanks everyone for the replies! Carol, I really enjoyed those videos by Paul, they are great. I'll keep you informed Nicole, hopefully I remember to post pictures once things get rolling. I'm going to start right as soon as I can to train them. I don't think I'll have a huge (or fast) spread, the area I'm planting the roses gets about 1/2 day sun, but we'll see!

Connie - what a beautiful fence! Perfect implementation for your area. In my case, the fence is 8' with boards running vertically so I can space it as close or as far away as I want. I'm thinking of using eye screws (pic below) to screw into the fence and running the wire through that. I'll look for galvanized wire, not sure where that's sold in my area but I'll find it.

Also - I'd be curious as to what your tool is - I love nice tools! Any idea of the manufacturer?

Thanks again,
Bob

{{gwi:289242}}

Bobby, Mine is in only about less than 4 hrs a day of late sun only, and that is how big it has grown in a year. It's more mildewy than I would have liked but I saw it on a show, and perfect for more shade than most roses and fantastic smell. It was coming home the minute I spotted one.

Connie, Fabulous fence, I can tell you must enjoy your yard. I'm going to see if I can track that electric fencing stuff down too. I can see lots of possibilities for these blocks walled fences I have, climbing anything, this would make it much easier.
Thanks! Nicole

Bob, I just saw that you're in DC. My wire came from Tractor Supply. The trellising tool is called a Max Tapener. It came from a vineyard supply company. Having one is really not necessary unless one has tons and tons of climbers.

The eye hooks are a great idea! I think that's what I'm going to do when it comes time to help the roses up the side of my house.

Connie