Lol about the squirrel & thank you for the info

As Holly suggested, spraying with milk is moderately effective - of course it washes off & you need to reapply after each rain. You could try the milk and see if that's enough to keep your rose clean. My neighbor who has three HTs by his porch buys Immunox in an aerosol can at Home Depot. Since you only use a small amount each time you spray, one can lasts a season for him. I agree with Mad Gallica that you don't want to buy a pump sprayer and a gallon of tebuconazole for one rose.

I actually went ahead and ordered the Bayer fungicide and a sprayer from Amazon as I do plan to plant more roses next year. This rose was meant to be a learning experience for me as it has been. The black spot has indeed spread but right now the leaves are still green and the stuff is supposed to Be here tomorrow so we will see how it helps. It did just start growing its first bud so hopefully I'll at least get to see it bloom

"Fungicides don't kill insects, they kill fungi. Insecticides kill insects and earthworms"

I'm afraid you could be wrong...found this very interesting site:

When researchers collected pollen from hives on the east coast pollinating cranberry, watermelon and other crops and fed it to healthy bees, those bees showed a significant decline in their ability to resist infection by a parasite called Nosema ceranae. The parasite has been implicated in Colony Collapse Disorder though scientists took pains to point out that their findings do not directly link the pesticides to CCD. The pollen was contaminated on average with nine different pesticides and fungicides though scientists discovered 21 agricultural chemicals in one sample. Scientists identified eight ag chemicals associated with increased risk of infection by the parasite.

Most disturbing, bees that ate pollen contaminated with fungicides were three times as likely to be infected by the parasite.

http://qz.com/107970/scientists-discover-whats-killing-the-bees-and-its-worse-than-you-thought/

while we're on the topic. Imidacloprid (Koinor etc)

Recent research suggests that widespread agricultural use of imidacloprid and other pesticides may be contributing to honey bee colony collapse disorder, the decline of honey bee colonies in Europe and North America observed since 2006.[8][9][10] As a result, several countries have restricted use of imidacloprid and other neonicotinoids.[8] In January 2013, the European Food Safety Authority stated that neonicotinoids pose an unacceptably high risk to bees, and that the industry-sponsored science upon which regulatory agencies' claims of safety have relied, may be flawed, or even deceptive.[11][12]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imidacloprid

just a little food for thought. If bees, frogs collapse, we're close behind.

Just how much of a danger to bees are Hybrid teas if they are cut well before them become open blooms with exposed pollen? Which would be the better alternative, providing no sources of pollen for bees or providing plentiful alternate sources, such as wildflowers grown sans pesticides, if you do grow HTs in a cutting garden? John Mattia, our resident Guru on exhibiting roses, has suggested that rosarians interesting in exhibiting HTs should practice all summer to gain experience in cutting HTs at the perfect moment to display them at the rose show.

I've found in high BS affected areas (and believe me, Michigan is a HIGH BS pressure area) you have two choices. Search and experiment until you find the roses that are the most resistant to the strain that effects your area. A rose could be terrible in TN but good in MA or vice versa. You just never know until you grow it in your yard. Or learn to live with some spots. I've chosen to live with some spots.from time to time. I love my roses, and while spotty leaves are not my favorite, I grow them for the blooms. My roses bloom all season with or without spots.

A complex topic. First it is my contention that all fungicides and pesticides are potentially dangerous. If the components kill living organisms (including fungus) they may not be all that good for us or other living creatures. But we live in a world where there are crops we want or need to grow so we occasionally need to rescue palnts from pests and diseases.

We grow trial fields and have approximately 25,000 roses at any given time in the fields. We are also a certified organic farm. We also have about 16 honey bee hives on the property. We do not suffer from hive collapse. For me the real test of the the health of our environment is how our native bee populations are fairing. This year it is a fantastic collection of wild bees feeding on many different plants we keep on the property to feed the pollinators. Yes, in our trial fields there are certain roses mostly single and semi-double rose flowers that attract pollinators. The bees love Lemon Fizz Kolorscape. To be clear roses are not nectar plants but do have pollen that attracts pollinators

We do spray and like many other rose growers we suffer from pests such as spider mites and flower thrips that can get out of hand. We use organic approved "natural sprays" such as pyrethrin. BT , spinosid and others approved for organic use. But these pesticides can also have a negative impact on pollinators too. So what we look for is organically approved pesticides which have a very short life. They will dissipate quite quickly after application. We also carefully time sprays to avoid the time when the bees will be actively feeding on plants -we spray very early morning or in the evening when bees stop feeding. We monitor all crops with traps to see the insect levels in the area and only spray when the numbers of a particular pest is too large to ignore. We use as many other techniques of controlling pests without using pesticides as possible. We never use fungicides as our goal is to select roses with natural disease resistance.

