Organic Vegetable Gardening

When to apply rotted horse manure to rose trees?

Three questions that are all part of the same basic problem. First, the single rose is not a ’sport’ but the bloom of the rootstock, which is ignoring the bud of the choice variety and putting up its own growth, also characterized by the seven leaves instead of five. Why suckers occur, and what to do about them, is best explained by in turn explaining why we bud and graft.

Budding (implanting a growth bud under the bark of another plant and in contact with the sap flow of the cambium layer) and grafting (joining on a shoot tip or short piece of young wood to replace the removed tip of another plant), are done for many reasons, but mainly because most choice varieties of roses and fruits do not develop a vigorous enough root system of their own to allow the variety to grow and perform to full potential.

Be it bloom or fruit production, quantity or quality, bearing when the plant is young or much later, a small tree or large, the stock has a profound influence on the kind of plant that develops, and quite different to what would grow if the choice variety were left to grow on its own roots.

Almost all bush roses are propagated by budding just above soil level, and standards by implanting the bud high up on a briar stem. As soon as the nurseryman can see that the bud has ‘taken’ he removes the original ‘wild’ stock foliage and growth above the bud so that sap and energy is diverted and concentrated into the choice bud.

Used in this way, evaporation of moisture from the soil is reduced or prevented, and hoeing to prevent the surface caking and packing hard can then be carried out clear of the soil and roots by light scratching in this mulch layer.

As always, you must consider which way makes most sense to you, and make your own common-sense judgement

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