Garden Advice › Flowers
Gardening with Roses
It's hard to feel inspired about roses in the dead of winter, but June is
the best month to go shopping (and get planting) if you want to grow the
world's most romantic blooms in your own garden.
The dilemma most of us have with roses is that the most desirable of blooms are
borne on the most undesirable of garden plants. It's something gardeners and
designers have been grappling with for centuries. The rose gardeners of the
17th and 18th centuries might have had more space to play with, but those same
gardeners would have given their eye teeth for the repeat flowering, high
health, free flowering rose varieties we have at our disposal today.
Traditionally roses were grown in a spot not seen from the house, so that their
beauty could be enjoyed in spring, but their bareness hidden away for the rest
of the year. These days, most of us don't have that luxury, but we can take a
few pointers from those early rose gardens.
The classic 'Rose Garden'
There are certain advantages in creating a dedicated area just for roses,
the first being a spectacular display and lots to pick at flowering time. Also
on the upside, beds planted only in roses with a clean layer of mulch at their
feet are much easier to maintain. Roses need regular deadheading, feeding,
weeding and spraying if they are to perform at their healthy best. Gardeners
averse to spraying need to be vigilant about clearing away diseased leaf litter
- easier when it falls onto mulch, rather than a plethora of companion plants.
To make a formal rose garden easier on the eye in winter, many gardeners go for
a geometric layout with low hedges encasing colour coordinated beds of roses.
English box is the all time favourite border hedge, but there are many fine
alternatives, for example Corokia, Euonymus japonica 'Microphylla', Hebe,
Teucrium, and compact Camellia microphylla, covered in pretty white flowers in
autumn.
Paved pathways make access easy in all weathers, but there is no need to go to
that expense. A simple 1.5 to 2m wide strip of mown lawn separating two
rectangular rose beds of about the same width looks lovely. Add a garden seat
at the end as focal point. If you have the space for segregation, consider a
'secret rose garden' screened from the main view. In this case, open trellis is
a better option than solid walls and hedges, as cutting off the air flow can
exacerbate disease problems with roses.
An informal rose garden
ecause of their usefulness for picking, fragrance and medicine roses were always an important ingredient in the true cottage garden, where they cohabited with all sorts of other very useful domestic plants, such as herbs, fruit and vegetables. More aesthetically concerned, the cottage garden of our time is more likely to blend roses with shrubs and perennials, and sweeping lawns. This is an easier way to deal with roses in a smaller garden. Shrubs and perennials are used both to complement the roses in bloom and disguise their winter bareness. The greater variety of plants minimizes disease by attracting a variety of good bugs to help deal with the pests. However, overcrowding can cancel this advantage and often, competition for nutrients from trees and shrubs can mean the roses may not flower as well as they would in a dedicated rose garden, so watering and feeding is important.
The best roses for a cottage style garden are the hardy old fashioned varieties, especially the disease resistant rugosa and alba roses. The easy-care, disease resistant modern shrub roses, such as Flower Carpet roses are also excellent in this setting.
Choosing roses for your garden
Your choice of roses will depend on what you want from them and how they
will fit into your style of garden. The classic vase roses are the hybrid teas
with their long strong stems, such as Elina, Peace, and Ingrid Bergman. These
roses are well suited to the formal rose garden layout. The more informal old
fashioned and David Austin's English roses are also loved for picking, and
their fragrance.
In an informal garden choose shrub style roses which flower prolifically and
repeat well. Disease resistance, general vigor and flowering performance should
be a criteria whatever your intentions. Not all roses are equal in this regard
and it's wise to engage in some pre-purchase research. Consider not only the
exquisite single bloom, but the overall appeal of the bush, its form, and its
foliage.
In a small courtyard garden, consider the compact free flowering varieties sold
as 'patio roses'. Flower Carpet roses offer a long continuous flowering season
and will grow well in large pots. Climbing roses, such as favourite red 'Dublin
Bay', make the most of vertical space.