Monty Don shares the ‘far best approach’ to ‘extend flowering season’ for roses

B&Q shares how to prune roses in spring

Roses are one of the most highly prized flowers, but they can also require more care and maintenance than many other landscape plants. 

A rose bush that is struggling to survive will bloom only occasionally if at all. 

However, to ensure that doesn’t happen gardening legend Monty Don has taken to his monthly gardening blog to share how to make roses flower for longer.

He claimed that for new flower buds to grow and last the plant needs to be deadheaded.

Deadheading is the removal of finished blooms in order to encourage further blooms and improve the appearance and shape of the rose. 

The 67-year-old urged: “Dead-heading roses is really worth doing at least once a week- and preferably daily – in mid-summer.

“When you dead-head you are effectively pruning and thus stimulating fresh side shoots which will bear new flower buds and therefore extend the flowering season.

“Dead-heading also stops the plant developing seed and so increases the chance of repeat flowering as seed always takes precedence from the plant’s supplies of nutrients and water.”

However, not all dead-heading methods can yield the same results according to Monty.

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He claimed that just pulling off the old flower heads “will help” but “by far the best approach is to use a pair of secateurs and to cut back to the first leaf below the spent flower”. 

After gardeners do this they will find that a new shoot will then grow from this point. 

For roses that flower in a cluster gardeners should remove individual faded flowers by pinching out or snipping, cutting the whole stem off once all the flowers in the cluster are finished.

When using secateurs, it is also important to clean them thoroughly after every use and before gardeners move into pruning another plant. 

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Failure to do so can result in gardeners accidentally spreading diseases across their gardens.

Monty added that some roses, especially the species bushes, have “glorious hips in autumn”, otherwise known as seed-filled pods, and these will only develop if the flowers are allowed to set seed and fruit.

His recommendation is to enjoy the rose blooms for as long as they last then wait for the new season display they produce from their fruit. Bear in mind that the hips will help bring birds to the garden too. 

By following Monty’s deadheading tips, gardeners should see their roses bloom free and full.

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