Be ready to prune and feed roses before Valentine’s Day

It is almost time to prune your rose bushes, ground cover roses and rose trees.

At the nursery, we prune roses between Super Bowl Sunday and Valentine’s Day. Some folks’ weekly maintenance workers have already pruned the roses. If that is the case, check on the job they did and fine-tune if needed.

Rose pruning is easy. An annually pruned rose should take less than five minutes to prune.

As you approach a rose to prune, look right to the bottom of the plant. Do not worry about all the buds, blooms or leaves still left on the bush. Look at the bottom and begin there.

A well-pruned hybrid tea, grandiflora or floribunda rose should have three to five nice, straight, clean canes without any leaves. The object of pruning is to remove most of the past year’s growth, all the crossing canes and lateral branches. Remove all gray canes.

You may have to use a cordless saw to get through thick wood. Do not worry how thick the canes are, you will not hurt the rose by cutting them.

The right angle

Make all cuts at a slight angle, right before a swelling of growth. If you look closely at a rose cane before you make the cut, you will see a seam with a swell. This is where the rose wants to grow.

I do not tell people how many inches of cane to leave, because it really depends on the amount of room you have for the rose to grow. If you have limited space, cut each cane further. If you like your roses tall, then do not cut down as far.

Rose trees should be pruned the same way by removing old canes, crossing branches and lateral branches. But leave more canes so they will look fuller.

Groundcover roses such as drift, carpet roses or meidiland style do not get the same amount of attention. Reshape groundcover roses, bringing them down and in. If the ground cover roses are out of control, prune severely. For a newer installation, the pruning will be lighter.

How to fertilize our roses

Fertilizing roses is especially important. We have been sharing this recipe for more than a decade. It’s for established ground-grown hybrid tea, grandiflora, floribunda or tree-shaped roses.

After your winter prune, each plant is to receive:

½ c. 16-16-16 fertilizer
½ c. bone meal
½ c. granular iron
½ c. alfalfa meal
2 T. Epsom salt

Work into soil along drip line and top-dress with an inch layer of chicken manure. Water in.

This sounds like a lot of products, but imagine how deep the roots of your rose are. Do not premix a larger batch. There is a reason for each ingredient and the quantity.

The 16-16-16 is a multi-purpose fertilizer. Bone meal is a source of phosphorus and will encourage bloom. Granular iron keeps rose leaves green and free of chlorosis. Alfalfa meal will stimulate new cane growth, and Epsom salt intensifies flower color.

Container roses get half a dose of each product. Give ground cover roses only the multi-purpose fertilizer and iron.

Nicole is the Garden Girl at R&M Pool, Patio, Gifts and Garden. You can contact her with ­questions or comments by email at
gardengirl94517@yahoo.com