Roses need to be pruned for two reasons:

 1.  to take out old and diseased wood which will encourage new flowering shoots to grow &
 2.  to keep a good shape & to allow light and air to circulate through an open centre.

Roses should be pruned when they are dormant.  Pruning can take place in the autumn (November), but if there is
frost and your garden gets cold in winter, then only prune in spring (March/April) when it's alittle warmer.

rose – n., any prickly bush or shrub of the genus Rosa (family Rosaceae), bearing usu. fragrant flowers generally of a red, pink, yellow, or white colour.

You love the roses - so do I. I wish the sky would rain down roses, as they rain from off the shaken bush. Why will it not? Then all the valley would be pink and white and soft to tread on. They would fall as light as feathers, smelling sweet; and it would be Like sleeping and like waking, all at once!

According to fossil evidence, it is suggested that roses are 35 million years old and were cultivated for gardens about 5,000 years ago in China. They have been used as symbols of love, beauty, war and in politics and have been used for medicinal purposes and as a source of perfume. Currently there are thousands of varieties of roses developed for bloom shape, size, fragrance and even for lack of thorns.

The name originates from the Latin rosa. The scientific classification is :

As it's summer and our rose bushes are flowering in abundance, we need to dead-head them regularly. This will encourage new flowering shoots as the plants energy would have been lost in forming hips. When the flowers have faded, remove the whole truss, cutting the stem just above the second or third leaf down. Remember to make a clean cut and at a 45 degree angle. If, however, its a first year rose, very little stem should be removed. I hope this will provide you with many more beautiful blooms throughout the remainder of the summer!