Check out this video: "How to Choose Roses: A Rose For Every Location" [1]

Submitted by Lisa [2] on Tue, 2012-02-21 11:35

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flower carpet roses [4]

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“In a nursery, you may be a little bit overwhelmed with all the roses you have to choose from,” says Growing Wisdom [5]'s Dave Epstein in his new video, "How to Choose Roses: A Rose for Every Location [6]. “Well, the reality is, you need the right rose for the right location.”

In the video, Dave demystifies the rose selection process with an overview of three popular, easy-care landscaping rose lines - Flower Carpet, Knock Out and Drift - and shows how each can be used to its best in the garden.

Dave recommends a little research before you shop, so you know you’re choosing the right plant for the right place: “Remember, when you go to the nursery, all the roses may look the same in the pot, but in a few years, they’re going to look a lot different.”

Here's Dave's breakdown of easy-care roses and their uses:

Flower Carpet roses along a roadway

Flower Carpet roses: Because they’re salt- and drought-tolerant, they’re perfect alongside roads and driveways. Their season-long blooms and full, sprawling, bushy form also make them ideal for filling out large blocks of color. Because they can grow up and around things, they’re also good for softening visual elements like fence posts, chain link fences, rocks, hardscaping and garden art.

“It’s more of a creeping rose than something that’s going to get high,” says Dave.

Knock Out roses: Because of their tall, vertical nature, they’re great behind a fence, at the back of a border or walkway or anywhere else they can be used as a tall screen or canvas upon which you can layer levels of shorter plants.

“Wherever you plant them, just make sure you’re OK with them getting this high,” says Dave, standing behind a shoulder-height Knock Out shrub.

Drift roses: “They stay smaller than Flower Carpet roses,” says Dave. “They’re best suited for a small container on the patio or balcony.”

The video's the best way, however, to get an idea of what these roses will look like in a few years, as opposed to what they look like when you buy them in the garden center. So check it out to decide which rose - or roses - might work best for you.

Read more… [1]

'Eat Your Roses' in 2012! [9]

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Who knew? The International Herb Association [16] has chosen the rose as its 2012 Herb of the Year. Meanwhile, nurseries and garden centers expect edible plants to remain popular.

Roses - the hips and petals - have a multitude of uses, from candied and crystallized petals, vinegars and teas to essential oils for cosmetics and medicines.

But take heed before you start serving up petals, warns Kitty Morse, author of Edible Flowers: A Kitchen Companion [17]: "Make sure flowers you choose have been grown naturally, without the use of pesticides." For this reason, most fresh-cut flowers from florist shops and nurseries are unacceptable. Instead, Morse suggests harvesting chemical-free roses from your own back yard. And since many fragrant heirloom roses are susceptible to pests and disease, this means growing easy-care landscaping roses like the Flower Carpet [18] line (Amber shown above), which is naturally pest- and disease-resistant (read: no chemical treatments needed).

"My mother used to make rose jam and tea and sugared rose petals back in the '50s," says Colorado garden blogger Becky Dziarnowski. Now, she makes tea from the hips of her Amber, Yellow and Scarlet Flower Carpet roses, crushing two or three hips and then steeping them in a tea ball for five minutes. "The Amber petals are sweet," says Dzarnowski, "like a super-ripe cantaloupe."

Cover from the book 'Eat Your Roses' by Denise Schreiber. Part of a post on edible roses on Tesselaar Plants' Your Easy Garden blog. Image from Amazon.com.

Rose petal ice cream is a favorite of Denise Schreiber, author of Eat Your Roses … Pansies, Lavender and 49 Other Delicious Edible Flowers [19]. After removing the white bitter part from the bottom of each petal, Schreiber dries them on a shelf or in an oven warmed to 200 degrees, then shut off. She mixes a quarter cup of the dried, crumbled petals into a half-gallon of French vanilla ice cream and boosts the rose flavor with a teaspoon of rose water and 2 tablespoons of rose syrup (available at most Middle Eastern groceries or in the international foods section of some supermarkets). The garnish: a sprinkling of fresh rose petals.

"Generally, the darker the color, the deeper the flavor," advises Morse. Born and raised in Morocco, where roses are regularly used in cuisine, Morse recommends harvesting roses early in the morning, washing them and then laying them on paper towels to dry. She likes making rose syrup lemonade with rose petal ice cubes and also adds a splash of rose syrup to champagne before serving it in flutes: "It's very refreshing; it cleanses the palette in between courses."

So dare to be different this year, and eat your roses! You might just find yourself a new a culinary favorite!

Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Amber) behind a hedge of boxwood along a walkway at the Noack Rosen rose gardens in Germany. Behind them is Flower Carpet Appleblossom and Flower Carpet Pink trained into a topiary tree.

