t-bred you will do fine with the bellina. It's just a phal with slightly higher temps required. I don't let my bellina's read the requirement sheets and just tell them the low of 60 is just fine for them. I love phals because I can always have multiples in bloom, regardless of the season. Phals bloom for months at a time, can be grown in the home in a sunny window without elaborate set ups and really don't demand much care. Brooke

Very knowledgeable folks have already given you very good insights here. I can only add that it is perfectly natural for older canes to get woody and brown, red, or gray, as you're describing. It's not a disease. Some old canes are very hard and near impossible to prune off (is this what you mean by "petrified"?) while others that are dead will sort of splinter/crumble if you cut them. When these hard older canes cease to put out any new growth, these are the canes that one would prune off down to the ground in early spring. Hopefully this helps to rejuvenate the bush and stimulate it to throw out fresh new basal canes from the base of the bush. Younger canes bloom better. (Incidentally, alfalfa meal contains a substance, triacontanol, which can help stimulate a bush to grow new fresh canes, too. You can throw a couple handfuls around each bush in addition to whatever other fertilizer you're already using.) All this said, as others have pointed out, roses grow and bloom best when they receive adequate sun and from your photos, these roses don't have that... If your clients aren't interested in replanting the roses where there is more sun or limbing up some of the trees on their property, you could suggest replacing those that are struggling the most with roses that are reported to be more shade tolerant. I'm guessing they are growing hybrid teas? Two HT's that have done ok for me in a part sun bed are Bronze Star and Peter Mayle. I have read Granada is somewhat shade tolerant. Pink Gruss an Aachen grows in the shade of a deciduous magnolia here and gives a great first flush and scattered blooms in part shade the rest of the season. I have several David Austin roses that bloom well in part sun (Pat Austin & Molineux) and hybrid musks and albas are two other classes of roses to look into, for tolerating less than ideal sun conditions. Still, all these "shade tolerant" roses tend to bloom better the more sun they have. Your clients need to adjust their expectations of any roses they're growing if they can't provide a rose it's preferred growing conditions. I don't envy you that task. ;) Regarding your questions about the black fungus on the base of the containerized rose, perhaps I'm missing what you are trying to photograph, but I'm not seeing any fungus. My first thought, too, given the diameter of the trunk versus the diameter of the pot, was that this rose has just outgrown the pot and is possibly very rootbound. It looks to me like as this rose has grown it may have pushed up out of the soil, leaving a gap or hole. If you cannot replant the rose in a bigger container or rootprune it and replant it in fresh potting mix, you could at least add some compost and lime. (If that rose is still in the original soil from whenever the rose was planted, the pH could be far from ideal now...) Hope some of this helps. Dawn

My first Hydrangea is now in the ground for more than 25 years. At this point, I keep it for sentimental reasons only. It's gotten so THICK with canes that if I wrap it in my usual cage, I have to get everything so tight in there that I think I may actually be suffocating the plant. I've not had good luck overwintering it in recent years. This past winter I didn't even bother with it. If I were you, I'd consider taking a cutting or digging out a portion of your sentimental one and essentially start over. It would indeed be the same plant, so you could keep your sentiment. But I can understand sentiment. I should get rid of my first Hydrangea, but I'm not. For a long time I would cut back the old canes completely to the ground in the Fall. I'd only leave canes that had shot up from low points on the canes or from the crown. They would have grown all summer and would end up giving me great flowering the next year. I'd have very long stemmed flowers, too, that I had cut. The big problem with this technique is that you end up with weaker stems than you would otherwise and next summer they'd be weighted down to the ground with their flowers. I've found that, for my zone, I can usually prune as hard as I want up until about Fourth of July, just to be easy to remember, and not hurt the flowering potential for next year. After that, the buds start setting for next year and you start running into that problem. (But then I've cut some "nikkos" back to the crown in the Fall and on some I'd get great flowering and on some I'd get none. Do I really understand this? NO.) So, here is another method for you to consider to keep it smaller, at least in height. Another thing I've experimented with is to prune all the wimpy growth completely out and just end up with a few stout canes over time. This was interesting, but you end up with an artifical looking Hydrangea and the few stout canes start looking rather strange. But with this technique, more or less, you could develop a plant that wasn't so crowded. I don't know though. I wish I could help you more. I'd like an answer to the question you have, too! Hay

I have been married now for 15 yrs and have lived in this home we custom built for 10 yrs. The first 5 yrs we lived in a 2 BR, one Bathroom, tiny apt where we shared many precious times. We moved there after getting married in our early twenties. Prior to getting married, we struggled to scrape together $7500 for a down payment on 9 acres of land. While living in that small apt, we payed off they land, saved money, and had our first child, a beautiful baby girl. We also made many special friends. During that time, we also started building a 2400 sq ft home that we contracted ourselves. Not to mention the countless hours my DH and Dad spent plumbing, painting, doing trimwork, etc. We did not see each other much over the yr it took to build our home. When we finally were finished and able to move in I remember the excitement I felt moving the boxes and all the toys from that small apt just a couple of miles from our new home. But once we moved here, I felt isolated. No more neighbors to visit everyday. Only though it was only a couple of miles away, it seemed like 1000 miles, because my life had taken a drastic change. I cried for a couple of months. My DH even offered to sell our home and move back to the apts we loved so much our first 5 yrs together. I knew we had worked and planned so hard for this home to be perfect. We stayed and had a son about 3 yrs after moving to our new home. Now I would never dream of going back to the life I had before, but memories are securely attached in the back of my mind that I will never forget. Our family of 4 would have never made it in the small apt. I find myself now lurking on this website everyday that I discovered while remodeling my kitchen. My husband thinks I am crazy that I spend so much time looking at others visions and dream kitchens. He often makes the comment that I should be thankful for the home we have which will be payed for in just a few years and our kids are still just 8 and 13. I do see things on this website that I love and sometimes even makes me dislike the home I have. I have gained much knowledge on this website, but I also have become more critical of every detail I see. I am glad to read this thread that reminded me to be thankful for the things I do have. I know there are people from all places and walks of life on GW, but you never know what kind of situation they are in. My aunt and her DH have no children and make plenty of money. She has a brother who is basically homeless that moves from motel to motel just to survive. She does help him tremendously, but he lived with her for awhile while she was in the process of remodeling her kitchen. When she got a new frig she cried because it was not what she had envisioned. He just looked at her and said "you can't even be happy with a brand new frig, and I don't even own a frig or place to put one." That opened my eyes to the real world. There are so many people who have lost there life savings in these terrible times we live in. I hope this thread helps everyone on GW realize how thankful we all are to have the homes we live in. I could dream all day of something bigger and better or changed, but I still would not be any happier in life than I am today! Thanks Creekylis for the thread. In time your heart will heal and you will have wonderful memories of your other home!