On Tue, 10 Jun 2003 21:35:22 -0400, in rec.gardens.roses you wrote:


" No, Tim. It is much better to bare root an older, established rose
because it is then POSSIBLE to move the thing without a backhoe.

Part of my dilemma in this situation, if you look at the pictures, the roots
are close to the sidewalk. So it makes it tough to dig it out and leave much
dirt on it.

I know, it's "just" Blaze. But that thing suffered one blackspot season
after another, didn't bloom at all until I discovered our phosphorus
deficiency, and is just now looking like a rosebush, once I discovered
Banner Maxx and Messenger. Roses sure don't come cheap, do they?

I will try to leave as much dirt as possible around it, and pull it on the
yard wagon to its new home, about twenty five feet away. If it doesn't make
it, I will be sad, but it's not an irreplaceable variety. I was hoping to be
able to dig far enough down by hand, to bend the main root backwards, then
strip off all the lower leaves, fill the raised bed, and let the lower part
of the plant (where it used to have lower leaves) turn into roots.

We shall see.


Scopata Fuori

Can you wait until the end of the season?

I tried to move a two year old Cherokee Rose in June and it never made
it, even though it had a pretty robust root system.

Everything else that I've moved out of season (either early spring or
late fall/winter), has survived pretty nicely I've moved four roses,
losing only the Cherokee, and would never consider moving anything
from March to October here in zone 6B.

I'd think that the best thing would be to wait until right about the
time it goes dormant, prune the heck out of it, and then dig it up,
pretty much treating it like a bare root rose.

Or even better now that I think about it, is to do the above right
before it's time to break dormancy but after the ground is thawed
enough to work with (say Feb. or March) and then do the mulch mound
thang.