Flower Carpet roses (Pink) in front of a background of lavender in German rose breeder Noack Rosen's rose garden. From Tesselaar Plants' Your Easy Garden blog (www.youreasygardenblog).

Flower Carpet roses (Pink) with a backdrop of lavender

Flower Carpet roses on the grounds of German rose breeder Noack Rosen, from Tesselaar Plants' Your Easy Garden blog (www.youreasygarden.com)

(In front): Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Pink Supreme) and original Flower Carpet roses (Red), (White) and (Pink, as a topiary or standard)

Flower Carpet roses (Pink) at German rose breeder Noack Rosen's rose garden, from Tesselaar Plants' Your Easy Garden blog (www.youreasygarden.com)

Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Pink Supreme) and the original Flower Carpet roses (Red) growing through (and thus, softening) a fence

Flower Carpet roses (Coral) in German rose breeder Noack Rosen's rose garden, from Tesselaar Plants' Your Easy Garden blog (www.youreasygarden.com)

Soft mounds of Flower Carpet roses (Coral) softening a walkway

What are your favorite rose gardens to visit? Drop me a line and tell me all about it! You can also send pics via email at: lhutchursongmail [dot] com.

Pruned Flower Carpet roses with tete-a-tete daffodils in early spring

Late winter is a great time to prune deciduous trees and shrubs, although in cold climates like my Zone 6ish garden. Here in western New York, I usually prune on or around St. Patrick's Day. It's an easy way to remember it, anyway.

When you do prune deciduous trees and shrubs, make sure to remove diseased, damaged or close-crossing branches, but take special care not to spoil the plant's natural shape.

For magnolias, forsythias and other spring-flowering woody plants, delay pruning until just after flowering. Summer-blooming shrubs such as hydrangea and hibiscus are best pruned in winter or early spring, just before growth gets going.

March and April are big months for pruning roses. My Flower Carpet roses are the easiest to prune: I just take a sharp pair of hedge sheers and reduce their volume by about two thirds. A more conservative approach is needed for traditional bush roses: Aim for an open vase shape, making cuts about a half-inch above an outward-facing bud. Old-fashioned roses that flower once in early summer shouldn't be pruned until just after flowering.

For more information on pruning Flower Carpet roses, check out the video "How to take care of Flower Carpet roses in spring [43]" by Dave Epstein of Growing Wisdom.

Whenever you prune, always use clean, sharp pruning tools. Mangled, unclean cuts can lead to disease. And don't put diseased material in the compost bin. If Jack Frost strikes, avoid removing any frost-damaged growth, as this helps protect the plant from further frost damage.

I know it's hard to wait till spring, but try to enjoy some garden dreaming and planning. And don't forget to put pruning on your calendar!

Check out this video: "How to Choose Roses: A Rose For Every Location" [1]

Flower Carpet roses along a roadway

'Eat Your Roses' in 2012! [9]

New Growing Wisdom video: "How to Find the Right Plant for Any Location" [21]

A mid-winter's dream: Noack Rosen's Flower Carpet^® rose gardens [33]

Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Amber) behind a hedge of boxwood along a walkway at the Noack Rosen rose gardens in Germany. Behind them is Flower Carpet Appleblossom and Flower Carpet Pink trained into a topiary tree.

Flower Carpet roses (Pink) with a backdrop of lavender

(In front): Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Pink Supreme) and original Flower Carpet roses (Red), (White) and (Pink, as a topiary or standard)

Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Pink Supreme) and the original Flower Carpet roses (Red) growing through (and thus, softening) a fence

Soft mounds of Flower Carpet roses (Coral) softening a walkway

Winter 2012 - a time for dreaming, planning - and pruning! [37]

Pruned Flower Carpet roses with tete-a-tete daffodils in early spring

Check out this video: "How to Choose Roses: A Rose For Every Location" [1]

Flower Carpet roses along a roadway

'Eat Your Roses' in 2012! [9]

New Growing Wisdom video: "How to Find the Right Plant for Any Location" [21]

A mid-winter's dream: Noack Rosen's Flower Carpet® rose gardens [33]

Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Amber) behind a hedge of boxwood along a walkway at the Noack Rosen rose gardens in Germany. Behind them is Flower Carpet Appleblossom and Flower Carpet Pink trained into a topiary tree.

Flower Carpet roses (Pink) with a backdrop of lavender

(In front): Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Pink Supreme) and original Flower Carpet roses (Red), (White) and (Pink, as a topiary or standard)

Next Generation Flower Carpet roses (Pink Supreme) and the original Flower Carpet roses (Red) growing through (and thus, softening) a fence

Soft mounds of Flower Carpet roses (Coral) softening a walkway

Winter 2012 - a time for dreaming, planning - and pruning! [37]

Pruned Flower Carpet roses with tete-a-tete daffodils in early spring

A mid-winter's dream: Noack Rosen's Flower Carpet^® rose gardens [33]