"Unique Too" wrote in message


Wasn't it Cass who recently said she had POed the rose gods. I don't
think
she's the only one!

Julie

Hello Julie,

No she is not the only one, believe me!
We have been fighting a fierce battle with
a new strain of botrytis, cercospora and
black spot. Other than that...

We had a gorgeous show for about one week
that tickled the pride and made us forget about
the deer. In one single swoop they cleaned up
the entire beds on the East side and demolished
some once bloomers we were eagerly awaiting
to see. Since some of them were first time
bloomers in our garden and we are keeping
track of performance we had just counted some
of the buds in the newer plants. Some had as
many as thirty and yet they managed to eat
everything, and what they didn't munch
they just broke and left on the ground.

I never thought I will hate any living creature.
I have found differently. Anyway, if what your
rose has is indeed bacterial gall there is little
or nothing you can do to save the plant. However,
that said I have been successful before by cutting
some of the galls with a very sharp Japanese saw
(like the kind used for bonsai) and then used a
brush to brush pure Clorox on the cut. If the
galls are superficial ( I mean not inside the root
system only ) you still can try to do that.

The soil indeed is infected with the bacteria,
but there are many ways to clean it including
replacing the actual soil and laying it fallow
but you don't need to wait five years. Some
of the info available is nearly ten years old
so take it with a grain of salt. In the old days
we used Gallex® but it was discontinued way
back in 1991. I guess it was just as bad as the
bacteria it was trying to get rid of.

Did I miss which rose it is except for being
a climber? How old is it? And why do you
think that cutting some of the galls is out of
the question? At any rate I hope you can
find a solution without having to worry about
the other roses...

Allegra