Total rose newbie in zone 5b- are dead canes normal in spring?

3 years ago

I bought a new home from a master gardener in summer 2019. There are two Seven Sisters rambling rose bushes that climb trellises, and another that I actually don't know the variety but it's a small, deep red, very spicy fragranced rose. I don't remember what they did during our first spring in the house, but I do know they gave us beautiful blooms in the summer. Last fall, I did some searching in this forum about pruning, because the Seven Sisters in particular had gotten a bit out of hand in their rambling and were sprawling into other perennial beds and poking me while trying to get out to cut and weed. So, last November (after the first frost), I went and did some pretty aggressive pruning of the Seven Sisters to get them a bit more contained to their trellises. Now, this spring in zone 5b-- I am going to check their spring progress and seeing only brown and dead canes. As I said, I don't remember if they would have been brown in spring 2020 with no pruning...... did I kill the roses? Or will they bounce back, perhaps a bit later in the spring? Do I look for new growth at the base? As a point of comparison, the smaller dark red rose bush I have did NOT get any pruning, and it is also showing nearly all brown canes. One of the canes is still green, but that's it. That one did not get pruned. Thanks for any guidance! BTW, I am in southwestern Wisconsin (USA), and we did not have a particularly harsh winter for what that's worth.

Featured Answer

Nippstress Nebraska z5

3 years ago

The short answer to your original question is a resounding "Yep"!! All that I would add to Seil's excellent advice is to expect to prune out canes that are clearly dead in any given year, and to rejoice when you see live cane. If a rose is truly hardy for your zone you wouldn't need to prune back much at all, but even roses that are hardy at the root level like Knockouts need regular pruning out of dead cane in the spring. It's just a regular chore, but be sure to do it in the spring.

Cynthia

Sort by:Oldest

Comments (9)

joeywyomingzone4
3 years ago
Wait a while before pruning, you may be surprised at what comes out. Some of my red roses actually have dark red-brown canes, but they are perfectly healthy and will be leafing out here in a short while. If you look at the growth buds along the cane, you may be able to see some starting to swell where the rose will begin to leaf out.

A master gardener once told me not to prune until the last danger of frost, because if you prune too early in a very cold area and then get another frost, you can end up losing more cane than if you just leave it all intact until there is no chance of freezing.
Mischievous Magpie (CO 5b)
3 years ago
Maybe I'm being extra, but when I move out of this house one day when my kids are grown, I'm going to leave behind a sheet of detailed instructions on how to care for each plant 😅

Have you read this thread? You may find it helpful.

