There's no way of knowing where that rose became infected or how long ago. HD may have gotten it already infected from the grower and that could have come from anywhere. Or it may have become infected in your yard too. Since the mite that carries it travels on the air I'd keep a close watch on all your roses.

If this rose was bought last year and only now you see symptoms, most likely it was infected in your yard. There is plenty of RRD in IL. You don't need to buy already infected plant to see it in your garden. Wind will bring mites.
Olga

Dunking roots in insecticide is for Japanese beetle eggs and grubs. RRD infection shows up more quickly than one year from what I hear.

I forget to mention that it was infected LAST YEAR. That was before I joined the forums so I didn't know what it was. I kept wondering why it didn't grow, and had odd canes. I was about to return to the store but got lazy and kept it.

I checked the RRD map: a few cases reported in Chicagoland, but not as widespread as further south of IL.

Comparing a rose sold at Home Depot to a band sold by a small nursery is much like comparing apples to oranges.

Home Depot buys their stock from suppliers, they do not grow them on site in green houses or fields. The source of the RRD could have come from anywhere from the supplier to the store to your flower bed. Carried by the wind, the truck driving could have picked up by the wind at a truck stop.

Maybe your point was that you prefer to buy bands and monitor their growth in your own back yard rather than purchase larger plants who some one else grew for a couple of years before selling?

But RRD is not the common result from buying a bigger rose from a nursery or home depot vs buying a band sized plant.

But I have to ask, why dig up a plant that had slugs? Seems like a rather extreme way to deal with a minor issue that has easy organic treatments available. Check out "Sluggo"

Good point, Kippy " Maybe your point was that you prefer to buy bands and monitor their growth in your own back yard rather than purchase larger plants who some one else grew for a couple of years before selling?

Kim Rupert informed of the law regarding shipping plants in the Roses Exchange and Propagation Forum: plants must be shipped in a soil-less mix, not in contact with the ground .....sterile potting soil is allowed, but not dirt from the ground to prevent transmission of insects. "

That's why I prefer to buy band-size roses mail-ordered, grown in sphagum moss/perlite like from Burlington. Since they are tiny plants, I can easily inspect again for slug in the pot, or bugs on the leaves.

I dug up that Bonica because it lost all leaves, there were tons of slugs in that rootball, it's not worth keeping. I don't have slugs here after getting rid of that one.

The slugs likely were there to clean up the decayed roots, one of those which came first, the chicken or the egg kind of debates.

Please don't depend on RRD maps to show where RRD is. The maps show where it has been reported and the most recent map I know of is at least eight years old.

I'm in n. Illinois and have had one suspected case of rrd, it was in a 3 year old own root plant propagated from my mother in law's plant, the mother plant never had it and none of my other roses have been affected. Just goes to show how random this disease is and that no matter the source, the disease is a roll of the dice.

The disease is more like a roll of loaded dice.

If you grow roses where the wind patterns are more likely to drop the mites that vector RRD, then roses there are more likely to get RRD.

If you grow roses in a wind tunnel-like situation, like between two houses where the wind speed doesn't slow down, but increases (venturi effect), those roses are less likely to have mites land on them.

In my gardens, I have one bed that has had RRD more often than any others. It has our garage plus a big ole arbor contributing to making it a drop zone. I live with that, because it's what I see when I look out my kitchen windows and I can't move the kitchen.

Thank you, Ann, that's a great point. That RRD rose is by itself near the mailbox, there are no neighbors with roses nearby. My other 40+ safe roses are in the backyard. My house is 2-story tall, so that ought to block the wind.

Probably a mite hitched on that rose in Home Depot's outdoor center where it sat next to many Knock-outs, plus others from different nurseries. It was healthy and loaded with blooms, that's why I bought it last June. After putting in the ground, it gave me 3 distorted bloom, and nothing else for last year. It always have this bronzy-sick color since last July.

I dug up the plant, plus the soil, and trashed it. One site said NOT to plant anything there for 2 years, since a tiny root left behind had been known to infect another rose planted in the same spot. Then I sprayed the entire area with Windex. Why? Windex had been known to trigger asthma attacks. In microbiology class, we tested Windex against 90% alcohol and it was just as effective in killling germs. My kid uses Windex to zap ants in the kitchen. Ants hate it more than alcohol.

I also wiped my shovel and pruners with alcohol. I'm leaning toward buying from mail-ordered nurseries. The well-run nurseries have tight control on what's in stock, whereas Home Depot is like a middle man who collects many items from different nuseries. Burling from Burlington Roses, CA, roots all her roses, and if she sees something not right, she trashes it - that's a very good watch over the health of her plants.

Near the mailbox - do you have your lawn treated for weeds?

Wind doesn't only blow in 1 direction. I too live in a 2-story home and on more than 1 occasion, our patio umbrella in the back yard has been launched like a projectile by fierce winds.

You may want to reconsider Windex as a soil additive since you state your soil is already alkaline. Windex rings in around 10 on the pH meter.

Hi Henry: No, I don't treat my lawn for weeds. It's an advanced case of Rose Rosette Diesase, I already trashed the whole rose, including the soil. I don't plant anything in that spot for the next 2 years. Windex sprayed lightly on surface soil will be washed away by rain. Rain water is acidic at pH 5.0 to 5.6.

Wow, interesting. My soil lacks the intelligence to repel liquids in the same manner.

Hence the expression, "Dumb as dirt"? Kim