When is the proper time to prune roses? And how much should I prune?
And how much should I prune?
Best time is in the fall. Prune sour all old branches. (Sometimes you hold to go back to a short stub.) I live contained by LA and we do ours right after the rosebolw game on Jan 1 every year
I cut past its sell-by date the spent flowers down to the first 5-leaf branch.
In the fall, I prune down to about 2 foot tall, and mulch heavily (to protect from the winter). In spring, when the days are no longer freezing, and around when the Forsythia blooms, I prune back to roughly speaking 14 inches.
My climbers I prune in the spring (again, just as clean buds are beginning to show), usually down to about 3 foot tall - and any parts that had winter die-back.
Answers: Major pruning is done in the early spring.
The exceptions are some climbers & roses that produce blooms on the previous year's wood. They should be pruned right after they bloom.
You can prune stale dead or diseased wood or criss-crossing branches anytime.
This video from Heirloom Roses states that the pruning of their type of roses starts in February:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGIhRYN13...
This gardener from the Utah State U. Extension like to wait until he sees some nice growth surrounded by the spring so he can tell which stems to cut & which ones he wants to hold:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLgdQvFlC...
Dead-heading when flowers fade & cutting long-stemed flowers is actually a mild form of summer or day-to-day pruning. Video on how to deadhead roses:
http://gardeners-world.net/videotest.asp...
When doing your most important pruning, get rid of the dead wood first. Then bring back rid of the thinner wood, which is the stems that are thinner than a pencil. Cut all of the branches that cross or overlap one another because these are often diseased or will become so.
Keep the remaining five hearty branches. These are often dark green. You will want to bring in your roses fluted or vases shaped, with an unambiguous center, and keep them from touching or overlapping each other. Cut so that the bud is facing outside of the bush and at a 45 amount angle that slopes inward so that you can keep promoting the outward growth.
http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/roses/prune...
Pruning in stove climate zones:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5Tas3uhF...
Pruning climbing roses:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB8GnCqkj...
Good luck! Hope this is helpful.
depends on the rose. Some roses bloom on the current years growth and those can be pruned back completely in deferred winter, and some bloom on last years growth which if you cut them down, they will grow, but not bloom, so they need selective pruning. spring. and spring solely. in spring u will see what brunches survived and what look healthy. those which re weaken u cut all, which re thick vigorous looking u cut above 3 bud
hybrid tea roses that grow into high shrubs can be pruned down in late slop after a frost has killed the leaves, but solely take off the extra soaring stuff.. leave a good two ft on the plant. afterwards mulch. you'll still need to prune deadwood in spring and shape the plant at that time. forsythia is a fitting indicator.. when it blooms, prune roses!.
bush roses can be left till the spring pruning.
what you don't want to do is to prune too soon... that opens cane to insect invasion and also stimulates NEW growth that will be killed in the first freeze. that will own taken a lot of energy out of the plant that it will consequently not be able to regain cuz it will be going dormant... weakening the plant..
climbers enjoy their own method of pruning. plenty of info on how, here..
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rls=c...
as soon as they finish flowering