Pruning roses properly is crucial if you want to grow beautiful, lush roses. Roses have been highly hybridized and cross bred over the years so that they produce beautiful blooms, and this has effected their growth habits. To keep the bush size and shape appealing requires some human intervention in the form of pruning.

Pruning roses isn’t as complicated as some people make it out to be. In fact, there are only a few basic rules. If you keep these in mind whenever you pick up your pruning shears, you’ll be rewarded with beautiful rose bushes that your friends and neighbors will envy.

1) When to Prune

Pruning roses should be done in the spring, just as the leaf buds begin to swell. This is very important – it needs to be done before the season’s active growth begins. Young roses should not be pruned at all. They need to reach a strong, mature size (2-3 years) before any pruning is required.

2) How Much to Prune

To some extent, this depends on how large you want the plant to become. Rose height can get out of control without pruning. Assume a rose bush will grow 3-4 feet over the growing season and prune it down enough to allow for that much growth. You don’t want the bush to grow so high that you cannot see or enjoy the blooms at the top.

3) What to Prune

Once you’ve cut the bush down to the desired height, the next thing to do when pruning roses is to remove any dead, decayed, broken or damaged growth. Not only does this keeps your bushes looking good, but it prevents pests and disease.

Make your cuts just above a strong leaf bud. Notice the direction that the leaf bud is growing. If left intact, that is the direction that the cane will grow in. You want to leave leaf buds that are growing in the desired direction.

Tiny, spindly canes will generally not amount to much of anything. Remove these so that the plant’s energy can be directed to the larger, stronger canes. Get rid of most of the old remaining leaves to promote new leaf growth.

4) Rose Pruning to Maintain Shape

It is a good idea to keep the center of the bush free of canes that are growing horizontally across it. This promotes good air circulation which helps avoid fungus infection. Another reason to avoid having too many canes crossing each other is that they will create a lot of leaves that shade lower branches and discourage blooms on the lower part of the plant. When pruning roses, you want to prevent bushes from growing into large tangled masses with small and inferior blooms.

Climbing roses only need to be pruned to control their overall size or when they are growing in the wrong direction.

Continuing to shape your rose bushes as they grow is a good practice. Changing them from wild and unruly to prim and proper is the goal of pruning roses.

5) Prevent Disease

Always use clean, sharp pruning shears when pruning roses. Clean the shears after each use to remove any disease or fungus. After pruning, major cuts can be painted with a sealer to aid in healing and to help keep out insects and disease. Regular Elmer’s glue, diluted a bit, works just fine.

Finally, finish your rose pruning by cleaning up all the dead stuff you’ve cut away. You don’t want to leave infected canes on the ground to spread disease. You also don’t want to be surprised later with thorny canes to step on. Pull the weeds from around the rose bush and finish up by placing new mulch around the base of the rose bush.

Correctly pruning roses and shaping them makes for a lovelier bush and a healthier plant with larger blooms. Proper rose pruning is easy, and it is the key to a happy, healthy rose garden. Enjoy your beautiful roses.

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