As far as roses and fungal diseases -there is a revolution going on in hybridizing. New rose varieties are being created that are a huge improvement over older ones with regard to resistance to fungal diseases. Not perfect yet, but good enough to allow everyone to stop spraying fungicides on roses. It is not just shrubs but also new HTs that have exceptional resistant to the fungal diseases. Search them out and replace those sick roses.

My pet peeve in rose care is the "all in one" - the systemic rose care food and long acting fungicides and insecticides one adds to the soil. This is terrible stuff for the environment! First it is toxic over many months and kills many beneficial insects. It is used long before there is a problem so it may be unnecessary. It is dangerous to people and pets. I would love to see these products banned from use.

So advice to home gardeners is use natural methods first. Use a hose and blow the aphids off the plant or if a big problem an insecticidal soap. Spider mites love hot dry weather. If you are have problems use over head sprinklers on the foliage and perhaps blasting the undersides of leaves with a hose may help bring things back into balance. Flower thrips - well I have no good answers as they are always a problem for us because they come to our crops from the hay fields surrounding us. All I know is if you are really going to try and control them you have to start right at bud crack be cause if the flower is open forget it. I don't have some of the other nasties like Japanese Beetles or Chili Thrips so no advice there. I do believe we should be tolerant of the natural order and try and live as gently on the earth as we can.

Blue cups covered with canola oil will catch thrips--I still see a few of them on the roses but white flowers look pretty clean. I find that I can catch a lot of insects like leafhoppers when the weather cools down at sunset. Aphids are easily brushed off roses. I've been making my yard more bird friendly--the hardware cloth fence used around my mini roses to keep rabbits away doubles as a perch for small brown birds.

After I read about the blue cups on this forum we are using them as a trial in our fields - thanks to those who suggested them.

A possible advantage of a colder climate like 5A versus 7 or 8 is that you have less fungi overwintering in the canes and leaves--you can just whack everything to the ground and start over in the spring--one might reasonably assume that exposed HT canes aren't going to survive a zone 5 winter. Removing leaves with a leafblower or rake should be easier if there isn't any cane above soil level. But, cutting climbers and Teas to the ground every year is likely to be a disaster--they need lots of cane to survive over the winter to do well.

I remove leaves because they turn into a slimy mess and canker the canes in my climate. They also harbor BS spores that will reinfect the plant. Where do you think the BS spores that get into the mulch come from? As for your garden, you may be growing good varieties of roses that don't get BS. But, this discussion is presumably about what to do about growing varieties of roses that do have a susceptibility to black spot. One assumes that shovel pruning the offenders is not an option.

This discussion is about a rose that got too much water from the rain water spout that she admitted got a lot of rain from a huge rain storm.

"Thank you! And I was wondering if the downspout could be causing issues. I don't water that particular area when we have had rain due to that spout. I will look for the attachment.". We all saw in the news 1000 years storm. Huge rain in the Mid Atlantic area.

Seil is right weather related. Last year it was The Boston area and Houston TX with the flooding rain. This year it was West Virginia.

Leave it alone.

Touting Bayer fungicide for 15 years. How long is enough to stop spraying chemicals? 35 years? 50 years? Do you own stock in the company? You have her dousing it in chemicals that may be banned in Maryland soon. How do you know there is no kids or dogs there? Dr Kuska says it is an endocrine disruptor. It effects children 20 or 30 years. I am sure the poor guy has better things to do than bickering about the health effects of tebuconazole. What if a dog wipes past and gets the chemical on them? You can't control where a dog or cat is gonna go.

The chemical you are talking about is banned in New York State and Banned in the European Union.

Speaking of being out of line. Here is one 3 years ago.

buford(7 NE GA)

May 28, 2013 at 2:57PM

Strawberry Hill, if you used the Bayer Advanced Disease Control and you still had blackspot and defoliation, you were doing something wrong.

