Hi Colleen, these will respond best to the "total parental nutrition life support" regimen. Depending upon their size, start them off in a one, two or five gallon can. You want the size appropriate to the size of their root ball, then pot them up to the next larger size as they develop root balls. Use whatever premium potting soil you prefer. Feed regularly and generously, with a combination of inorganic and organic fertilizer. I prefer a water soluble All Purpose (again, your choice) used at half strength combined with an All Purpose organic. Feed at half the intervals directed on the labels and use half the strength. If the label says one tablespoon per gallon of water, use half tablespoon per gallon. If it says feed every two weeks, feed every week. If it says to provide the plant two cups per feeding, provide one cup. Same with the organic fertilizer. Instead of feast or famine, you want regular availability of the food so the plant is stimulated into growing at a steady (or as steady as the heat and light, with the genetics of the rose will allow) rate.

Give the plants morning sun, which is cooler without the cooking heat of afternoon sun, unless the fog prevents this, then afternoon is what you have to use. Ideally, you give them the best of everything, including good growth light without the heat stress of being cooked by the hottest sun. That is very climate dependent. If you don't get sun until afternoon, that's what you have to use. You just don't want to bake them with extreme heat.

Once they begin pushing growth, do not let them flower. The plants will either flower or grow. It's your choice which you prefer them to do. Preventing them from setting and maturing flowers will stimulate them to push new growth in an effort to flower again.

If it's necessary for you to spray in your climate/garden to maintain healthy, unmolested foliage, then you have to spray. If you're fortunate not to have to, great.

As they increase in plant and root size, pot them in the next appropriate can size as required. Your goal is to give them everything they require to start a steady rate of growth and maintain it, putting all of their energy into plant development instead of flowering. The more wood and foliage they generate, the faster they will begin to grow. Depending upon their genetics, the conditions under which you can grow them and the resources you provide, you might have the maturity and size plants you desire in the first year. Any reduction in the quality or quantity of those variables can increase the time required for the results desired. But, this works consistently with all types of roses, and is often the only way to push really obstinate, weak growers into developing into acceptable (or as acceptable as possible) specimen of their type. Good luck! Kim

Wow! This is what I was hoping for and more.

Thanks, Kim, for the clear, precise instructions. Your wisdom will guide me not only with these two, but with other reluctant types in the future.

Colleen

Great! I'm glad. You're welcome! You can honestly accomplish the same thing with any rose which seems to need a "push". It is most spectacular with really weak "dawgs" like Dove, Grey Pearl, Angel Farce, Sterling Silver, etc. You can ALMOST generate decent plants from them using this technique. You don't HAVE to do it, but if you do, you can force growth out of really stingy growers and you can push maturity out of slow to mature plants in a season or two.

I've previously taken three and five gallon climbing Teas, Noisettes and yellow Tea-Noisettes, all types which are very often glacially slow to develop, and pushed them into fifteen gallon size specimen in one summer (of course, MY summer, not yours). I think you'll be quite surprised at the results! Have fun! Kim

So Kim, would you suggest this regimen for tiny bands which will arrive in the Spring. Would bands receive a quart pot?
Thanks.
Susan

In OUR conditions, Susan, I put bands into 1-G. pots.

They stay in those until we can see roots out the bottom, then they go up to 5-G. When they're bursting the seams in a 5-G, we figger they're ready for the ground.

My only caution is that 1-G plants are very vulnerable in hot weather in particular. We have been gone for 4 days. Before we left, we set up a sprinkler to "rain" on the 1-G plants for a minute each day. We've started yet another heatwave here, but the pots came through in great shape.

And given the predicted temps, we'll be watering them daily for the next few days.

Jeri

I agree with Jeri. Anything smaller goes directly into a gallon can until it's obvious it wants a larger size. Her heat isn't quite up to mine (neither is yours). We're over a hundred here today and they're saying to expect 100 - 106 tomorrow. I have two and three gallon canned roses where they receive a few hours of morning sun; potted in moisture control soil and they dry out in ONE day in these conditions. I'm not fertilizing any time the temps are this extreme, but I am watering copiously. As intense as it is, ANY moisture on the foliage fries it immediately, so I'll water after sun down and flood them two or three times so it soaks in.

