You can probably grow those roses in your area. My parents grow lots of David Austin roses, and a few other old garden roses in Illinois, and their yard has clay/ is glacial till. Likely you'll have a lot of die-back through the winters, so I'd suggest looking for own-root plants to give them the best chance of coming back from the roots in the spring. Some protection (piled up leaves or mulch, for example) could help them to over-winter.

I’ve had clay in all my gardens and roses love it. It holds moisture and nutrients . I’ve also used manure from the local farm and they love that too ! Fish emulsion is great but you don’t have to use it if the smell kills you . I like Alaska brand “ more bloom “ when I wasn’t Using fish emulsion. They are beautiful roses you chose ! Try them and enjoy !! :)

The most important thing you need is full sun, a minimum of 6 hrs. daily total (continuously, or daily combinations, like 2 hrs. in the AM and 4 hrs. later, 6 hrs. total). Preferably more, all day long is ideal, if possible. With the minimum 6 hrs. you will grow husky, abundant blooming roses.

All other requirements for growing roses successfully, primarily: good drainage and nice soil can be amended/corrected by you. The amount of sunlight you have is a given, you cannot change that.

Moses

Your soil sounds perfectly good for roses; I agree with lily that roses love clay. I can't help with the cold-hardiness issue. A word of warning: be careful with fish emulsion if you are gardening in an area with a lot of wildlife .In my garden it was a terrrible fiasco; I brewed my own and only applied it when it had become odourless-to MY nose. But not so for badgers!!! I had to struggle for years, putting up special fencing to keep those dem things out; they persisted in thinking of my garden as their territory LONG after I stopped using the fish stuff!

I grow Julia Child, here in zone 6b. It is my easiest, most vigorous and successful rose. I've had a few roses come and go in my garden over the past 6 years, but Julia is the one that has done the best. This year, I didn't even have that much winter die back. It leafed out to the top of the shrub. We did have a milder winter with less snow cover. Did we? Really, I didn't track low temperatures, but we had less storms and a lot less snow than usual.

I bought roses bare root from Pickering when they were still in business and they were located up in Canada, so, they needed to be hardy enough for them to grow. This year is the first year I bought roses since they went out of business and I bought from Palatine, which it turns out, is located near where Pickering was. So again, they need a rose that can grow in their zone.

They are bare root and when they arrive in early April, the instructions are to plant the 'bud graft' 2-3 inches below the surface of the soil, to give them as much winter protection as you can. Which is what I've done - planting them the full 3 inches below the surface.

I grow organic and I try to take care of my clay/loam soil. My ph is about 6, almost neutral. I always leave a natural mulch on the growing area - chopped leaves - sometimes mixed with grass clippings. In the spring, I add a layer of compost in a ring around the roses near the drip line and add a layer of alfalfa meal on top of that and just gently work it into the top inch of soil with a hand claw, then pull the mulch back over that. Then I use Neptune's Harvest fish emulsion over the growing season. They have a rose formula and I just started using that. I do the same thing after the first flush of bloom is finished to help it along with another. That is on my established roses, newly planted roses, I do nothing to the first year except the fish emulsion.

Good luck. :-)

Hardiness ratings for roses that bloom on new wood are notoriously unrealistic. So just because you can find a site that says a rose is hardy to zone 4 does not mean that it will reliably survive zone 4, or zone 5, or even zone 6. Also, climate can play a big role in how well roses come through a winter. In general, midwestern winters are easier on roses than northeastern ones, so you need fairly local input to make intelligent decisions about how much risk you are comfortable taking.

To start with, ignore anyone who says that winter protection is going to be the answer. That is an entirely other art form. What works is going to be heavily dependent on your soil, your microclimate, your cultural practices and a whole slew of other variables. There are potentially major risks involved, and it isn't something that somebody can necessarily talk you through.

One thing I noticed was that you plan to amend the planting hole. If you do that, you may create a pocket of loose soil surrounded by poorly draining clay, essentially a bathtub where water flows in easily but only flows out slowly. If you want to amend, do the whole bed and leave it slightly mounded so excess water won’t be trapped right around the roots of the roses.