So I don't know what happened here but I can say that 1. The rose didn't get too much water, if anything, it hasn't had enough. 2. I'm even more confused about what to do about this than I was when I asked for help. 3. Now I'm worried about spraying the Bayer as I have a large dog & my neighbor has an outdoor cat...

We all just watched the news and saw the heavy rains flooding West Virginia and Maryland.

In this thread two separate people are saying their dogs had seizures.

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1617782/bayer-advanced-all-in-one-rose-and-flower-care-question?n=25

Thanks Zack for the sensible response.

I read the whole answer to the link you posted. Good Info.

http://www.gardensalive.com/product/yes-you-can-protect-your-roses-from-dread-diseases

That's why I always tell folks with disease-prone roses—again, all of this advice applies to battling ANY disease, not just black spot— to remove all the old mulch from around their plants VERY early in the Spring, replace it with an inch of fresh compost on top of the soil, and replace THAT with a fresh inch once a month throughout the season.

So just so people realize I really do have an issue and am not jumping the gun this is what the rose looks like now.

I wish you all the best vallkyrie1979!

hi Valkyrie

Could you perhaps lift the rose higher, using any really good soil - stuff that has life in it? and perhaps put it in a spot with all the morning sun it can get?

I looked at your rose and it seems like there might be damping up around that area?

if you leave it in that spot, when you lift it, if you decide to do that, maybe you can check the drainage, and add some mychorrizal fungi underneath the roots?

That may be possible. If things didn't go well with what is there now I thought about putting in a raised bed (mostly cause no matter what I do the grass keeps invading. Lol ). It gets full morning sun from 7a- around 2p right now. The shadowing was from my body & from the garden flag as it was windy this morning. And it stormed a lot last night so that's why it looks really wet

Unfortunately every location/garden can be different and have different challenges...Some areas there are just fewer choices because the disease pressure is much higher than in other areas...

As you gain experience with rose growing you will start to understand more and more what will work and what will not work in your own garden...

Please come back in the future vallkyrie1979 and share how your making out...And best of luck! Thanks...

Good luck Valkyrie!

I am accustomed to seeing a lot of bs as an organic gardener and especially if you live in Canada too where a lot of chemicals are banned from sale. I just accept that it is part of growing roses. The newer roses are more resistant but by late summer and early fall, most of my roses would have bs anyway. Since I live in a colder zone, it doesn't really matter since growing season is over anyways.

I do not spray as I believe it goes back into the land and water which eventually will come back to us. Therefore I am willing to tolerate bs for our health.

Since you don't want to spray, watch the rose and see what it does. If you can, remove all the leaves that have blackspots on them now. That might keep it from spreading. If you find that this rose (did we ever get which rose it is?) continues to spot, you may want to consider another. Ask rosarians in your neck of the woods what roses do well without spray.

It's a Sundowner. I don't think taking off the spotted leaves would help right now as i would be taking off all but the very top layer. It has a bud forming at the top & is now growing taller instead of being short & bushy. I would like to see it bloom at least once. Then after that I guess I will decide if I should shovel prune it. It's supposed to storm today so I'm sure it will be spreading.

I am going to try the cornmeal spread under my recently planted roses & will let you know if that helps prevent new outbreak. I can't yet handle mulch bags & where there's old mulch has been hit hard w/bs. Someone earlier posted about fresh, thick mulch keeping bs away & they are right. On the other end of the bed, a friend spread about 4" of mulch for me & there's very little bs. I wish I had had enough $ to mulch the entire bed!

Hang in there, vallkyrie. Growing roses can be an adventure, learning what works for you.

I think new mulch can help. Many rosarians remove the old mulch at the beginning of spring to get rid of the blackspot spores that are in it and put down fresh mulch, which would be clean. But over time, the new mulch will collect blackspot spores.

To me, this is a mild case of blackspot. I would not remove the leaves. As long as they are green, they are productive, which a new plant needs.

Those of us who are in blackspot-prone areas have been through this, so don't despair. We can help find other varieties that are easier to care for, and just as lovely.

I agree with Diane - this is a pretty mild case that it looks like the rose can shake off without too much trouble for the time being. We tend to be a bit overprotective of our roses, but there's some indication that they can build up some resistance over time if we let them. Paul Zimmerman has posted about this at times on his website.

I always find that less is better when it comes to rose treatments, in cases like this.

