but recently new technology has gotten the best of my family and found my husband was deleting emails through his new phone, Maybe it would be best for you to have your own private email addy just for Garden Web and trades? Below is a link to all of your posts here on The Seed Exchange. You can rule several out, but possibly reading through them will jog your memory and you could email them. Here is a link that might be useful: posts for momgardens1 at Seed Exchange

Sorry for the delayed response. It has been a very hectic past few days! Dumb question. Is RRD contagious? Meaning if I try the wait and see approach (by removing only the impacted canes instead of digging up the whole plant) with the roses who don't seem to have it as bad yet.....will I take a risk that somehow the RRD could get transmitted to the roses who don't have it? I would hate to lose any of the seemingly healthy roses by doing this. Moving forward, is there anything I can do to lessen the chances of the roses getting RRD? This summer Japanese beetles have been widespread in this area. Honestly, I can't ever remember them being this bad before now...or ever even seeing them really. I know of several other people who have knockout roses here and everyone is having the same problem with the Japanese beetles feasting on them. So as bad as it may sound, I can take some solace in knowing it is not just my roses that are getting hit. Is there anything I can spray on the roses to prevent Japanese beetles from attacking them?

The following was stated: "who wrote it knew nothing about roses. KO is a great rose." H.Kuska comment: ? I do not see how one can draw that conclusion from what was written.

Hi CaWill Knockouts in my experience need pruning out of most or even all of last year's canes over an average zone 5 winter. They're billed as being particularly hardy, and while the roses survive zone 5 fine for the most part, they're definitely not cane hardy. What you describe sounds perfectly normal for Knockouts in cold zones. Just continue to do like you did last year and prune out the dead wood, and they should be back to shrub height by June or so to start blooming again. You might keep an eye out for any canes that looked healthy in spring but fade a little later into the year, as sometimes there's a bit of delayed reaction in the canes that give up after the winter. All in all, your roses sound fine. Cynthia