As Mad Gallica said, hardiness will vary and won’t necessarily agree with published hardiness based on my experience. So I have ended up trying roses with the knowledge that some that “should” be hardy won’t be, and some that seem unlikely to survive will do fine.

These will do fine for you. They will die back to the ground but don’t freak out they will come back. Easy keepers that have been super hardy here - Party Hardy, The Fairy, Above & Beyond (once bloomer), Sven just a few off the top of my head. As Babs suggested I would not amend the planting hole, topdress instead. Are you in the Chicagoland area?

Try! And make sure you show pictures when you succeed! Seriously, it would seem from the comments other people think you have a good chance, it’s not like the majority are saying “oh, no way that will work” so try :)

I have a rose garden in zone 5b in PA. I make sure the grafted parts are about 2”-3” under ground when I plant a new rose.

Such great advice here, perennial! I would just second the sentiment that you just try it and see. I doubt anyone here really thinks they have “perfect” soil for roses, and even if you did, soil is a living dynamic thing that changes all the time. Your idea to amend with lots of organics is a great idea. Fish emulsion solution works great as a wetting agent when you are digging in all those amendments, and then you can cover up the stinkiness with a thick layer of mulch. If you think of your soil as the living organism that supports all your plants, and treat it well by feeding it regularly and protecting it with mulch, you’ll see great results no matter what kind of soil you’re starting with.

One thing I’ve picked up from folks in colder zones is that a one-zone buffer is good insurance. If you try roses that are zoned to one or two zones lower than yours, you’ll have pretty good success.

Even if your first attempt to grow roses “fails” according to whatever definition of failure you've decided on, you will learn how to do it better the next time. That’s pretty much what we’re all doing! :-)

I have all three roses that you mention but they're wimps in zone 5, and in order to get much bloom from them I have to put them on the south side of my house in my virtual zone 6 spot. As Halloblondie says, they're highly likely to die down to the ground every year in zone 5, so you'll want to plan to have a rose that can regrow from its roots well. There are different benefits of grafted vs. own root roses in this respect - grafted roses can get a boost of vigor to survive the first winter but if the graft fails there's not a good chance to come back from the roots like there is for an own root rose. If you buy a grafted rose, be sure to bury the graft (the knobby bit where all the canes sprout from) at least 2" under the soil.

I agree with everyone that they're worth trying, and among the three Twilight Zone is the best bloomer among the relatively wimpy bushes for me (a much hardier lavender is Poseidon). Only you can decide if the small bushes but occasionally lovely flowers is enough for what you're looking for in a rose. The more reliable snow cover that you get in the Chicago area is a good asset to help winter survival more than any other winter protection you could provide, as MadGallica says.

Cynthia

I am in zone 5 northern IL, and soil in the area is definately heavy clay on the basic side. I am not a rose expert, but based on my experience, japanese beetles and harsh winters are much bigger enemies than soil around here. Austin roses tend to do well in my garden, and they survive the winter without any problem as long as you plant them deep enough. Hybrid teas can be challenging. Kordes have mixed results, some thrive, others disappoint. Overall, I wouldn’t hesitate to grow roses at all. Like others said, get enough water and sunlight, and you are ready to go.

Claire

What is the difference between "amending" soil and adding organic matter to it? I was planning to mix in some organic matter (in this case either horse or cow manure most likely) with the dirt when I plant these roses, but if this is unwise I won't add any at all. Also I'm wondering if it's better to grow them in pots instead of in the ground. If I have them in pots I can move them to a sheltered location (most likely in my garage) over the winter so they are not damaged as much. If I do decide to grow them in pots what kind of potting mix would you recommend? It would obviously need to be something acidic since they seem to like things on the slightly acidic side.