Cynthia

I haven't ever pulled off the blackspotted leaves unless they were completely dead. Is taking off blackspotted leaves a generally recommended practice in a high blackspot area? (She asked with trepidation, fearful of setting off another argument O-o! ) I take away the ones that fall off, in hopes of removing some sources of further infection.

There is a laundry list of things that are recommended in so-called high blackspot areas. In those areas they might work. However, in the true world capital of blackspot, the Mid-Atlantic, they have little or no effect. It's why it is important to know where you are, and where the people you are listening to are. I wouldn't pull off infected leaves, or even pick them up. Too much work. What I do do is grow roses that don't have much trouble with blackspot. So I grow a lot of once-bloomers and other unfashionable types.

I have not gardened in the mid Atlantic where you are, but here in the piedmont of NC, even blackspot resistant roses get blackspot. I don't worry too much about it, but if there is a widely accepted/recommended practice, I try it. I find cleaning up the fallen leaves does help. I have under 50 roses, so it doesn't take too long. I sometimes enjoy it, because I get really close to the roses and examine them.

I would love to hear of some more suitable choices for this area, hopefully not all knockouts. :p. Not that I mind them but I already have two (those are doing spectacular btw no bs at all on them). I wanted to try Good Ol Summertime. Anyone have any idea how it would do around here?

If you are at all interested in a climber, my Harlekin aka Kiss of Desire has never had any blackspot. It's been very floriferous & a quickly established bush on its own roots. I am zone 7, also, but am in the warmer end of 7. I am sure you get more winter than we do, but maybe not a lot more. Check it out on hmf

For black-spot resistance, check out roses bred by Kordes. If you're planning ahead for next year's garden, take a look at Palatine roses online. Great selection and many Kordes varieties. Personally I find that the thicker and shinier the leaves, the better the blackspot resistance. I am sure that's an over generalization, but you do see the shiny healthy leaves on many Kordes roses.

Drift roses do extremely well here - you should edge your Knock-outs with Drifts LOL. I'm concerned that you are thinking about mail ordering a rose for summer delivery and that troubles me... spending several days in a box traveling across country in July would be pretty hard on a rose.

I'm in SE Virginia and am adding more Kordes roses. I strongly prefer own-root roses, so I am getting mine from Roses Unlimited. Lions Rose has been outstanding, blooms steadily and has beautiful dark green shiny foliage. It's basically a white rose but has beautiful apricot tones in spring and fall. Sunny KnockOut looks a little like Summertime; a very pretty yellow which fades to white creating a pleasing multicolor effect and it is very healthy!

I'd hesitate to recommend Good Ole Summertime; it was bred from an Austin rose and they are very difficult to grow here EVEN if you spray!

Oh! and I second cecily's recommendation of Drift Roses. The best are Peach, Apricot, and Sweet. (Coral is pretty but prone to mildew-- can be cut down to 12 inches in spring which helps). Healthy and great repeat bloom. Drifts are landscape roses; I put Peach Drift right outside the kitchen window where I can see it from the sink!

The only Kordes I have that is bullet proof is a groundcover rose called Roseberry blanket. I bought 6 years ago from J&P. I believe they are now marketed as the Vigarosa line, this is Raspberry Vigarosa. It's a low mounding bush with small leaves and flowers. The flowers on this one are very red and bloom in clusters. It also sets nice hips if you don't prune it in late summer. Never has black spot ever. It's mostly a landscape rose, doesn't have the same impact as an HT, but I like it for certain spots. Here is a picture of it in my yard earlier this year. I like the contrast with the red and the greens.

Cecily, I was asking so I can start planning for next year. I'm not adding anything this year and thank you everyone for your suggestions. I'm looking into them all :)

I kept thinking about this post as I worked in the garden yesterday. I do spray some of my roses to thwart fungal disease. I don't get involved in many conversation about spraying, I don't like participating in online conflict. So I was thinking how there must be others like me who'd prefer to avoid the drama, and because we don't share there's an absence of advice & experience for people who might like it.

Here are a few random thoughts that came to me yesterday.

I watch a rose before I decide to spray. But on the either hand I sometimes do treat a young rose to give it a good start. Roses need their leaves to absorb energy and thrive, and defoliation in the first year is a bad way to start.

Happy healthy roses are less prone to BS. Roses like full sun, good soil, good air circulation, and new roses can take a while to establish a strong root system. Ask yourself if the rose is getting what it needs. You may find that improving a rose's conditions dramatically improves its disease resistance.