As long as the temps remain lower than high nineties, I fertilize the canned roses, but with COPIOUS water before, after and regularly. I'll water them VERY well after the sun moves away from them, let them absorb it a while, then lightly fertilize them. An hour or so after fertilizing them, I hit them with water again. They grow like weeds with no disease due to the high heat here. I know your conditions are quite different, and I'm not suggesting you follow my exact method for fertilizing. I simply want to give you an idea of what has been working quite well here so you can modify it for your situation. Good luck! Kim

Kim, total newbie question here. I have some bands and some 1 gals own roots. Would your method work for those?

And how big of a clay pot should I get for the next size up? 10, 12, 14 inch, or? I don't know how much each size holds, and I've got some of each size.

I am definitely going to do this with some of my bands...and yes to the nighttime watering for the mo'. It's nasty hot, and the winds are starting...so it will be lots of root watering for now.

Best-
Herding Cats

Absolutely this will work for bands as well as one gallons, whether they are own root or budded. You absolutely do NOT want clay pots, period. Clay, terra cotta, is a cooking utensil. It absorbs, holds and radiates heat and can easily cook a plant to death. Ceramic pots are Corning Ware. Plain old black plastic nursery cans are significantly better than either clay or glazed ceramic. While they will be hot while the sun shines directly on them, they will release the heat and begin to cool of tremendously faster than a cooking utensil.

The best would be wood, foam, concrete, something either dense enough to insulate or which contains enough air spaces in it to insulate.

If you have a band, you want a one gallon can. If you have a one gallon can, you want a two gallon. Once the one gallon outgrows that size, you put it up into a two. You up size a two to a three; a three to a five; a five to a seven; a seven to a ten or fifteen gallon. How far you do depends upon the results you desire.

Whatever you currently have in clay pots, cluster them somehow to shield them from direct sun shine on their sides. It is like putting a frying pan on an electric or gas burner. If you have plants in plastic pots, cluster them around the clay ones to use them as shade for the clay pot sides. It will make a huge difference in nasty hot weather. They won't dry out as quickly and the plants will
actually begin to show some development rather than sitting looking stressed, or actually shrinking due to their root system (digestive tract) being destroyed by the extreme heat.

If you must use clay, you may use bubble wrap inside the pots against the sides to insulate against them cooking the roots. Line the inside sides with the bubble wrap, not the bottom, then pot the plant inside the opening. It will work for a while, though the bougainvillea in the clay pot on my rear southern facing deck has been in its clay pot, insulated with bubble wrap, for the past three years and it's doing great. Kim

I'm sorry, I forgot your size question. A one gallon pot is about 6" in diameter. Two gallons is roughly 8"; three gallon is about 10". They taper, as you know, so perhaps putting a gallon into an 8" or 10" clay or tapered pot might work, as long as any root ball already formed fits well in the bottom of the pot with the taper. If you want to insulate the inside with bubble wrap, of course you would want to jump a size, so put a gallon into a 10" with the inside lined with bubble wrap. Kim

Had NO clue about the clay pots...thanks sooooooo much. I will leave the ones in the black nursery cans, and, once it cools off a tad, I'll move the bands I put into clay back into nursery cans.

I did cluster the pots, but exactly opposite from what you suggest...I put the clay outside so it would shield the black cans. I had the idea, lol, just backwards.

I do have an Eden climber who is brilliantly happy in a huge clay pot...but it's not new. It's older (I bought it older, and have had it for about 2 years now).

I will make my adjustments this morning, before the heat, and give some extra water this morning. Once it cools down, I'll start the 1/2 strength, continual feeding you've suggested...

Thanks so much.

Best-
Herding Cats

You're welcome! I'm glad I could help give you some ideas. If your climate is milder, more coastal without the extremes in heat and sun brilliance we're getting inland SoCal now, you probably don't have to move them out of clay pots. When I worked in Pacific Palisades, two blocks from the ocean, we often used clay pots to provide the necessary heat many plants (including roses during much of the year, definitely citrus and other fruit as well as Plumeria) required but didn't receive without the solar collection the ceramic and clay pots accomplished.

It all depends upon your climate. I can't put pots on hardscape here without cooking them to death, unless they are huge pots, where the sheer size of the damp soil ball insulates, protecting the roots. On wood or the ground, it works OK. At the beach, I frequently had to put these types of pots on hardscape to get the plants warm enough to push flowers and ripen fruit. Tomatoes, oranges and strawberries usually tasted like crap there because there wasn't enough heat to induce them to form the sugars to ripen. Clay pots on concrete patios, and against stucco or block walls "cooked" them enough to form the sugars needed to generate the tastes expected. Move inland just a few miles and that extra heat collection and radiation can flat out kill the same plants in the same pots. So, adjust that to your conditions and climate, too. Most plants will respond well to warmer roots, growing, maturing and performing much more to your expectations, unless that heat level approaches the threshold where the heat over stresses them and eventually cooks them. Kim

This is the kind of experience and wisdom that cannot be gleaned from a book. Thanks Jeri and Kim for spending time helping us newbies.
Susan

You're welcome Susan! I'm glad I could share my experiences with such "exploration". I know you'll have fun exploring on your own! Good luck. Kim

Thanks for these tips, Kim. Not to hijack the thread, but this is related and perhaps the OP and others can benefit.

