Wild roses...

Almost all of my old roses have gone ‘wild’, that is died back below the graft while we were away from our house and our roses… and perhaps this house should not be called by its original name any longer? Unless I start thinking of replacing all those wild roses, it should be called something else.  Something like “Robin Nest Cottage”, or “Mourning Dove Alcove”. 

I discovered this most heartrending of things at the beginning of spring, right after we moved back to our house in the roses, when they started putting forth some meagre blooms of single-petal red roses that hadn’t been there before.  This is pretty maddening and discouraging because you can still see growth from the root stock of these rose bushes, they are hardy and vigorous plants, they look every bit like a rose; thorns and all, but they don't show signs of a bud. You wait and wait looking forward to those beautiful buds only to be tricked into a great disappointment. After those few blooms at the beginning of spring, that’s it. 

I have learned that eighty percent of the roses grown in the US come from the Wasco, CA area and are grafted onto red climbing Rosa 'Dr. Huey'. So, if suddenly, all of your roses are red and throwing longer than normal canes, with no bloom whatsoever, pretty good bet your top graft is gone. 'Dr. Huey' is a pretty good rose in its own right, however, if you want a succession of blooms, they are not the best of choices and otherwise not garden worthy roses.

The worst thing is, I can cut all the wild stems back to the ground, and Dr. Huey doesn’t care.  I have tried in vain many times to dislodge the canes, but cutting suckers just makes them come back stronger. They must be carefully torn away, something that it is almost impossible in many cases, and they grow so fast that must be pruned almost every week.  Oh Dr. Huey why did you moved in? You should have gone to live with our renters, wherever they went!