Part 2:\u00a0 Selecting Roses and Laying Out The Garden<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\nSo how do you the home rose gardener go about deciding which roses are Garden Roses? First and foremost ask other rose growers in your area either through local rose society meetings or via the many rose forums on the internet. No rose does well in all parts of the country, so local information from rose growers who grow Garden Roses in your area is important.<\/p>\n
You can begin by using the rose classes as a guide. As with most things it\u2019s not perfect but a good place to start. Keeping in mind the point I made in the previous paragraph about not all roses doing well everywhere, I asked Richard Beales of Peter Beales Roses U.K. to help me with this. Richard and I put our thoughts together and we feel these classes make good Garden Roses both here and in the U.K. I feel that should cover a good part of the U.S.<\/p>\n
The Chinas \u2013 This group of roses are invaluable in that they stay on the short side \u2013 something important in today\u2019s smaller gardens. In addition they are usually healthy, continuous flowering through the summer and have an important genealogy as ancestors to modern roses. Many do well in pots and they excel in mass plantings. In the U.S. they are hardy to zone seven and maybe a few in zone six with shelter from the wind. One exception (isn\u2019t there always one) is Mutabilis which I\u2019ve been told is hardy to zone five.<\/p>\n
The Albas – A very healthy group of roses and can be used as climbers or shrubs. All are fragrant and, although spring flowering only, are very charismatic in that their grey-green foliage make perfect backdrops for summer and fall flowering perennials and roses. In terms of size they can get tall \u2013 up to six feet. They are very hardy with some withstanding zone 4.<\/p>\n
The Portlands \u2013 Our northern gardening friends rightly lament that it is difficult to find hardy, repeat flowering shrubs. Look no further because all Portlands flower continuously through the summer and most have a built in resistance to diseases. They are, without exception, fragrant and easy to grow especially in group planting or bedding. Easily hardy to zone five and some to zone four. Average height is three to five feet \u2013 ideal for any garden.<\/p>\n
The Gallicas \u2013 Also spring flowering but make up for this by having some of the most beautiful and fragrant flowers of the old garden roses. Grown as shrubs, they are usually easy to accommodate in any situation. Fans of \u201cpurple\u201d colors will love the gallicas as that shade runs rampant through the class. Hardy to zone 4 and some even beyond they need a winter chill to bloom well so I would advise against growing them above a zone seven and even that might be pushing it.<\/p>\n
The Hybrid Musks \u2013 A class created by the Rev. Joseph Pemberton in England this is a superb group of remontant shrub roses, almost all developed between the two World Wars. They are easy to maintain and healthy. Some are quite capable of making small, continuous flowering climbers if grown on walls or given support. They can handle to zone five and also seem to thrive in heat.<\/p>\n
The Rugosas \u2013 The roses that grow wild on the beaches of Maine in sandy soil. These must be classified as the healthiest of all roses. Almost all are fragrant and repeat their flowers in succession throughout the summer. They have durable dark green foliage and most of the single flowered varieties produce an excellent crop of bright red hips every autumn. All make superb hedging plants. Easily hardy to zone four and three one thing to keep in mind is they hate spraying of any kind on their leaves. I have also found in hotter climates it is best to plant them in a location so that by mid-day they are out of the scorching sun as it will burn their leaves.<\/p>\n
The Noisettes \u2013 Created in Charleston, South Carolina by a rice planter named John Champney, these are a class of mostly repeat blooming climbers with colours ranging from white through the yellows and reds. Almost without exception they are fragrant with good healthy foliage. Some of the earlier Noisettes like Mary Washington are shrubs so do some homework. It was when they became crossed with Teas that they almost all became climbers. They are hardy to zone six and some are grown in zone five in sheltered spots or with winter protection.<\/p>\n
Ramblers of both Wichurana and Multiflora origin \u2013 Almost all have the `wow\u2019 factor when in full bloom. Within their ranks is a complete spectrum of colour. They are healthy and, if necessary, will tolerate impoverished soil and harsher weather conditions. An excellent use of these ramblers is as backdrop to repeat flowering climbers. In spring all the roses are in bloom and for the rest of the season the healthy and abundant foliage of the ramblers set off the repeat flowering roses. Easily hardy to cold climates of zone four and even lower.<\/p>\n
