dave weil wrote:

The exception to this in my opinion, as I'm now finding out in my 3rd
full season (so keep in mind that I'm a novice) is that for many
hybrid teas, you *need* to take some of the stems back a bit, because
you'll lose any decent shape to the plant and they can tend to
legginess. My Mr. Lincoln is in need of some serious cane pruning
right now.

I will have to agree with you here - with my HTs, I don't always
winter-prune, sometimes the only pruning they get is when I take off
long-stemmed roses for the vase. Sometimes I prune them after they have
finished their first flush. I was not thinking of those practices as
deadheading when I wrote this last night, but thanks for making me stop
and reconsider.

Most of my roses are OGR bushy creatures, but I also have a fair number
of HTs. For some reason, when I think of my roses I forget to think of
the HTs!

I'm guessing that this way of deadheading works well for bushy type

Yes sir, that is really so.

plants like Baby Love (it's the method that I use on it - then at the
end of the season, I trim it like I would a hedge). I'm also using
it on climbers like Sombreuil and Old Blush.

Uh-Huh. In your climate and mine where the growing season is long, there
are all manner of liberties we can take with how we prune and shape the
bushes because even when we make mistakes, the rose will recover and
teach us how to do it right the next time.

On my Aloha, I definitely take some stem with the blooms (because I
use them a lot in arrangements that I take to work), although I'm not
happy with my eye in terms of how to take them. When I bought my
house, the bush was very round and well-shaped, not it's not so much.
I think I need an expert to come in and do my winter pruning this
year.

Ah! Where is the fun in that :-)!

Seriously, I do remember feeling rather ill at ease with pruning,
deadheading and everything in the first few years of growing my roses,
and slowly, the roses themselves taught me how each individual likes to
be treated. It may be uncomfortable for you now, but this will pass and
you will have a tough time remembering why were ill at ease about
pruning ever - one of these years, I promise.

And I wonder what this site means by "straight across" he

"The Royal National Rose Society growers recommend cutting hybrid
teas and floribunda shoots straight across with shears or a hedge
trimmer. They believe this promotes more and stronger growth and
possibly better flowering than traditional pruning and thinning
techniques".

I assume that this means just taking hedge clippers to shape the
plant, not "lop it off in a straight line", right?

They do mean straight across - as in make the top all the same height.
Amazing, isn't it? It really works too to the extent that I have tried
it or seen it tried at the Heritage. I do something more in addition to
certain rose bushes, like remove dead-wood and really inconveniently
located branches, and the roses actually seem to like this treatment.
Makes the pruning go faster too since I don't have to stand there and
ponder each rose bush wondering where to make the cuts.


--
Radika
California
USDA 9 / Sunset 15