You're welcome, Rachael. I wouldn't worry about that damage. It will probably regenerate itself as long as the plant hasn't, or doesn't become too dehydrated and that area dies. That's what knocks them off usually. Either that, sun burning or freezing. Otherwise, in the absence of diseases or other physical damage, the plant contains all the necessary mechanisms to regenerate whatever it needs, when it needs it. All it requires from you and the environment are the water, temps and nutrients for it to do what it "knows" to do. Over time, you will learn what roses do well where you are in what form. I respect Pickering as a business and as a rose supplier. I don't buy from them because their root stock does not do well in my soil, water and conditions. Multiflora isn't happy here, not even as a plant on its own. Anything with too strong a multiflora influence suffers and simply doesn't perform as it should. That goes for anything budded to a strongly multiflora type root stock as well as own root roses possessing that influence. For budded plant roots, Dr. Huey and Fortuniana do better here. If what I want will perform well here own root, and I can get it, that's what I will go with. If it's only available budded to a suitable stock for my conditions, then that's fine, too. I hate killing a plant, so I won't buy one budded to an unsuitable stock simply to propagate it then dump the unsuitable plant. (of course unpatented types only!) So, I'll just keep an eye out for possible cuttings down the road and work on other things. I have propagated two flats of stocks to bud some of what I already grow to improve their performance here. Even though they are alive and grow a bit, I'm sure they would be much better garden plants with more vigor. That's what budding can help provide. It all depends on a number of variables. Kim

Hi Vuwugarden The idea that all roses are best grown ownroot is just plain wrong. Some roses do very well ownroot, old garden roses, some hybrid perpetuals, knockout-/explorer-roses, some Kordes hybrid are not comparable to most modern roses. Now and then even the odd hybrid tea does well(I grow Peace in a container, selfmade from cutting). Even in warmer climates grafted roses can do better, in general grafted roses will grow a bit taller than ownroot. These are results from large test in the fields of many countries and observation has been as much as 7 years or more. If you live in area with fairly cold winters and a short growing season I dare state that modern roses will perform considerably better as grafted plants. Not all roses does well on the most common rootstocks, but this is something the large nurseries know. Suckers are not a big problem, if you check your roses two times a season or something like that rootstock will never have the chance to take over. You simply take out some leather gloves and pull them off. Some rootstocks sucker more than others, but you will probably not see more then one or three a year per 60 roses. Catrose: when the roses gets olde they will all form a "fist" of older wood near the ground. In fact, it is not that easy to tell the difference between a grafted and an ownroot after a few years unless you do some digging. Graftpoint usually is planted a few inches into the ground. I have several roses both grafted and made from cuttings of the same variety. Growth habit is by far determined by the variety, not the root stuck. Rootstock will give stronger growth, and plants will on average grow taller. They tend no more than ownroots to get leggy, spindly. This is more determined by variety and pruning than rootstock. Scardan123; As far as I know the Meilland roses we get here are grafted. Where my family and I have been gardening (Norway, Denmark and France) we buy mostly grafted, and all Meilland roses are. There are a few exceptions; some old roses, rugosa hybrids, some park-roses, species and near hybrids, groundcovers, but even the Meilland ground-coverers I have are grafted (probably on laxa). In short, Meilland roses are no less grafted than other roses. How ownroots will do are dependent on climate, soil, growing season and care given. I am not against ownroot roses, and will happily try to root any variety from cutting. If I where to grow ownroots exclusively I would have to give up most chinas, hybrid teas, floribundas, many climbers and shrubs, at least they would stay small and puny plants. That is mostly due to the short growing season; grafted plats gets an earlier start in spring, grow faster and stronger. These roses will not be more winter hardy as ownroot, if they freeze to the ground they will sprout back, but will have problem really taking of and becoming good plants. Hardy varieties with strong growth will do better. This is at least my experience on the subject, and I have spend a lot of time and energy on different rootstocks and ownroot roses. I know this is a subject that depend very on climate, soil, care roses get..., but still I am surprised how different experiences we have. I suspect that there are differences in the rootstocks that are used, USA use other types. It might have something to do with the grafting techniques too. Here oculation is by far the most common, if not the only one; an eye from the cane of the desired variety is placed in a T-shaped cut on the neck of the rootstock. That produces plants where grafting-point is hardly seen after planting, if at all. My post became far too long, I get carried away by this subject :-)

Newgen: I've done dozens of bareroots and had good luck for the most part, with only some losing quite a bit of foliage (none lost *all*). But it seems bad luck has hit me this year as I'm 0 for 3 on gritty mix bareroots (all 3 have lost significant foliage). It's depressing and frustrating. However, the worst loser of the bunch has already re-grown quite a bit of the foliage, which is an excellent sign if yours is already doing so a few weeks afterward. I was *sure* I had done well with that worst loser and thought it wouldn't even notice I had bare-rooted 'er. I was wrong. I decided to build some 511 and just refresh the outer few inches of the additional trees targeted for gritty. I'll just wait until Spring to do them -- now THEY didn't miss a beat when I did not bare root and put into 511. I do the majority of the work underwater and/or late at night and sometimes things still go wrong. After repot I relocate to spots only receiving direct morning light with the container itself always protected from direct light. Here in our climate, even 11am direct sunlight is harsh on a recovering citrus when ambient is already 90F by then. If I don't do used these methods, my experience has shown the tree struggling immediately afterward. But again, I've never totally lost one on a bare-root for gritty mix. I've only lost one when I tried to do root pruning simultaneously and another that had root loss from winter freezing. Just a general note to anyone else who may also have struggling citrus after bare-root into gritty: Be sure not to over-fert and especially excess Nitrogen can force the tree to regrow lots of foliage it cannot support -- it will then drop those same leaves and take some of the limbs, too. Just small amounts until a few weeks have passed and you know it's in the clear (no signs of stress). If there is lots of immediate loss, then again stay with a bit lower than normal N until it stops with the loss and settles or even puts out it's first leaf. I'm thinking closer to a 1-1-1 ratio vs. a 3-1-2 or 5-1-3 for normal healthy conditions. Good luck! Chris

Thanks maifleur, I got a good one one for you - That loose stem I was mentioning was bothering me so I went out and gave it a second look. I thought it looked weird, about the size of my little finger but no sign of buds. I then realized what I suspected - it's actually a root which is attached to the side of the root stock which somehow got turned around so it was facing upwards! I pulled out the whole bareroot as I only planted it a few days ago. Turned out it's not loose just a little twisted so I turned it downwards and replanted. So your dummie comment is particularly appropriate! The limited instructions I got with the bareroot are as follows -"Our Japanese tree peonies are grafted on herbaceous peony roots. Planting a Japanese tree peony is similar to planting an herbaceous peony. Japanese tree peonies need to be planted deeper to stimulate the growth of tree peony roots. The grafting point should be 4-5 inches below the soil surface." The graft point as they say is not always totally clear and putting the point at which the stems reach the rootstock at 4 inches under would nearly bury a bud so I sort of averaged the middle of the rootstock which is only a few inches long at 4" deep. Hopefully I'm about right. I'll take a look at the book. I nearly always try to buy a book for the particular high value plants I'm using and I actually have Alice hardings "The Peony" and Martin Pages "The gardeners Guide to Growing...". Both of these are horrible IMO. Not one drawing of a planted rootstock and only a few pages on cultivation and site selection/preparation. Same thing with John Feltwells book on Clematis. Is the gardening trade unduly afflicted with poor writers?