Modern Shrubs \u2013 These are a group of roses that have been developed since the end of World War 11. They are of mixed progeny, almost all continuous flowering and are good where space permits them to develop their own personality. Many can be grown as small climbers if placed against some form of support. With this group it is especially important to judge each variety individually and speak with other rose growers in your area about the ones you are thinking about trying. Almost all will be hardy to zone six with many to zone five and some to even four or lower. Size can vary from three feet to eight feet or more.<\/p>\n
Floribunda Roses (Cluster Flowered) These have been developed over the last 100 years or so and some of them make superb garden plants especially if grown in groups. Usually more healthy than Hybrid Teas, a few of the older varieties of quieter colours fit comfortably amongst the older roses of all types. Their smaller size of on average three to five feet, make them welcome additions to the garden. Many are hardy to zone five.<\/p>\n
The Species Roses \u2013 Amongst the Species are many that make superb garden plants. Although few are remontant, they are invariably healthy and most produce a superb crop of brightly coloured hips. Hardiness will vary so again, check with rose growers in your area or on the internet forums. Sizes vary widely so do a little homework because when they get big, they get very big.<\/p>\n
Tea roses – Superb Garden Roses that continually bear their blooms all season long and come in most every color found in the rose world \u2013 including bicolour. Their open growth habit and rounded shape are very pleasing in any garden setting. In warm climates some can grow to seven feet or more but generally they stay in the five foot range. They also don\u2019t mind being regularly trimmed. They are hardy to zone seven and can handle zone six if sheltered from freezing winds.<\/p>\n
The Polyanthas \u2013 A very under used and under appreciated group of first-class Garden Roses. The smaller blooms appear in clusters all season on shrubs packed with proportionately sized foliage. Most stay under three feet and will spread as wide or more. Very healthy and easily hardy to zone five.<\/p>\n
Now that you have chosen your roses keeping in mind size, color and growth habit just as you would for any garden design, it\u2019s time to think about doing an initial layout on paper. Doing so gives you a moment to think about your garden before you start the actual planting. This is important because you want to make sure colors aren\u2019t clashing or a taller variety is screening out a smaller one. It\u2019s also time to think about how much area do you want each variety to cover and how many bushes of that variety you will need to make that happen. That\u2019s right, how many. We are too often tempted to plant one of each variety, and while okay for a collector\u2019s garden, for a rose garden (with or without other planting) multiples of one variety really give the garden that punch. And that brings me to spacing of the actual plants.<\/p>\n
It was during my first visit to Mottisfont Abbey in the UK when I first began to expand my ideas on how to use roses in the garden, and spacing was something I rethought during that visit. Conventional wisdom at the time was spacing should be at great distances so the roses don\u2019t touch each other and something called \u201cmaximum air circulation\u201d can be realized. At Mottisfont in many cases three to five of the same rose are planted in close groups so the roses can intermingle and make it appear as if one solid bush is covering a large area.<\/p>\n
It is important at this point to pause for a moment and understand why the conventional wisdom of spacing existed. That can be found in the supposed need for air circulation. It was believed air circulation was needed to help keep the roses disease free. Well if you are growing disease prone roses this is true. Garden Roses are by their very nature disease resistant so the need for air circulation isn\u2019t a factor.<\/p>\n
The concept of spacing has been taken to its logical next step by Michael Marriott of David Austin Roses in the UK. We were fortunate enough to bring Michael to Ashdown for a workshop in the fall of 2007. I had asked Michael to simply do a day on his philosophy on roses, in his own words and boy did he deliver. The day was wonderful but there was one part that really rocked people\u2019s rose world. And that was his section on spacing of the plants in a rose garden. Michael has been kind enough to allow me to pass it on to you in this article. I covered it in our E-Gazette after his visit and here is that section.<\/p>\n