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/3772241/is-this-cane-dead-a-visual-guide-for-cold-zone-spring-pruning#n=53
Related Discussions
Consistently cane hardy HTs/floris in zone 5
Q
Comments (39)
Ratdogheads - my Henri Matisse stays between around 3-4 feet in a mostly sunny spot, but might be a little larger in a full hot sun location. Suffice to say that planting it behind my Champagne Moment was not one of my brighter ideas, and it involves some judicious pruning to make both of them visible. Redwolfdoc - welcome to the fun of rose growing, and always feel free to start a new thread on a topic where it might get more response. I checked the website HelpMeFind, a TERRIFIC website for roses and well worth the optional membership fee, to look up Blue Angel. Both the regular and climbing versions of Blue Angel appear to be on the edge of reported hardiness for our zone, but those are default ratings so not anything to discourage you. If that rose has survived your winters, that's already a good start. Blue Angel cl. is reported to only bloom on old wood, which means that it won't bloom well if it has to regrow from dying back to its roots or graft each year, which is typical of some types of climbers that survive but don't thrive in our zones. Still, 3 seasons is still way too soon to make a judgment about a climber. They tend to spend more time than non-climbing forms in putting down roots and preparing to make their moves, so if it grows some or is at least green and healthy-looking in the active seasons, you might give it some more time. In my world, alfalfa hay or pellets is always a good thing to add to a rose to boost its production a bit in spring. To give you perspective, my Madame Isaac Periere - that is definitely hardy in my zone - was unexciting and unremarkable for 3-4 years while it was putting down roots. Then last spring in its fifth (?) year, it absolutely ate up every rose near it and was stunning in the spring. There's a standard rose wisdom that for roses, first year sleep, second year creep, third year leap. For climbers, you have to give them another year or two of creeping or sleeping before you get leap years. Hope this helps, and welcome to GW! Cynthia
...See More
Planting z6 roses in 5b?
Q
Comments (22)
Hi JessicaBe For what it's worth, I've grown some of the teas you list in a zone 6 pocket in my zone 5b garden for about 4-5 years. I'll post another thread sometime about these when they bloom, but my bottom line reaction is - it depends. Like Seil I enjoy zone pushing and don't spend a lot of money on my tea experiments (all from Chamblees, own root gallons). The results are decidedly "OK", but as expected none of them are as spectacular as they'd be in a warmer zone. Most of them have survived - so far the only ones that died were Safrano and Monsieur Tillier, though Duchesse de Brabant got planted later than I'd have liked last year and isn't doing so well yet. The following tea roses have survived and bloom reasonably well for me: Mrs. B.R. Cant, Madame Antoine Mari, Maman Cochet, Mrs. Dudley Cross, and the best of the bunch has been Georgetown tea (thanks to Olga for the recommendation). Remember that I do winter protect everything in my yard, and the teas get protected first with a full-sized bag of leaves next to them rather than a chopped down third of the bag. I doubt they'd bloom much without protection even if they survived, since teas want to build up structure over the years from existing old wood. So I agree with what has been suggested - feel free to try it but plan to winter protect them and don't expect the results you get in warmer climates. Cynthia
...See More
Mad Diary of Zone Busting in Zone 3 ...The End is a Long Way Away
Q
Comments (7)
Oh my. What is a passionate rose lover like you doing in that glacial hell hole? Reading about your endeavors has exhausted me and I haven't even lifted a shovel. I admire your grit and determination, but would love to see you rewarded with thousands of blooms on your rose bushes for all your hard work. I bet they could use engineers in zones 7 to 10!
...See More
Look at all that surviving cane (oh yeah, and spring bulbs too)
Q
Comments (22)
Thanks Martinca & Irisgal. Sharing the garden is half the fun of having it. I'm just about to run home from work and cut bouquets from some folks that are helping me out at work, as well as of course for a thank you for administrative professionals day. Sharon you also ask a good question about the bulbs (lots of excellent questions on this thread). Being a "rose chaos" gardener, I don't worry overly much about a week or two of looking scruffy while the foliage dies down. I find that the tulips go from green to yellow in about 2 weeks once they whole expanse dies off, and in fact some of the foliage in the first picture above is starting to die while other tulips are still blooming. So part of the answer is to have a lot of bulbs that bloom at different times so that they disguise the earlier foliage that's starting to die down. Once the tulip foliage turns yellow and flops over it's OK to clip it off. The bigger challenge as far as foliage goes is the daffodils, since that foliage doesn't fully fade till June in my area, and you need to leave it up and green or you'll start to sacrifice repeat bloom. I've read research that you can trim 1/3 of the foliage off the end and have the rest be just as productive, so I do that and it tidies up the rough ends a lot. Since I have bulbs planted every square inch (ideally) around other perennials and roses, the other plants are eager to shove the bulb foliage aside to get blooming on their own. One thing I don't have to worry about is a garden bed that's not thickly planted enough (smile). I find that I trim off the tulip foliage in the first bed you see listed because it's the earliest to bloom and fade, but by the time I get to mid-May there are so many other plants growing in the other beds that I don't notice the dying foliage at all after that point. I'll clip it off if I see it dead around roses when I'm working with them, but frankly I often just let the bulbs die down and join the leaf mulch as they quickly turn about the same color. As noted earlier though, planting this thickly with water-hungry plants like roses does cut back on the bulb rebloom, but it sure supports my lazy gardener habit. If you want to maximize your blooming from various plants for a minimum of effort, I'd probably interplant the daffodils and tulips among drought-hardy perennials like agastache or lavender or russian sage or salvia or all those types of plants. They're tall enough to hide the dying foliage but dry enough to co-exist happily with bulbs. However, I like roses too much not to put them in every bed, so even though I have all the above perennials I can't resist mixing in roses as well. They duke it out and seem to manage Ok. Hope that helps! Cynthia
...See More
bananastand
Original Author
3 years ago
@Mischievous Magpie (CO 5b) I would have LOVED a set of detailed instructions on all of my perennials!! Thanks for that thread, I'll check it out. And good to know I may just need to wait a while for growth.
seil zone 6b MI
3 years ago
In your zone winter cane die back is normal for most roses but I doubt your roses are completely dead, A lot of old garden roses have brown or gray and woody looking canes but that doesn't mean the cane is dead. Unfortunately your November pruning was the exact wrong time of year to prune Seven Sisters. She is a once blooming rose and only blooms on old canes. At least one year old wood. So by pruning her in the fall you probably took off a lot of her one year old canes and that will greatly reduce your bloom for this year. Once blooming roses should only be pruned immediately after they finish their bloom in the spring or early summer.