My soil is very alkaline clay. I’m in a totally different climate than you are, but my roses do just fine in my soil, with organic matter added. The only roses that I sometimes give some organic sulfur to, is my hybrid musks. They seem to need it more than the rest of my roses. If they start getting pale, or yellowish foliage, I sprinkle a few handfuls of this around the rose. Lisa

Perennial Fan - So, is your biggest concern, the pH of your soil? Have you had a soil test recently? I would think that is the place to start and not a step I would skip, if I thought my soil was very alkaline. I wouldn't guess. If it is very alkaline, than maybe you have special circumstances that need to be addressed, as with the kind of amendment Lisa Adams is talking about or something more.

As for the difference between amending soil and adding organic matter - adding organic matter is amending your soil, but you can also 'amend your soil' and not be adding organic matter. I hope you can follow that. [g] The suggestion has been made to amend your soil if you think it needs it. If you are trying to alter the pH, than know what you are trying to do with a soil test first. If you are trying to change the structure, for better drainage, then adding organic matter should help. If you are thinking of adding manure - I'd assume that is bagged aged manure and not fresh. Another test you can do is a drainage test. Digging a hole about a foot deep, filling the hole to the top wtih water and then waiting to see how long it takes for the water to drain.

The suggestion has been made, that amending just the hole you are planting in, is the wrong way of going about it. It might seem like a good idea, but it has been shown to create a problem for the roots of a plant, not just a rose, in the way the roots grow. Yes, if you need to amend your soil, you should, but, you need to amend the whole growing area at the same time, then plant your various plants.

This is true whether you are planting roses or anything else. Knowing your soil and understanding how to work with it for the best results can be a very effective and basic strategy for a gardener.

As for whether to consider growing roses in pots rather than in the ground, personally, I would rather work with the soil I have in the ground and figure out what it has going for it and then what likes to grow in it best. That way you are not fighting mother nature. But there is a wide berth of soil conditions that many many plants can be grown successfully in, without a lot of heroics. See if this article might be helpful....

10 Easy Soil Tests

Then there are certain plants that we just have our heart set on, and in that case, we might be willing to put a little more time and effort in to grow them. Roses might be that plant for you. You're trying to figure out three things - whether your climate [hardiness zone], your soil [pH & structure] and your site exposure to sunlight meet the requirements for roses. It would seem that your climate is not a deal breaker. There are roses that grow in your zone. In the Far North forum, zone 3 gardeners are posting about the roses they grow. If you know the area you want to plant in has enough sun, then the main area of question is the soil. If you spend some time getting more specific answers to what kind of soil you have, you'd know better what to do.

I have no experience growing roses in pots and storing them over a cold z5a winter, or whether it's necessary for you to go to those lengths. I always feel I have much better results growing anything in the ground than in a pot, so that would be my first choice.

Unfortunately no the ph is not my biggest concern. Absolutely NOTHING about my yard is ideal for growing roses. I'll consider it a miracle if they survive their first year. I don't have an exact number for ph, but a while ago I did the test with baking soda and vinegar and I didn't get bubbles (aside from the air bubbles from shaking it up) so I'm guessing I have a mostly neutral soil. The drainage in my soil is less than ideal, so I'd like to amend for that reason as well, but I don't want to amend a huge bed. We have a small shed in our backyard and I was planning on planting the roses in front of it on the side. I guess my point is this will not be a huge garden. It will basically be a few bushes in the middle of my backyard. Having said this, how do you recommend I proceed?

I've never heard of the soil test with vinegar and baking soda, but I looked it up and found this link ...

Baking Soda / Vinegar Soil test

So did you do the test according to this description and what exactly was your result? Because it did refer to not getting any fizz and said if that were the case, then your soil was probably fine. I'm confused.

What do you consider a 'huge' bed? If you plan on adding a 'few' roses, that's at least 3. How far away from your shed, how far away from each other are you planting these roses? Are you planting bare root or buying them in a pot? You could lay out where they are going to go, then add a 3 ft perimeter around the grouping and that would be the area you should amend...where the three roses go, in between them, and 2-3 ft all around them. Use a pitch fork and loosen up your soil when it is dry enough to work and work in your amendments, then rake the area and you'd be ready to plant. I'm assuming you know how to prepare and amend soil to plant.

