The starting point for healthy roses is healthy soil.
If you get the soil right for your roses, everything else will probably fall into place.
But if the soil is wrong, you will have to overcompensate for it on other fronts for the entire life of your rose bush.
Good soil for roses is firm enough to hold your plants in place, yet loose enough to allow easy access for water and oxygen to the root system.
Good soil also drains freely, yet can retain moisture during drought and heat waves.
It locks in essential nutrients and makes them available to your plants over a long period of time.
Properly mixed soil should feel loamy; that is, it will be loose, dark, and crumbly.
It should not be saturated with water for long periods of time -- you should see puddles around your roses only after heavy rains, and the puddles should disappear within a day at most.
Do not plant your roses in a spot that can become a temporary pond.
Most soil needs a little help to be a good foundation for roses.
The organic matter you add to soil to improve its structure is called an amendment.
Leaf mold, peat moss, rotted horse manure, and compost are all excellent amendments.
Ph-neutral soil has a pH of 7; roses do best in slightly acidic soil that has a pH of 6 to 6.
5.
The acidity of oak leaves makes them particularly ideal for roses.
If your soil is overly alkaline, the foliage of your rose bushes will appear diseased or distorted.
But if alkalinity is problem, or if your soil is heavy or clay-like, adding some peat moss can make a big difference by making the soil more acid.
Just be sure to mix the peat moss in well, and wet the soil thoroughly before you put your rose bush in the hole.
For most bushes, you should concern yourself with the quality of soil down to 18 inches.
However, some of the greatest rose growers insist that rose holes be dug three and even four feet deep.
This is, of course, well beyond the means of those of us who don't have a full-time gardener or the use of a backhoe.
But if you can possibly muster the willingness to keep digging after you've hit the 18 inch mark, and can keep going to 24 inches or, even better, 30 inches deep, your roses will reward you for years.
You only want to plant this rose bush once, so you might as well do it right the first time.
To prepare the hole first remove the soil from your future rose bed down to that depth, putting aside any good-looking topsoil.
Then mix in soil with a peat-based loam from a garden center.
It may have perlite in it (little white round balls that act as spacers in the soil, keeping it loose and airy).
Fill up your bed to ground level.
If you don't want to or can't dig down 18 inches in the soil you have, consider putting your rose bushes in a raised bed.
If you get the soil right for your roses, everything else will probably fall into place.
But if the soil is wrong, you will have to overcompensate for it on other fronts for the entire life of your rose bush.
Good soil for roses is firm enough to hold your plants in place, yet loose enough to allow easy access for water and oxygen to the root system.
Good soil also drains freely, yet can retain moisture during drought and heat waves.
It locks in essential nutrients and makes them available to your plants over a long period of time.
Properly mixed soil should feel loamy; that is, it will be loose, dark, and crumbly.
It should not be saturated with water for long periods of time -- you should see puddles around your roses only after heavy rains, and the puddles should disappear within a day at most.
Do not plant your roses in a spot that can become a temporary pond.
Most soil needs a little help to be a good foundation for roses.
The organic matter you add to soil to improve its structure is called an amendment.
Leaf mold, peat moss, rotted horse manure, and compost are all excellent amendments.
Ph-neutral soil has a pH of 7; roses do best in slightly acidic soil that has a pH of 6 to 6.
5.
The acidity of oak leaves makes them particularly ideal for roses.
If your soil is overly alkaline, the foliage of your rose bushes will appear diseased or distorted.
But if alkalinity is problem, or if your soil is heavy or clay-like, adding some peat moss can make a big difference by making the soil more acid.
Just be sure to mix the peat moss in well, and wet the soil thoroughly before you put your rose bush in the hole.
For most bushes, you should concern yourself with the quality of soil down to 18 inches.
However, some of the greatest rose growers insist that rose holes be dug three and even four feet deep.
This is, of course, well beyond the means of those of us who don't have a full-time gardener or the use of a backhoe.
But if you can possibly muster the willingness to keep digging after you've hit the 18 inch mark, and can keep going to 24 inches or, even better, 30 inches deep, your roses will reward you for years.
You only want to plant this rose bush once, so you might as well do it right the first time.
To prepare the hole first remove the soil from your future rose bed down to that depth, putting aside any good-looking topsoil.
Then mix in soil with a peat-based loam from a garden center.
It may have perlite in it (little white round balls that act as spacers in the soil, keeping it loose and airy).
Fill up your bed to ground level.
If you don't want to or can't dig down 18 inches in the soil you have, consider putting your rose bushes in a raised bed.
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