| Patricia Howlin, November 5, 2004
I am new to the state of Maine and my children gave me a yellow rose bush. So far so good but I don't know what to do with it to insure it will survive the winter up here. Can you help with information. Thanks. |
| 11/5/04 Thank you for inquiring. I do not know what kind of rose that you have, but it would be best to treat it as being tender in the Maine climate. Many yellow roses are tender and may or may not survive the winter no matter how good of a job at winterizing that you do. One variety of a somewhat winter hardy variety of a yellow rose is Prairie Harvest if you are looking in the future. Many roses can handle limited temperatures down to -20 F if they have had a chance to prepare for those temperatures by a gradually cooling winter. If it gets real cold quickly in late Fall/early winter then the plant will suffer. The other important thing to do is to protect a plant from drying winds. For practical steps, the first thing to do with a new rose bush is to plant it well which you may have already done. Before planting inspect the plant to see if there is a swelling just about the root area. If a swelling exist the plant is grafted with a selected ornamental plant grafted to a hardy rootstock. If there is no swelling (the bud union) then the plant is an own root plant, and is likely to be better able to withstand the rigors of winter. In planting, bury any bud union about three inches below grade - the regular ground surface. You most likely planted the rose sometime last summer, so you will need to assume that you did ok at that time. Step two is to cover the center of the planted rose with eight inches to a foot of compost, mulch, or soil to protect any bud union from freeze thaw throughout the winter. You will remove this in the spring. After this step, prune the plant to about 24 inches in height and wrap a cylinder of roofing paper (also 24 inches high) around the plant and mound, and fill the cylinder up with pine needles, leaves, etc. to act as insulation from drying winds.Leave the top of the cylinder open to keep the plant from heating up too much during sunny days during the winter. This is about as good as you can do to protect the plant in its current location. Alternatively, if you have an old farm house or an unheated garage, you can dig up the plant collecting as much root ball as possible, place this in a pot, and store in the garage for winter after removing the leaves. A bit of water from time to time will be sufficient for the dormant plant.
Jerry Cinnamon
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| 11/9/04 Thanks you so much for all the information about my rose bush. I will get busy doing all you recommended and cross my fingers. Regards, Pat
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