Bottom line, based on the information you've given, I'm not sure I can really advise you on whether your conditions are reasonable for roses. You seem to be of the opinion that it's not very good, and I'll take your word for it. You want to try it anyway and I think there is a lot of good advice in this thread to help you do that.

My approach to gardening is believing that any garden space can be successful, by understanding your conditions in detail and learning about how to optimize those conditions and then trying to plant which plants like those conditions. So, if you succeed with the roses that will be great, if you don't, then you can still be successful at growing something else that will like the conditions you have. :-)

Omg don’t do pots, it’s a huge pain, just put them in the ground. My soil here is alkaline and roses do just fine. The last soil test I had done the PH varied from 7.3 to 8 from one bed to another. Our water (well) is alkaline too. I don’t mix anything in the planting hole, mostly because I’m lazy but I don’t think it’s recommended. They get a good layer of mulch. I use Holly Tone in the areas the dogs can’t access :), otherwise just pelleted fertilizer and maybe some fish emulsion later. Don’t sweat it. Go to Menards and buy some cheapie bagged ones, I think you’ll be really surprised how well they do!

Dingo - I don't amend when I plant either. I thought it had become common recommendation not to amend, but to allow the plants to get accustomed to the native soil. I do add compost and alfalfa on the top of the soil to filter down the nutrients when it rains and eventually build up some organic matter. And I use chopped leaves as a mulch which again, eventually adds some organic matter. BUT, I feel I have pretty good native soil that is clay but on the loamy side with a pH of 6 and no drainage issues per se. I'd have to think about it more if I thought I had awful soil. But I would start out with some real soil testing that gave me good data to make decisions on.

In the past, in an area that I felt had been neglected for years, I decided to add a 'lasagna bed' to plant in. Layering organic materials on top of the soil and letting them break down into nice soil to plant in. That worked great. The earthworms loved it and everything I've planted there did well. If I had any question of poor soil conditions or drainage issues, I'd probably do that again. Of course, it takes some time for it to break down, but some people add a layer of potting soil to the top of the lasagna bed and plant directly into it right away. And you end up with a little elevation, like a berm, that also helps with drainage.

Nothing about your yard is good for zone pushing roses. There are roses that will do fine given your conditions. There are roses that will take over your yard and become aggressive pests, they will like the conditions so well. So the question isn't whether or not you can have success with roses. The question is can you find an overlap between roses you can grow, and roses you want to grow.

The soil conditions sound like a red herring. There are roses that like alkaline clay. IME roses can tolerate fairly poor drainage. The issue is going to be are you going to be fine with plants that may or may not make it through the winter in decent shape. Growing in pots and keeping them in a garage over winter can work, but then you should talk to us about your garage. Four walls and a roof do not automatically generate decent overwintering conditions.

I don't think you are setting yourself up for failure. I do think you need to think more about the roses you want to grow. How big do you want them to be? Zone pushing can leave you with maybe 2' tall shrubs if they die back to the ground every year. Some of the Explorer roses will be a lot more substantial for you, or roses by Dr. Griffith Buck. To me, those hardiness designations mean the roots will or may survive, but not necessarily the canes above the soil.

I'd say this should be your first concern.

Then you can worry about the soil, though I do not think it will be much of a problem. There may be a lot of trial and error figuring out what will be a good fit for you. You may be able to find a consulting Rosarian in your area who can recommend some good roses to try.

Good luck!

Mad_gallica what would you like to know about my garage? I think I am going to do pots because having my expensive plants die all the way to the ground every year is simply unacceptable to me. I'm aware there is no guarantee they will die back every year, but I don't want to take that chance. I want a large, healthy plant.

There are plenty of roses Hardy to zone 5 and lower. Look up the Canadian explorers an artist series and the more than series. My phone isn't recognizing voice recognition. It should be more than serious. Just look up Canadian roses. I'll try to mend this on my laptop tomorrow. Also look at the roses at High Country roses and Harlequin roses in Boulder Colorado. They have excellent suggestions for zone 5 in lower roses. Just get a rose that's Hardy to Zone and put it in the ground. Give it a mendence mulch it it'll be great. I hate who's.

