Roses - preparation for winter, pruning and winter feeding of bushes for better wintering of garden queens
Recently, our climate has been changing and sometimes surprises not only us, but also plants. Take, for example, roses: if earlier a smooth, cold autumn allowed them to complete their growing season, now the returning heat provokes continued growth and flowering. Therefore, growing roses, preparing for winter, pruning bushes at the end of the season is of great importance. If the flowers are allowed to retire on their own, then this can last a long time and will only cause damage to the plants. After the first frosts, sap flow stops, but the positive values that follow them resume it. And when frosts hit again, the juices in the shoots freeze, and this tears their tissues. Such wounds are a hotbed of infections, from which roses can completely disappear. To prevent this and help your darlings survive the winter, they need to be prepared.
Roses - preparation for winter, pruning
- winter feeding;
- trimming;
- shelter.
When and what to feed
At the end of the growing season, roses need phosphorus and potassium. They will help establish flower buds for the next season and increase the plant's resistance to adverse conditions.
In total, you need to carry out two sub-winter dressings:
- In the first decade of August, flowers are watered with a solution with the addition of 10 g of potassium sulfate, 25 g of superphosphate and 3.5 g of borax (in a bucket of water).
- A month later, in the first decade of September, watering is repeated. Only the solution should now contain an equal amount of superphosphate and potassium sulfate (15 g each for the same amount of water as in August).
Foliar top dressing can also be done instead of watering. Only in this case, the concentration of solutions is reduced by a factor of 3.
When and how to prune roses
Autumn pruning is carried out in the month of October. It is done mainly for sanitary purposes, to remove all diseased and dry shoots. A thin young growth is also cut out, which still will not overwinter.
Depending on the type of rose, there are some guidelines for how long to trim the remaining healthy stems, for example:
- Only shorten the tops of park roses. Standard cascading adult roses also only slightly "decapitate". But their young seedlings are cut short in the first year, leaving no more than 15 cm.
- A couple of branches of climbing roses are cut shortly so that they give a young growth. The rest of the shoots only pinch.
- Medium pruning, for 5 buds, is carried out in roses of grandiflora, floribunda, polyanthus, tea-hybrid.
- The lashes of shrub and Old English roses are shortened by 2/3.
How and when to cover roses
Do not rush and cover the bushes immediately after pruning - the wounds should heal.In addition, the October Indian summer may return. It is better to cover flowers after slight frosts come. Having given the bushes 10 days to complete the growing season, you can proceed to the last stage of preparing them for winter.
The shelter scheme depends on both the variety and the growing region with its winter temperatures. In the south, it is good enough to mulch the trunk circle. In colder regions, it is better to wrap the bushes with spunbond, building a frame. It will be convenient to lay long lashes on the ground, pin them and cover them while lying down.