Special Rose Pruning advice: summer pruning 

Your first flush of rose bloom has passed now and it's time to clean up your roses a bit. If you are trying to encourage another round of bloom, or in the case of roses like Knockouts, continuing bloom, pruning is essential. Do read the general pruning instructions to the right. Then follow these guidelines to have lovely, bloomin' roses!

The twigs or branches of roses are called canes. Just like other shrubs, cut out Diseased, Dead, andDamaged bits. If you are feeling really motivated, cut off the leaves that have yellow bits or blad spots or white powdery mildew (in sort, any leaves that are not perfect) and discard them (don't let them lay around under the roses and spread mildew.)

Cut off any suckers that you see - they will come from near or below ground level and will be below the graft (big knobby lump) on a grafted rose. The suckers will usually have different looking leaves from the rest of the rose.

Next, cut off each dead bloom. Cut back to the first set of three or five leaves, or even further if you are working to shape the rose, just be sure that your cut is angled outward, and is just above a set of leaves.

 Next, fertilize to encourage the most bloom. Municipal gardens and botanical gardens use both liquid fertilzer when they water, and a time release fertilizer in the soil. You can use 1/2 strenth liquid fertilizer ( like Miracle Grow, Peters, or fish emusion, mixed with water) every week if you are super-motivated. Be sure you are not just feeding top growth by also giving your roses a good top dressing of manure organic fertilizer. You can add a teaspoon of time release fertilizer and that will cover the entire growing season - scratch it lightly into the soil around the driplineof the rose. As you can see from the three suggestions above, there is no wrong way to fertilize, just follow the directions on the package and don't exceed the recommendations. 

 CLEMATIS PRUNING

We will be the first to admit, the subject of pruning Clematis is confusing! You don't have to know a lot, all you need to know is what plant you have. Using a good garden dictionary or encyclopedia, look up the Clematis you have to see which of three groups it belongs to - they are pruned differently, because some bloom on newly formed growth and some bloom on old wood. Here are some general guidelines:

Group 1 includes the early flowering Clematis, like the evergreen 'Armandii', which has fragrant white blooms in early spring. It blooms on wood formed last year. Prune Group 1 plants after flowering, cutting out dead and damaged growth, and cutting back to fit your space. This encouages new growth that will form blooming stems next sprng.

Group 2 includes early to mid-season bloomers like 'Nelly Moser' and 'Henryi' and these produce blooms on new growth. Simply cut these back to the most prominent buds in very early spring. Removing the flowers after they fade can encourage a second flush of bloom later in summer.

Group 3, most blooming in late summer and fall, is the easiest to prune - just cut it back to one foot of the ground (usually two buds on each stem) in very early spring. This group includes the cultivar C. maximowicziana,better known in the south as Sweet Autumn Clematis.

shown above: two views of Sweet Autumn Clematis- the easiest of all Clematis to grow, with a heavenly  fragrance and fall blooms.

YEAR - ROUND PRUNING -

You may have heard older folks talk about "pinching back." We remember a lot of pinching back going on with Geraniums around here. A gardener should be pinching back every day that they are in the garden. This is the true source of the expression "GREEN THUMB," because you will not only have green fingers, but green fingernails, too.

As you walk past the Rosemary, for instance, pinch off the soft tips onbranches in order to make them sprout out multiple branches. This will keep you from having to prune into the old wood later, which in Rosemary can be fatal. Pinch off rose blooms after they whither or better yet, cut them off back to the next leaf junction. Remember the first principle of pruning is that it encourages branching - justmore of a good thing. 

IT'S EASY BEING GREEN - SOMETHING WE LOVE: Terracycle

We just tried the Terracycle Lawn Fertilizer, which contains "Liquid Worm Poop" - this stuff is great. As it says on the label, it's Goof Proof - won't cause turf burn, natural and extremely effective. But that's not the best part. In their own words, "TerraCycle produces a potent, all-natural, eco-friendly plant food that is the first mass-produced product in the world to be packaged in used plastic soda bottles. To go even further, the entire product is made out of garbage - from the contents to the packaging. As a result, TerraCycle Plant Food is the first mass-produced consumer product to have a negative environmental footprint." Pretty darn cool, huh? Have a look at their really neat website: http://www.terracycle.net/ The products are available at Target, Home Depot and Wal Mart.