Someone suggested removing the affected leaves and I would not recommend that on large scale, but particularly for roses grown close to a wall ( less than ideal location since roses like good circulation) something I have found helpful is to remove the lower leaves, especially anything that touches the ground. This improves air circulation and minimizes contact with splashed water.

As my garden has grown I have slowly eliminated BS prone roses and listened to the experience of other growers to select BS resistant varieties. Since BS seems to be region specific this has been some trial and error but I enjoy the collecting, building, and improving aspect of gardening.

Don't try to grow Iceberg roses.

So I would just like to thank everyone for your help & suggestions. As far as the rose goes this is what it looks like now.

Thank you for not ordering roses in the heat of summer. I can stop worrying now (smile). Ordering roses online is a slippery slope because so many are available at your fingertips. The abundance of possibilities is overwhelming and many claim to be disease resistant. If you wanted a new rose or two this summer, Behnke's nursery in Beltsville, MD has a large selection of roses. I haven't been there this spring so I can't quote specific varieties (I don't go there deliberately - my yard is full).

Underpruning is the concept of removing the lower leaves of a HT since they're just gonna get spotty and fall off anyway. Don't do this with little guys. I wouldn't remove that central cane either - wait 'til next spring to shape him. Growing a young rose in a pot for a year or two would lift it up off the ground and accomplish the same thing. Once you start growing roses, you develop a radar for roses and you notice them in other people's yards. The HTs that are vigorous enough to survive no spray around here (like Queen Elizabeth and Frederick Mistral) will be five or six feet tall but only the top eighteen inches of each cane has foliage. Folks are steering you toward shrub roses that will keep more of their foliage because a big, naked rose does not enhance your landscaping.

Yes, clearing the center to improve circulation is a good idea.

Valkyrie, I think your rose actually looks pretty good, all things considered. Since you are new to roses, I think you should give yourself some time and figure out what your own personal level of bs tolerance is. In my experience, honestly, I don't think you run the risk of killing the rose by not spraying. I grow over 200 roses, and I don't spray. Some of them get bs, some of them don't. As an example, I have had Joasine Hanet for about 10 years. Every year, about this time, she gets bs, but she just keeps growing and blooming - she's a big healthy thing with never a sign of die-back. I think most of them sort of just shake it off. The few who don't, well, if they are weakened enough to die off over a cold winter, then I guess they are just not hardy in my garden (and truly, I have not had a lot of cases where this happens - mainly its when I know I'm kind of pushing things zone-wise). For me personally, spraying isn't worth it. Due to my work, the amount of gardening time I have is pretty limited, and I really don't want to spend it spraying chemicals. I'm far from 100% organic, but I do try to not use chemicals - I don't like touching them, and I worry about our birds and butterflies, rabbits and all the other creatures in the garden (and the humans too!!) I want my garden to be beautiful, but it doesn't have to be perfect. Though for some people, the answer is to only grow very disease resistant roses, for me personally, I deeply love some of the ones (like Joasine, or Mme Isaac Periere, or Zephirine Drouhin) that do get bs - I wouldn't be without them, so I just tolerate the bs. I think those of us who don't garden as a profession are lucky - we don't have to please a client, just ourselves and the people and creatures we share our gardens with. So since I really, really don't think some bs is going to kill your rose, then if I were you, I'd just give it some thought and decide if the bs bothers you too much, in which case, yes, spray (probably not a bad idea to research organic sprays, however, like the milk one people suggested in this thread); or if maybe you can live with it as it is. And I'd also highly recommend getting more roses, lol! That way, the ones that stay healthy and blooming will distract you from the ones that are troubled by bs. Good luck with your rose and your garden!!!

YES YES YES Finally someone got it right!!!!!!!!!!! Thank you frances_in_nj(z6 NJ)

Thank you frances. This is kind of what I've decided to do. I'm just watching it. It keeps plugging along even with the bs. I've decided to let it be for this year at least. When the leaves start to yellow I go ahead and pull them. The newer leaves are higher off the ground now and more spaced out so they don't seem to be getting the bs quite as fast as the ones that came before them. And it is starting to bud so I figure it must be at least a little happy. I still haven't fertilized it at all. I figure if it comes back next year and continues to grow, I am pretty tolerant of some bs, like you said, it doesn't have to be perfect and I am hopeful.