One of the many subjects Michael Marriott covered during his recent all-day workshop here at Ashdown was the way he plants his roses in groups to get a stunning mass effect. Unlike most of us who plant one bush of each variety several feet apart, Michael tightly plants several bushes of the same variety.<\/p>\n
In England Michael plants them anywhere from eighteen to thirty inches apart depending on how large the variety will ultimately grow. For warmer climates he recommends starting at twenty-four inches and working your way up from there. But the idea is to plant them close enough so they intermingle and you cannot tell where one bush starts and another ends. He uses anywhere from three to six to twelve or more bushes of one variety depending on how much space he wants to cover in the flower border. He does not worry about planting in odd numbers.<\/p>\n
In between the mass plantings of a particular variety he leaves enough room before the start of the next variety for maintenance and to define where one variety begins and another ends. For example if he is planting plants of particular varieties eighteen inches apart the first bush of the next variety will begin thirty-six inches away and then its plants would be spaced eighteen inches apart and so on.<\/p>\n
Lastly one of the most important points he made concerns pruning and shaping the bushes in this type of garden. He does not prune each bush of a variety’s mass planting individually. Rather he treats the mass as one plant and shapes the whole.<\/p>\n
Don’t be afraid to try this method. Michael has used it successfully in gardens all over the world and we certainly can’t argue with the results!<\/p>\n
The simplest way to layout your garden is on graph paper. The first step is to decide what \u201cscale\u201d are you going to use \u2013 scale being the distance each square covers. Michael had another great tip for this as well. Set your scale at one square equals twelve inches. That way as you draw the area each variety will cover you can simply count the squares to help you determine out how many plants of each variety you will need.<\/p>\n
As an example. You decide a short variety is going to cover an area three feet by four feet. As you lay it out you find it covers a total of twelve squares. Planting the bushes eighteen inches apart means each one will take up 1.5 squares. Simply divide twelve by 1.5 and you arrive at eight plants. A variety spaced twenty-four inches apart will take up two squares each. So divide twelve squares by two and you need six plants. A variety spaced thirty inches apart will take up 2.5 squares each so divide twelve squares by 2.5 and you conclude you will need five plants or you can use four and spread them out a little more.<\/p>\n
The same method works for figuring out how many of a perennial, annual or other shrub you will need. As you continue to layout your garden on paper consult the spacing recommendation for the other plants you are using. Count the number of squares, do a little simple math and you will quickly know! I\u2019ve used this since Michael\u2019s workshop and find it a real simple and quick way to lay out the garden.<\/p>\n
As you lay out your rose garden keep in mind color and height of the plants you are choosing \u2013 be they roses, perennials, annuals, shrubs or other. It\u2019s best to make sure colors blend smoothly from one group of plants to the other. If you have an awkward transition plants with white blooms always make a good color to put in between. But in the end your personal choices is your guide. Some people like soft pastels and some like hot colors that clash \u2013 it\u2019s your choice in the end.<\/p>\n
As you lay out your garden try to get out of the habit of using only one plant of each variety. Think drifts of plants and color planted in tight groups. In the end it is a more pleasing effect that polka dots of one plant here and one there. After all as Graham Stuart Thomas so aptly titled his book it is \u201cThe Art of Gardening With Roses\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Paul F. Zimmerman – A two part series published in “The Rose”.\u00a0 Official publication of The American Rose Society 2008 Part 1. Garden Roses. The Rose is one of the most diverse plants gardeners have. There are Cut Flower Roses producing beautiful long stem blooms for the florist industry, Exhibition Roses winning awards at shows […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":295,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P2XcPG-4R","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/301"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/301\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paulzimmermanroses.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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