Kay, it sounds like you are off to a good start. DA 2 quart size are own root roses I think. Your mid Florida location might be better for these roses than further South in Florida. I have read they will need a lot of compost and nutrients like organic rose fertilizer because your sand and rains wash everything away.

Transplant shock causes some leaves to drop temporarily.

Floridians will have wonderful advice I am sure. Buying roses grafted to fortuniana may help in the future, but do not dig these newbies up.

Kay, welcome to the rose forum. I won't be much help since our climates are so different. Be patient, someone also in Florida, will have some good advice for you. Your roses are probably on Dr. Huey root stock. You chose two beautiful roses to start with.

I wouldn't worry about the spent blooms falling and the wilting bud. They've been through a lot in travel. They will soon get acclimated to your conditions.

If you put them in the sun right after taking them out of the box, that could cause wilting, but they won't die from it. Shade them a little if possible by sticking an umbrella in the ground or setting a chair over them. If they're against the house or a fence, you can lean a window screen or sheet of plywood against the fence to shade them. just let them get some light.

Make sure water is penetrating the soil all the way to the roots. You can poke around in the soil to see if it's just sitting on top or running off and not getting all the way down. Build a little berm around the perimeter of the rose to hold water. Let it soak in, and repeat as many times as it takes to saturate the soil. Sand that doesn't have enough organic matter can repel water. Often we think we've watered our plant, yet the roots are bone dry.

Good luck. Let us know how they're doing. In Florida, they should still be blooming after mine are under a blanket of snow.

Kay, DA roses are often grafted on Dr. Huey, like flowers says, but the 2 quart size container plants are own root.

Dr. Malcolm Manners is in Florida. Be sure to pay attention to his posts. We are hoping to offer encouragement, but Florida is different as far as gardening is concerned.

Ah! Sheila, I'm glad you caught that!

Thanks Sheila and Floweesaremusic, I’m excited to join this forum! I have been watering them every day to every other day. When I planted them in ground, I dug a hole bigger than the plant and replaced the soil with a bag of generic planting mix along with some cow manure compost and a little of the DA rose food. I hope I didn’t overdo it with the nutrients. Excited to see how these little plants do.

Sounds good, Kay. Someone posted mixing a couple of cups (my guess on amount) of plain clay kitty litter into the planting mix in the rose planting hole. This was for sandy soil areas. I only heard this after I planted roses in high sand dry areas. I put the kitty litter on top around the roses in that sand. I'm hoping it will drift down over the years. Maybe it could help retain moisture and nutrients.

Good to know Sheila, I’ll have to look that up. Sounds like it would work well for my soil.