"David Shalita" wrote in message
...
My almost 50 year old rose has large blossoms but the stems are so thin,
that the blossoms cannot stand upright. Located in hot valley near Los
Angeles, CA.

This rose I call a rose tree, all leaves stems blossoms grow on top of
the 4 foot stem.

I feed regularly with a systemic food by BAYER company. Sun exposure is
about 5 hours per day.

Are weak stems a symtom of old roses or is there
something I can do to cause stronger stems?

Thank you, Dave

Hello Dave,

Lets start from the beginning he do you know what
kind of rose do you have? Some roses are "nodders",
this meaning that the blooms are bigger than what the
stem can properly hold up. In the old roses there are
several varieties that will comfortably fit this bill, and
that will make the difference between a lack of vigor
because they are suffering from malnutrition (seldom
the case to my limited knowledge) or because it is
a natural predisposition of the plant to behave as it
has been genetically programmed to do.

Any chance of you getting a photo here for us to
take a look at your rose? If you have a digital camera
and can post it, I am sure we can figure between all
of us what gives there. Some of David Austin new
roses have a tendency to have "weak necks" and
that in fact do not detract from their beauty. When
they reach an above your head height and the slightest
breeze moves them, you forget all about their looking
into the ground, they are so beautiful. But I can
understand why you would want to know.

I would suggest that in the feeding department you
may want to simply get a couple of bags of Whitney's
steer manure and some alfalfa pellets from a feed store
-not the one with sugar added but the straight for the
rabbits pellets- and mulch your rose with some nice
spadesful of manure and then a couple of handfuls
of alfalfa. You can put some fine barkdust on top of
it. The reason for this is because I have found that
this has helped many of my roses grow some really
healthy basals. Once you have a couple of those
coming from the base of the plant, you may be able
to find out if the rose nods because it is supposed to
or because it needs to be regenerated by pruning.

Good luck, and although there is nothing wrong with
Bayer products, an old rose seems to respond better
to "natural" food than to chemical one. I cannot explain
that one scientifically but some of my twenty and some
year old roses always were happier in my old garden
with that mixture than even with the professional growers
food I used to get from Teuffels. Go figure!

Allegra