How To Plant a Rose

Roses are beautiful, traditional flowers which can provide a sense of elegance to any outdoor space. If you’re new to planting, it can feel overwhelming to remember the key information on how to care for each of your plants. In this blog we will be talking through how to plant a rose and how to care for it afterwards.

1. Where To Plant Your Rose

Plant your rose in an open, sunny position in your garden. It should be planted in well-drained and fertile soil. If your soil isn’t fertile, you can add organic matter such as farmyard manure (best for roses), used compost or leaf mould.

2. How To Plant Your Rose

Just like any other plant, dig a hole in the sunny spot you’ve found in the garden. Adding root grow will be very beneficial to your rose, giving it a stronger root system, helping them to grow and develop their roots quicker. We recommend Mycorrhizal Fungi. This will be especially helpful if you’re planting later in the year, more towards the Summer!

To add the root grow, firstly water your rose while it is still in the pot you bought it in. When taking the rose out to plant, add a sprinkling of the root grow onto the root ball of the rose. As the soil will be moist from the watering, the root grow will stick to it. Now add just a little more root grow into the hole before gently placing in your rose – be careful to not prick yourself! Once the rose is in the ground, backfill with soil and firm down to keep the rose sturdy in its place.

3. Caring For Your Rose

Now that it’s firmly in the ground, how do you care for a rose? Roses can be a high maintenance flower so can need a lot of attention. Water your rose well until established and especially in hot weather. Roses are also very greedy feeders! We would recommend feeding your rose with Westland Rose High Performance Plant Food twice a year, once in the Spring when the new growth appears and again in Summer after the first roses fade. We’d also encourage using a liquid feed weekly for your Roses in the summer months June – September.

4. Maintaining Your Rose

How can you keep your rose strong and healthy? Dead head your roses regularly, cutting off the flowers that are beginning to wilt away. Don’t be alarmed if you find yourself doing this more or less every day! This will prolong flowering, encouraging further blooms and keep the plant healthy until Autumn.

5. Pruning Your Roses + Further Care

Roses are prone to catching diseases so by pruning your roses, it helps to prevent diseases by removing the areas that could attract infestations. This will be areas where stems cross and rub against one another. This causes wounds in the stems, opening them up, allowing disease to get in.

Not only this but pruning also encourages flowering and stops the plant from losing its shape. Once Autumn comes around, you’ll want to lightly prune your roses, taking off the top growth and chopping them down to the next leaf, preventing the stems dying back down.

In Spring you can give your roses a harder prune if needed, cutting the plants down until they’re just a foot off the ground. This will allow your rose plant to maintain a good shape during its growing season. The roses will grow the same way as the leaves you chop the stem down to so when pruning it’s important to make sure the roses will grow outwards and not cross over.

If there are any signs of green fly, black fly or black spot, the Rose Clear Spray is great to use. This will cure your rose by killing its attackers and then preventing further attacks. As long as you feed your rose well this is easily prevented.