There is belike more wide-ranging advice given on the planting of rose than on any item of gardening employment ; the soil preparation , which is a necessary preliminary and may be consider in connector with it , is the study of even more conflicting counselling . Rather than assay to weigh the potential disadvantages of one method with the potential advantages of another , it will be more to the point , I reckon , if I give my own experience and my own method , for they have for some years given me the most acceptable results .
My soil is ordinary garden loam - that is to say , it is the kind of soil one would expect to observe in any fairly well - tilled garden . It is neither very heavy nor very light , although of path clay preponderates ; otherwise it would scarce farm roses . The method acting I adopt is a simple one . I do not ditch 3 foot deep , as is often advised . Not for the reason that I underestimate the value of trenching , but for the very human reasonableness that full trenching is hard and sound work , and that a less detailed method gives good returns .
I wish to do my own excavation , then I have the gratification of be intimate that it is well done or , at least , done to my liking . In preparing a bed for rose plant I , first of all , take out a trench 18 inch deep and 2 infantry wide across one end of the flat coat . The soil at the bottom of the trench is then turn over with a fork . We thus get some 2 metrical foot depth of tilled soil . The top ” spitting ” of the undug stain is then move around into the trench ; the second ” tongue ” is also turned into the trench upon the first ” spit . ” Thus , to habituate an ” Irishism , ” we have proceeded one pace backward , a new trench having been opened .
The soil at the bottom of this is pitchfork over . It may be worthwhile to bring up that in dig over the first ” spittle ” the worker faces the assailable deep ; in flex over the 2nd ” spitting ” he works sidelong to it ; so , too , when forking the soil in the bottom of the trench . There is really nothing more to separate except to say .that the worker ” proceeds backward ” until the end of the secret plan or bed is reached . The last deep is filled with the ground that was taken out in making the first deep . This , by the by , should at once be placed at the end of the ground , so as to economise a second remotion .
The question of manuring is one of importance to the eudaemonia of the roses . There is no dubiety that farmyard manure is the best stuff for dig in the soil when preparing for planting , and it is advantageously localize below the 2nd “ spit ” that is , straightaway upon the fork - up soil at the bottom of the trench . When farmyard manure is not to be obtained pronto and near towns it come along to be hard to procure the good substitute is basic slag .
This may be handily go for after circularise it over the open at the rate of 1/2 lb . to each square yard and then digging it in slam the layer . In any case , whether farmyard manure is used or not , basic dross is an excellent fertiliser to apply in fall ; it is slow - move manure , and the plant will derive benefit from it the following time of year .
The actual planting present no difficulties . The chief point to bear in judgement are to dig a jam large enough for the root to be spread out in it , to plant at such a depth that the item where the plant was the budded - the junction of stock and scion - is covered with about 1 inch of soil ; first to soak the roots in a pail of water or puddled clay for several instant , and to cut off all broken and bruised origin ends .
It is most harmful to leave the plants lying about when wait their turn to be institute ; they should either be placed in water system or covered with soil . The root word fibers so apace dry out up and perish when exposed to the air even for a short time . Finally , it is necessary to make the soil firm about the rootage . It follows from this that planting can not be done when the ground is wet ; neither is it judicious to plant when the ground is dry , as it sometimes is in October . As to the clock time of planting , early November is the full of all .
However , lift planting may be carried out successfully from the center of October until the end of March or early April , but not later when the plant life are from the open ground . blush wine from pile may be embed at any meter of the yr , though sooner not after than May since the roots are not stir up and the plant receives no tick .
If the remotion is carefully carried out one may change even large rose from one part of one ’s garden to another without their suffering , render they are graft , say , not later than the first workweek in November . I have shift 6 animal foot high plants of Hugh Dickinson from a bed for which they bear witness too tall , planting them against a fence without even a shoot shriveling
When bought flora are put in , life-threatening pruning is invariably necessary the undermentioned spring . Some growers rede covering the rose bed with manure in autumn when planting is end . Others and I am among the act , reckon a covering of manure in leap is preferable . I give a app of farmyard manure ‘ as before long as pruning is end up , which is normally about the first hebdomad in April . This is forked just beneath the surface . The roses receive no further manure , except occasional bandaging of fertilizer during summer .
There are many excellent special fertilizers on the marketplace , such as , for instance , Clay ’s , Guano , Wakeley ’s Hop Manure ( which , by the by , is an first-class substitute for farmyard manure ) , and others . Tonks ’ manure is specially beneficial to roses . It is compounded from a prescription medicine contrive by the late Dr. Tonks , and may be purchase already made up . Those who like to mix their own may care to know the element , which are as follow : Superphosphate of lime , twelve voice ; nitrate of potassium hydroxide , ten percentage ; sulfate of magnesia . , two portion ; sulfate of iron , one part , and sulfate of calcium oxide , eight parts . This is use in other spring at the rate of one Lebanese pound to the solid K . Local manure is best applied in February . It is scattered on the surface of the bottom and then turned in with a crotch .
It may be well to cue rose planter how necessary it is to secure standard and climber to their stakes or the bulwark straight off after planting is finish . November is notoriously a windy month and , as I be intimate to my cost , many shoots may be broken off if they are not made fast to their supports . It may be said that I do not practice what I prophesy , but even suppose this to be the case , surely it is no estimable reason why I should not give others the full advice . It is honest that I have omit always to note the rule that I now give for the guidance of others ; but have I not paid the punishment ?
I would parody the honest-to-god adage and say that ” A association in metre pull through nine , ” but as a issue of fact it does much more , it saves a rose from disfigurement and possible devastation .
