I have seen gardeners give up on roses after one brutal winter. It is a painful loss. You spend months nurturing a plant, and frost wipes it out in a week. The good news is that roses do not have to be fragile. Many varieties handle deep freezes with little help from you. This guide…
Roses are rewarding, but they are not carefree plants. I have watched a healthy-looking bush turn yellow and drop half its leaves within two weeks, and it caught me completely off guard. If your rose bush looks off in some way, you are probably searching for a straight answer. This guide gives you one. Why…
I still remember the first time I heard the Peggy Martin rose story. A single climbing rose survived two weeks submerged under roughly 20 feet of saltwater after Hurricane Katrina, while 448 other antique roses in the same Louisiana garden did not. That kind of resilience earns a reputation, and this rose has certainly earned…
I planted my first rose bush before I understood there was any system behind it. I picked whatever looked prettiest at the nursery. Years later, after killing a few plants in the wrong climate, I learned that roses are not one flower but an entire family of classes, each with its own bloom habit, hardiness,…
There is a particular satisfaction in pruning a rose bush well. You step back, look at what you have done, and know — with confidence — that the plant will respond with fresh growth and another flush of flowers. Summer pruning is not just maintenance. Done correctly, it is one of the most powerful tools…
There is something quietly heartbreaking about walking into your garden and finding your rose bush looking unwell. The blooms may still be there, but the leaves — once a rich, healthy green — are now turning yellow and dropping. If you have been asking yourself “why are the leaves on my rose bush turning yellow?”,…
If you grow roses, there is a good chance you have faced this moment — you step outside to check on your garden, and there they are. Small, dark circles spreading across the leaves. Some leaves are already yellowing around the spots. A few have dropped to the ground entirely. The bush that looked so…
There is a particular kind of unease that comes with checking on your roses and finding the leaves rolled inward, twisted along the edges, or cupped like small, distressed hands. The flowers may still be coming, the canes may still look strong — but something is clearly not right, and you cannot quite put your…
Few things take the joy out of a rose garden faster than walking out one morning to find the leaves speckled with dark, spreading circles. The flowers may still look beautiful, but something is clearly wrong beneath the surface. If you have noticed black spots on your rose leaves, you are dealing with one of…