Roses in pots, regardless of the (photoshopped) pics you will see in catalogues such as the Austin stable, are a disappointment. Even with great attention to soil and feeding, you can expect only one (not very) good flush of blooms then very sporadic blooms in ones and twos. If you do not have automatic irrigation, growing roses in containers is a daily hassle of feeding and watering and deadheading (although as you won't see more than 6 blooms at a time, the deadheading is not onerous...although, if the alternative is nothing...Even in a tricky zone with iffy soil, the (right) rose will hugely outperform the same in a pot.

To be fair, I do not struggle with freezy winters so given any choice between a container rose and one in the ground, the ground wins hands down, every time. There are, however, a number of roses which are perfectly suitable for freezing zones right down to Z4...and if you considered some of the species, such as the ineffable lovely little arctic rose (r. acicularis) or the dainty burnets (r.spinossissima), then who really needs teas and noisettes?

I have 4 remaining roses in pots - the others are long gone or given away. The large flowered Austin (Princess Alexander, I think) is looking good right now, as are the 2 hulthemias and a random NOID Kordes rose...but after the first flush, they will get increasingly ratty, diseased looking and stemmy until they are not fir to be seen by around August. The smaller flowered and prostrate ones (such as little singles like Smarty, Blue for You and the ever blooming Sommerwind, Nozomi, the Drift series and some of the Poulsen Pearl series, look better than the huge doubles.They never really pick up for a September flush (unlike the roses in the ground on my allotment)...even with weekly feeding and annual soil topdressing. Although I am making a possibly unfair comparison since I have the luxury of multiple options.

I haven't read through all the replies, sorry if this was mentioned already -- if possible, try to buy own-root roses. Then you don't have to worry about the top growth die-back -- it will re-sprout from the roots true to form.

About garages - ideally you want to overwinter roses somewhere that stays a bit above freezing. Since you aren't going to do that without a climate control system, the more realistic goal is somewhere that stays above about 25F and below around 40F for most of the winter. Lower and the rose roots freeze. Higher and the rose breaks dormancy before it can go outside into the sunlight. The place that comes closest to that in zone 5 tends to be an unheated, uninsulated, attached garage. Most heat will be lost because of the lack of insulation, but there is enough heat coming from the house that it won't be frigid cold. A free standing garage will not be much warmer than the outside temperatures. So it will get too cold on subzero nights. Basements are too warm since the point is to keep the rose dormant for most of the winter.

There is an entire other routine involved in moving them in and out. Some sort of wheels are very helpful, since roses usually need large pots. The first time I saw roses overwintered in a garage, they were in cut down garbage cans, complete with the attachable Rubbermaid dollies. Expensive, but quite cool. I just have a handtruck.

I have some very painful experience of winter storage potted rose trees in unheated and uninsulated garden sheds, I lost all of them in a cold winter , about 50 of them , all of my rose tree collection gone with the wind. It still hurts to remember that in this very moment. A lot of beautiful rose trees disappeared under my care, and that was all my fault.....garden sheds are too cold for potted rose trees.

I have good experience to store potted rose trees in insulated attached garages for many years. Now my rose tree collection is over 100 and I also have about 30-40 potted roses too in zone 5b and 6a. In zone 5b I had 74 potted rose trees and 7 potted roses stored in garages and an unheated dark basement at our country property, I only lost one during winter months, I missed to water one pot since there were a lot of pots. Same thing happened in zone 6a, I lost one tree too last winter, missed watering one.

The low temp in zone 5b last year was -15F and -10 F for zone 6a. Hope this helps you. Moving them in and out of garages is a good workout......... :-) Make sure you have light weight potting soil. I have to change the soil in all my pots later, too heavy for me.

Perennialfan, just because they die back to the ground every year doesn’t mean they won’t be large healthy plants. You don’t have to spend a ton of money. Home Depot has a decent selection right now, take a look, see what you like, and ask on the forum about them. If you are in southern IL you will be warmer than I am here too.