A while ago, I wrote about digging up and moving an old, well-established rose.
This was a rose which was scheduled for demolition, to make way for a vegetable patch, and rather than just heaving it out and throwing it away, I took the opportunity to use it as a learning experience for my Trainee, and we dug it up and moved it.
A couple of people have asked for an update!
Here it is on the day we moved it, which was February of 2020.
Not a lot of it left, considering that it used to be wrapped around a collection of 6' tall obelisks!
If you haven't read the other post, I should tell you that there was quite a lot of upper growth on it, after several years of me patiently training it to loop gently around the supports.
And we cut off all but two stems, and those were reduced to these short stems, as you can see.
By May of 2020, three months after being moved, it was recovering nicely, as you can see.
It produced quite a lot of foliage, and all we did was to water it every week without fail, and we did give it some liquid feed once or twice, just as general encouragement.
By June, it had even produced a couple of flower buds!
We were so proud....
By August, it had put out some good new shoots, and we were training them along the wires, because we wanted it to go horizontally.
Well, here's the update from June 2021 - success!
As you can see, the rose is now going along several of the wires, so it is starting to cover the wall, as planned.
And best of all, it's flowering beautifully!
The key points, as per the original post, are to prepare the place it's going to, before you dig it up: reduce the top growth down to a bare, harsh, minimum: and once you've moved it, watering is vitally important, even if it rains.
That goes double if you plant it close to a wall, as we did, because of the rain-shadow effect.
So don't let anyone tell you that roses can't be moved, because they can!
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There are so many myths out there like this. It is good to see the rose growing again and flowering. I have even cut the roots back on an old rose when I moved it as I thought they were too big (ignorance of a novice) but it still grew. Well done to you both.
ReplyDeleteThank you Joy, we were pleased and proud that it's doing so well!
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