"Rod" wrote in message
...

"Franz Heymann" wrote in message
...

"Rod" wrote in message
...

"Franz Heymann" wrote in message
...
I need to do something like that too, but before risking it, please
confirm
that I understood you correctly:
(1) You are talking of shrub roses. (of the Rugosa group)
(2) You did not lose a season's flowering. (I am ancient and the
loss
of a
season's flowers is, if I may be blunt about it, a matter of life
and
death).
(3) What time of the year did you prune it?

Judy's roses are not rugosas - she can prune quite hard and still have
a
reasonable lot of flowers next year, though personally I'd
do a rather heavy dead heading or summer pruning now and more heavier
pruning in the autumn - like end of next month.
With your rugosas you can reduce the area they fill quite a lot by
pruning
them somewhat like cane fruit. ie take out all old wood
and wood that's flowered this year, just leave as much of this year's
basal growths as you have room for. You don't have to do all
of this - just do as much as you need to get them how you want them,
but
do spare at least this year's basal growths and if possible
any of last year's that have nice strong side shoots. Done properly it
will look a lot smaller but won't look like a heavily pruned
plant and should give a decent show next year.

Many thanks for clearing this up. I will follow your advice. But just
one
more thing: Do I have to wait for the winter to do that maintenance?

[Franz Heymann]

That kind of pruning can be done now or anytime in the next few weeks, in
fact it will help the new basal shoots to grow and ripen
before the winter.

Many thanks. I now have a very nasty chore on hand.

[Franz Heymann]