The color of the outside of the canes is not an accurate way of telling if a cane is alive or not. You need to look at the inside of the cane. Find an end and snip off a small piece and look at the center of the cane. If it is brown/tan and dried up it is dead. Go down another few inches and clip again and look. Do this gradually down the cane until you find a center that looks white/greenish and moist. from there on down the cane should be alive. Do this with each cane. After a bit you'll get a better feel for what might be dead and what is still alive.

Your red rose sounds like a modern rose and die back is even more common. Use the same method of pruning to find what is good, live cane and what is not. On these types of roses it is a good idea to make your last cut at a 45 degree angle about a quarter inch above an outward facing growth node. Take off all the dead wood first and see what you have left before you decide to do more pruning.

In your cold zone I caution you to wait a bit longer before doing any pruning. It is still too early. I am in zone 6b and I am just going to start pruning mine this week. A rule of thumb is to wait until the forsythia bushes are blooming. That's usually when the roses begin to show new leaf growth as well and you can see where new leaves will be coming from to make your cuts easier to find.
bananastand
Original Author
3 years ago
@seil zone 6b MI, thank you for this VERY helpful guidance! The forsythias here are actually already dropping their flowers, so we're pretty far along. I am glad to have more info on the Seven Sisters rose, also-- I had a lot of trouble locating good info on them in my searches last year. Sounds like I may have one year of fewer or no blooms as my price to pay, but I do think they survived based on some of the guidance I've already read in this thread-- there is a lot of green cane at the base of both bushes. Always learning!
bananastand
Original Author
3 years ago
last modified: 3 years ago
Here is a photo of the miniature red rose from last summer. If anyone has ID suggestions, that would be helpful!
Henry Kuska
3 years ago
See:

https://www.brainerddispatch.com/lifestyle/home-and-garden/6975450-Ask-the-Master-Gardener-Reinvigorating-your-roses
seil zone 6b MI
3 years ago
If you want more info on your Seven Sisters go here.

https://www.helpmefind.com/rose/plants.php?searchNmTyp=5&searchNm=seven+sisters&rid=3954&sbSearch=SEARCH&tab=1

There are a few different ones listed so you'll have to look at the pictures and decide which you have.

I think your red rose may be a Knock Out. They're pretty much bullet proof. You can prune them any way you wish and they should be fine. Here's a link for that one,

https://www.helpmefind.com/rose/l.php?l=2.24139
bananastand thanked seil zone 6b MI

Total rose newbie in zone 5b- are dead canes normal in spring?

Nippstress Nebraska z5

Comments (9)

joeywyomingzone4

Mischievous Magpie (CO 5b)

Related Discussions

bananastand
Original Author

seil zone 6b MI

bananastand
Original Author

bananastand
Original Author

Henry Kuska

seil zone 6b MI

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

Total rose newbie in zone 5b- are dead canes normal in spring?

Nippstress Nebraska z5

Comments (9)

joeywyomingzone4

Mischievous Magpie (CO 5b)

Related Discussions

bananastandOriginal Author

seil zone 6b MI

bananastandOriginal Author

bananastandOriginal Author

Henry Kuska

seil zone 6b MI

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

bananastand
Original Author

bananastand
Original Author

bananastand
Original Author