Stephen, if you're finished, congrats!! It was a wonderful weekend to be outside. Hope you didn't get sunburned! I've been finished for a couple weeks but I'm still healing - I've got a large thorn still working its way out of my thumb. Ouch. This weekend I got out the shovel and played in the dirt, digging up perennials and moving them around (to what I *hope* will be better spots), and dividing daylillies. I also hit the local nurseries for the first time this year. Didn't buy much. Yes, that means I did buy a few things. They always get me with those $4 small pot perennials. My 10 month old walked in the grass in bare feet for the first time this weekend - now it really doesn't get much better than that!

Glad to help! If you're happy with how the rose looks there's not usually a wrong way to do such things. In my yard, I probably am not as enthusiastic about cutting my laterals way back unless they're actively annoying me, since I want to keep the laterals as the blooming canes when convenient. I just bend those laterals sideways like I bend the main cane sideways, and then the laterals put out more laterals that put out more laterals...and the climber starts building that fan shape. You don't have to do that, but it helps increase the blooming over time. Those skinny lateral canes will fatten up if you leave them, rather than making that cane start over to produce new blooming canes. Not wrong to remove them if they bug you, but there's a tradeoff in blooming profusion and frequency. I also don't cut back canes where the leaves are unsightly since you want maximum canes to support more leaf and bloom development. If you can't stand the sight of the leaves it's OK to remove them, but the plant still benefits from the leaves even if there are holes. There's some sort of formula for maybe 35 leaves to support one bloom to keep in mind to increase blooming. Not set in stone of course, but I like to leave as many healthy canes and tolerable leaves as possible when pruning. Sounds like you did a great job getting things tidied up. Having a garden that brings you joy is part of the point of the activity and it sounds like you were getting tired in a good cause. Cynthia

Vaporvac - These are photos of Pope John Paul - this spring. It was the first rose to open in my garden, although roses are late by a week or two here. I'm enjoying this rose. It is very fragrant. The blooms are very large in comparison to Julia Child which are small blooms. If you cut a bloom and bring it into the house, they last a long time in a vase. They open slowly on the bush, which seems to cause the outer petals to look older before the bloom has even finished opening. That seems to be it's only flaw that I can tell, which I can live with. Even if you remove the outer petals, it's still a gorgeous bloom with a lot of petals. I was thinking today, it might be that I will enjoy it more if I cut the blooms soon after they start to open and enjoy most of them in the house. I suppose that would encourage it to push out more blooms as well? The shrub itself has clean foliage at this point, with a few minor bug damage to a few of the leaves. I haven't gotten photos of Beverly or Savannah yet. Savannah had some issue with disease at the end of the season last year, and got off to a rocky start this year. But I cut it all back close to the ground and it pushed up a lot of healthy canes that have buds on them. Opening later than the others. I'll come back and post photos of those two soon.

Having one of those Climate Change Mild Winters so far. I'm waiting for the cold to creep in and stay so that I know things are dormant and I cull some of these down. Anybody else here waiting for Ma Nature to put things to sleep