Rugosa Rose Prisoner of thorns.
Word of Caution: If you have long hair or if you have any hair, please read this and BEWARE it could happen to you.
My rugusa rose is one tough cookie. She will not allow me to control her. She wants to control me and so far I think she might be winning. I love roses and I have a hard time to trim a rose bush after it has flowered for the simple reason is that I want the rose to bloom again next year. But with this rugosa ( name unknown) it grows so tall, over 5 feet (I’m 4 feet 9 inches and it was over my head) and so I needed to chop off her head…just a bit.
April 29th 2015. Rugosa Rose bush getting ready for trim.
Very hard to tell this has been trimmed–April 29th 2015
1st pile of cut canes on the left of bush–April 29th 2015
So for the first time in April 2015 I trimmed, and I swear every snip I made with my cutters I felt it in my heart. Poor thing looked so small when I finished with it. I seriously thought there would be NO roses this year. But OMG !!!!!!! I just learned that a rugosa rose is tough and really bounces back after a cutting. I’ve been reading tons of information about how to trim why to trim and when to trim, but reading and watching videos is not the same as really doing it and seeing the results.
2nd cutting of canes to the right of bush–April 29th 2015
Using metal tongs to clean up–April 29th 2015
I cut quite a few inches off this spring on April 29th 2015. As you can see in the photos I had two small piles of cuttings to discard of. I’ve learned with the thorns to use metal thongs to pick up the cuttings. My bush is too congested so I really have to get in there and seriously cut back HARD and open up the middle. I guess what frightens me most is that I have no confidence in myself or the rose bush. What if I chop back to hard and kill it?
I have to be careful of her thorns, those are so dangerous. If you have long hair, actually if you have any hair, get close to one and let the thorns near your hair, you’re going to wish you didn’t do that. I had one experience with that. I had gloves on and I was parting the bush in the middle to see what needed to be taken out to make more air circulation inside the bush, so I was busy making sure not to pick my fingers, you really need good gloves for this and I wasn’t paying attention to my head and I brushed up against the bush and that was it, I became a prisoner of thorns not a prisoner of war. My hair got so tangled that the kids brought me scissors so that I could cut my way out.
Yeah it’s a funny laugh out loud moment now, but just imagine seeing someone with their head in the rose bush and their butt sticking out and yelling bloody murder. The more you try to pull away, the more it hurts. So cover your head with a scarf and make sure that scarf is not wool or some other kind of material that can get caught in the bush, the scarf should be smooth like nylon or polyester like tablecloth material.
Exactly 9 days later. On the 8th of July 2015. Full of new growth
New growth PLUS new buds at the same time–8th July 2015
The brown wood where I cut and the new green growth showing–8th July 2015
So getting back to the results of my cuttings. I cut back several inches on April 29th. 2015 This is what my rose looked like on July 8th, exactly 9 days later. The new canes grew more than 3 inches. Wow and what was truly amazing is that the rose was making buds. I was going to have flowers again!!!!!I tried to show where I made the cut and then thinking that photo might not help to much, I tried to show with my finger where I made and cut and you can see the canes around my hand, they are pretty vigorous
Many blooms opened and many coming on 19th of July 2015.
Passionate gardeners know how exciting it is to see rose buds coming–19th July 2015
On the 19th of July the bush was in bloom. Do you see all the roses? and all the buds that were still waiting to open? I was so thrilled!!! I now know that my bush will be just great next year. Actually I’m looking forward to next spring to get inside and clear the middle for a bit more air circulation. With this rose next spring I am going to try to trim it to look like a Rose tree. If I have enough courage with the thorns, I might try to twirl them a bit like you see with the feng shui money trees that you can buy. I’ll meditate a bit more on that idea this winter. I have also noticed that my rose makes lots of suckers and so it will spread if I give it a chance. This is a great bush to have on a property line because animals won’t get through it. Oh they may try once and it will be the last time when they experience what I went through LOL.
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