Chuck wrote:
I've been told different things for pruning off the old dead flowers. Where
is the correct place to prune them off?

I don't know what everyone else might consider 'correct,' but my
preferred way of deadheading a rose is snapping off the bloom at the
abscission layer (where the stem is swollen just beneath the peduncle of
the flower). This was taught to me by Mel Hulse, the Director of San
Jose Heritage Rose Garden as a method prone to encourage more new
flowering shoots than the old method of cutting back to the first
five-leaflet leaf as standard practice dictates. I was told that this is
a procedure that was found to produce greater flower production by
England's Royal Horticultural Society. Here is a reference:
http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m.../article.jhtml
The relevant passage is under 'Rose Tips' on the bottom of the first page.


--
Radika
California
USDA 9 / Sunset 15