GKVKs – Gardening Tips and Store Gardening Tips and Store
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Rose is undoubtedly the ‘Queen of Flowers’. If you have a passion for gardening and love
flowers then I am sure you have always wanted to grow roses in your garden. Some
newbie gardeners including me, a few years ago used to think rose is one of the
most difficult shrubs to grow. This is actually
a misconception. Anybody can grow roses just like any other plant. All you have
to do is follow some simple tips and tricks on how to grow roses correctly.
In this article let’s list out the 10 useful rose plant care tips one by one.
10. Bare Root Roses or Container Roses?
You can purchase roses already potted in soil thats container roses or as
dormant bare-root plants. If you are a beginner, container roses is the best
option, because they are easy to plant and they establish quickly. If you are
planting bare root roses, which are commonly sold online, they need to have
their roots soaked overnight in water before planting them in the soil, and the
roots must be kept always moist for the first few weeks after planting.
9. Repotting a Newly
bought Rose plant
The commonest mistake most of us do immediately repot a newly purchased plant.
Never do this. Keep this newly bought container in partial shade or indirect
sunlight for at least 3 to 4 days for it to settle down and then shift to full
sunlight or consider repotting in a new container and new potting mix of you
choice. Do not remove the entire mother soil from the plant, specially beginners.
Just tease the roots around and then
place in a new potting mix. Then after repotting, water it thoroughly and keep
it in shade for few days to prevent repotting or transplant shock which causes
the plant to wilt.
8. Drainage and Pot
Selection
No doubt, You need a well draining soil for all plants. This applies even to
rose plant. Make sure you have good drainage holes at the bottom that do not
get clogged easily. As you keep the
containers in full sunlight, plastic containers are not recommended. Clay pots
are the best and next comes the cement containers.
7. Potting Mix
Rose is a special plant and we expect a lot of flowers from it. So the nutrient
requirement for this plant is high. As you all know, Any plant requires
Phosphorous and Potassium for healthy flowering and fruiting. Keeping this in
mind while you prepare your potting. Steamed bone meal is the most important
source of phosphorous and a slow release fertilizer. One handful of it will be sufficient to
produce flowering for the entire year. You should also make a proper potting mix with
all ingredients like decomposed cowdung, vermicompost, coco peat or peat moss
and garden soil in proper proportions to make a well draining soil
6. Sunlight and
Location
Rose plant needs atleast 6 to 8 hours of full direct sunlight to produce
flowers and to keep it healthy. You cannot expect flowering without sunlight.
One more important point to remember here is its location. If possible protect
it from hot noon sunlight, like 12 pm to 2 pm sun or if this is not possible,
you can install a 50 percent green shade net to protect from noon sun,
specially in hot summer.
5. Watering
Requirement
Roses need daily watering and a well draining soil is very important and at the
same time moisture around roots has to be maintained by adding stuff like
compost and coco peat. You can add a little more compost like decomposed
cowdung or some extra leaf compost in your potting mix. One important watering
tip for roses to avoid fungus is Water early in the morning before sun starts.
Watering in evening can keep it damp and encourage fungus.
4. Fertilizer
Rose plant requires regular feeding to increase flowering both number of
flowers and also to achieve big sized roses. If you use chemical fertilizers, NPK
20 20 20 and DAP crystals that’s Di ammonium phosphate alternating every week
is sufficient to produce good flowering. But if you are completely organic like
me, Consider adding a hand full of vermicompost or decomposed cow dung in each
container every 15 days after raking or tilling the top soil. Raking or tilling the soil is itself an
important task to improve soil aeration and improve your plants health.
Then, You can also perform a foliar spray by mixing 1 teaspoon of Epsom salt in
1 litre of water once every 15 days for best results.
3. Pest Control
This is most important step. The only regular pesticide I recommend is Neem oil weekly once spray. This prevents and cures a lot of diseases and pests on rose plants. 5 to 10 ml neem oil mixed in 1 litre of water with few drops of liquid soap or shampoo. There are two most common disease attacks on rose. One is the Rose die back disease and the black spot rose disease, both are caused by fungus.
2. Dead Heading
This is another important task most of us are lazy to perform. Just pluck those
dead and fading flowers from the plant. This will conserve the plants energy to
product more new buds rather than diverting the energy in seed formation. Performing dead heading as soon as the flowers
starts to fade is beneficial instead of waiting for the flower to dry
completely.
1. Pruning or Trimming Rose Plants
This is important task most of us neglect. Do not hesitate or be afraid to prune you rose plant. You are not gonna kill it. Pruning is an important gardening secret to healthy rose bush because this encourages branching and makes your plant more bushy as a result more number of flowers. Perform at least a basic pruning what is called soft pruning in early spring season once in a year.
I have a detailed article on Pruning concepts and types of pruning.
Now! Two Bonus Tips:
Firstly About Soil PH: Rose loves slightly acidic soil. If you have a PH testing meter you can check it by dipping into your soil. Rose loves a ph of 6.0 to 6.5. To acidify your soil you can water it by mixing 10 gms of alum in 1 litre of water, once every 15 days or a month. This will certainly improve your plants health and increase flowering because acidic soil is important for nutrient absorption.
Secondly, You can add Mustard Cake Tea or Even used tea dust as discussed in my previous article on Used tea for Plants.
Happy Gardening!
