Growing for success | Rose to the occasion

By Riverside Gardens

Nov 2, 2023

Ideal: The sunny Goulburn Valley offers the perfect weather for growing roses. Photo by Contributed

Larry Smith and the Riverside Gardens team talk all things pots, plants and pruning in their weekly gardening column.

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The Melbourne Cup is not only famous for being the race that stops a nation with all the horses, fashion on the field and the glitter and glamour that goes with it. It is also famous for its amazing rose display that really sets the scene for the spring racing carnival.

This is not surprising when you hear that there are about 16,500 roses that make up the display, and about 1000 of them are replaced each year. All are cared for and timed to be in full flower from day one of the carnival.

Blooming: Pierre de Ronsard rose. Photo by Contributed

It’s pretty skilful gardening, considering Melbourne’s unpredictable weather this time of year. It would be a lot easier if it were here in the sunny Goulburn Valley, where the weather is ideal for growing roses.

Our hot, dry summers and cool, frosty winters really suit this group of plants. You only need to walk out into the Garden Centre right now to see and smell just how well they do. The plants are all flushed with new growth and in full flower and looking quite stunning.

Stunning: Just joey rose. Photo by Contributed

If you follow a few basic steps, you will have great success growing roses in your garden and without a lot of work either.

Roses like an open sunny position with good air movement around them to minimise humidity building up among the foliage. If they have good drainage, they will handle a range of soil from clay to sandy loam. They require quite a hard prune in the winter to encourage new growth from down low on the plant’s structure.

Charming: Fragrant charm rose. Photo by Contributed

Then, during the growing season, if you remove old flowering stems, the plants will continue to flush with flowers as they push out new growth, replacing what was removed. A few light applications of a rose-specific fertiliser throughout the spring-summer months will help improve the plant’s vigour and build resistance to fungal problems that can occur with roses.

The Garden Centre staff members are always ready to advise on how best to prevent or control problems that attack your plants, which will happen from time to time, no matter what you are growing.

Golden: Gold bunny rose. Photo by Contributed

Roses are grown in a variety of styles, from ground covers to bushes, standards, climbers, ramblers, and weepers. Most are self-explanatory, but standards and weepers are essentially bush roses or rambling roses on tall trunks.

Standards roses, in their most common size, are really bushes on 900mm high stems, and weeper roses are ramblers on 1800mm stems. All styles basically require a similar amount of care and are treated right. They will give you months of colour and fragrance in your garden.

Yes, most roses do have thorns and can catch you unaware at times, but hey, toughen up and smell the roses.