My new Granada and Angel Face bands from Vintage will arrive early next week, and I plan to put them in 1-gal black plastic pots. I'll be sure to pinch off any buds. My favorite fertilizer for containers is Foliage-Pro 9-3-6 from Dyna-Gro. I've noticed a big difference in our other container plants since I began using it, at half-strength 1-2 times/week. Would you suggest mixing some homemade compost with the potting mix as a slower-acting organic boost?

We also have a weak "dawg" Angel Face in the garden that needs an extra boost -- would you suggest I move it to a large pot, or just give it the 5-star treatment where it is, as you recommend for Peace and Sterling Silver?

Hi Jenn, you're welcome! Congratulations on obtaining the Granada and Angel Face bands. That's quite a score! Personally, I don't mix anything homemade with potting soil. Potting soil, if it's any good, is formulated for drainage. Homemade compost may not drain properly and could rot out your new bands (or anything else you pot in it). I would use the potting soil of your choice and mulch the tops of the pots with your compost. Let it do what it would be doing in the garden. Keep it on the surface where it will be warmer and break down, releasing its nourishment faster.

I'd leave the planted Angel Face in the ground. Why set it back anymore by chopping off any of its roots? Mulch, feed and water it well (or appropriate to its drainage), disbud it and pray for the best. It can't hurt it. Digging it up, can. Good luck! Kim

Why is Angel Face referred to as a hard to grow "dawg"? I purchased my Angel Face about a year and a half ago from a local nursery. I believe it was in a three gallon pot. After planting out, it has been extremely vigorous and in constant bloom. It's treated no differently than any of my other roses. The only thing I can think of is that this rose responds in a drastically different way in different climates. I'm genuinely curious because I would like to acquire more of these dawgs. Diane

Kim, thanks. Would you suggest feeding AF (the one in the ground) as you instructed above - half as much fertilizer, twice as often?

Angel Face own root is a slow grower. Angel Face grafted onto Dr. Huey made a nice bush in my yard. My grafted Angel Face finally declined due to Mosaic Virus but it was pretty old. Love Potion own root has a similar perfume but different look. It's a better grower than Angel on its own roots.

I have a question about an own root Royal Highness. This was a band 3 years ago and has since been planted out. It does nada. No growth, no blooms- As if it was plastic. It was making slow growth in a pot but has now decided it will have 2 canes and no more. Is this a weakling own root or should it be given more time. I had a grafted one years ago and loved it. I just ordered a brides dream from Rosemania to see if I liked it more. My Royal Highness has a great spot and the Oklahoma and Johann Stauss nearby are going to town. Is that rose better off back in a pot?

You're going to find many roses really don't perform all that well own root compared to the same rose budded. Not all rose roots are created equal. There are great differences not only in vigor of root system, but the individual rose root system's ability to absorb nutrients from different soil types.

Potted, even the weakest will perform better because the drainage is usually quite good; the soil is nicely balanced and nutrients much more readily available because of soil composition as well as warmer temps compared to the ground. Putting that plant into the ground can set it back, which is why I suggest growing it to nearly the size you desire before planting it. Of course, for rather vigorous types which grow larger, faster, that isn't usually necessary, but if you have one (or several) which just want to sit and take their own sweet time, keeping them potted until they are about the size you want before planting is usually a whole lot more satisfactory.

If it's already in the ground and you feel you can repot it without disturbing the roots significantly and setting it even further back, go for it. Otherwise, just do the best you can to push it in place and hope for the best.

You'll hear some say they have the rose in question and it's done just fine, and that's likely so. But, unless they have the identical site, soil, drainage, heat, water, climate, etc. as yours, it doesn't compare. Perhaps their soil is more potting soil like, where yours is more clay? Or, yours receives hotter sun, maybe in a hotter situation or climate? There are just too many variables to consider, all of which can easily explain why yours isn't doing as well as someone elses' might be. Ki