I think you could definitely heel in your roses over winter at your new home. I included a link for a few ways to hold on to bare root roses, which is kind of what they will be when you dig them up for transport. I would cut the canes down to 1-2 feet to make them easier to handle and you can lay them in a trench...make sure you cover them with plenty of mulch and plant as soon as the ground is workable in the spring so that new tender roots aren't damaged when they are moved. Watch for heaving during the winter to make sure the roots stay covered with soil or mulch. Another option would be to trim the canes and pot up these roses in nursery containers and overwinter in a sheltered area outside (covered with a pile of leaves/straw mulch), in an unheated garage or basement, or even put the pots in a trench and cover with soil and mulch until spring. If you do pot up and overwinter indoors, I've used a black garbage bag over small potted rose starts to help keep light from triggering weak foliage growth...make sure you cut a generous ventilation hole in the top. If they are healthy, established roses, they should survive the transition fine :) Here is a link that might be useful: heeling in bare root roses

JJ and Lily, I move roses around like they were furniture in a living room. Here is my best experiences. First, when possible, I move them as soon as the dirt is thawed enough to be dug in the spring when they are dormant. Dig the destination holes first. Next, dig a large area around the roots to take as much root with you as possible AND, take as much dirt as possible. I use 2 shovels and place the rose between them before I lift them out. Sort of like a shovel/rose sandwich. Then I place them in their new hole and add water and fill in with dirt. Most often they don’t even know they have been moved. To do it later in the season is tricky. I did it last year. I used old sheets on copper pipe trellises in front of the roses and made sure I watered twice a day. It was 90-100 degrees. I moved 4 of them,and 3 of them were little. The 3 little ones did great. The jury is still out on the larger rose. It’s canes stayed green, but it didn’t grow leaves afterwards, so I’ll find out if it’s alive this spring. Believe it or not, I am going to be moving 3 of those 4 roses again this spring... it’s just the way I do. :) If you like the location, JJ, I would give them another year. Use a good fertilizer (I use Osmocote 1/4 cup per plant early in the spring) and water them well during the season. See if that doesn’t make a difference. Rebecca

Vaporvac, I would love it if you could come. But there aren't any other rose aficionados there. I brought Oranges N Lemons and Sally Holmes last year and there weren't really any takers. The Oranges N Lemons went in the free for all at the end where you just grab whats left but I brought the Sally Holmes home. This year I didn't bring the Gourmet Popcorn I gave away because we hadn't dug it up yet. Instead I advertised it on Nextdoor so someone could research it and really want it. If I thought there would be any interest we would have made more of an effort to get it dug up. In terms of timing they are decided upon a few weeks in advance based on the schedule of the person volunteering to host. BTW, my other Oranges N Lemons I tried to propagate died over the winter in our basement but the Sally Holmes appears to have hung on. It showed a small amount of new growth this spring but is back in the basement due to bad weather. I don't yet know where I will put it if I keep it. The Oranges N Lemons in the yard showed great new growth a month ago but then got badly shredded by the hail. Right now it is looking iffy if it makes it with barely any green on it's little stub of a self. I think if it doesn't I won't replace it with another. We just have bad juju with that rose. First it gets run over with a garden cart the same day it goes in the ground, then the rooting portion dies due to neglect when my mom forgot to water the basement plants while we were on vacation. And now it gets hammered by hail.

Oh....thank you for those suggestions. I just looked them up and they are very pretty! You are on the right track. I see that Pink Pet is not only very disease resistant, but continuous bloom which I haven't had in that area before. Everything I grew there bloomed once and I am still not sure if it is the 6hrs of sun instead of full sun. And actually, it's been awhile since I measured the sunlight and it could be over the last 5 years, the shade has increased. I can't check that until the spring though. Rogue Valley Roses - has 2 Pink Pets - one is a shrub and one a short climber that has a 2nd name, 'Caldwell Pink'. And that one is an Earth Kind rose, which is again, something I would welcome as evidence of it's disease resistance. The "oak eeghislaine Dr feligondKe" is coming up as 'GHISLAINE DE FÉLIGONDE' in a search and is a David Austin rose? HelpMeFind has it as a Hybrid Multiflora with 148 favorite votes! Bred in 1916. Wow. One of the roses that past the 10 yr test in Longwood Gardens. Great great suggestions. I'm going to read up more on them and keep them in mind, but I wonder might you have another suggestion for a dark red rose? I don't have one red in my whole garden and the Penelope is a white with a little apricot in the center, and I'm thinking of something dark to contrast. If I don't find something I really love, I still might consider getting another New Dawn. I really wish I had a larger property with more sun. I can completely understand how anyone who grows even a rose or two, ends up wanting 100 of them! lol