If you want to grow beautiful, lush roses, proper rose pruning is essential. Roses have been highly hybridized and cross bred over the years so that they produce beautiful blooms, and this has effected their growth habits. To keep the bush size and shape appealing requires some human intervention.

Pruning roses isn’t as complicated or mysterious as people make it out to be. In fact, there are just a few basic rules. If you keep these in mind whenever you pick up your pruning shears, you’ll be rewarded with beautiful rose bushes that your friends and neighbors will envy.

1) When to Prune

Rose pruning should be done in the spring, just as the leaf buds begin to swell. It is very important that the pruning is done before the seasons active growth begins. Young roses should not be pruned at all. They need to reach a strong, mature size (2-3 years) before pruning is necessary.

2) How Much to Prune

To some extent, this depends on how large you want the plant to become. Rose height can get out of control without pruning. Assume a rose bush will grow 3-4 feet over the growing season and prune it down enough to allow for that much growth. You don’t want the bush to grow so high that you cannot see or enjoy the blooms at the top.

3) What to Prune

The first thing to do when you start pruning roses is to remove any dead, decayed, broken or damaged growth. Not only does this keep your bushes looking good, but it prevents pests and disease.

Make your cuts just above a strong leaf bud. Notice the direction that the leaf bud is growing. If left intact, that is the direction that the cane will grow in. You want to leave leaf buds that are growing in the desired direction.

Tiny, spindly canes will generally not amount to much of anything. Remove these so that the plant’s energy can be directed to the larger, stronger canes. Get rid of most of the old remaining leaves to promote new leaf growth.

4) Rose Pruning to Maintain Shape

It is a good idea to keep the center of the bush free of canes that are growing horizontally across it. This promotes good air circulation which helps avoid fungus infection. Another reason to avoid having too many canes crossing each other is that they will create a lot of leaves that shade lower branches and discourage blooms on the lower part of the plant. When pruning roses, you want to prevent bushes from growing into large tangled masses with small and inferior blooms.

Climbing roses only need to be pruned to control their overall size or when they are growing in the wrong direction.

Continue to shape your rose bushes as they grow. Changing them from wild and unruly to prim and proper is the art of rose pruning.

5) Prevent Disease

Always use clean, sharp pruning shears when pruning roses. Clean the shears after each use to remove any disease or fungus. After pruning, major cuts can be painted with a sealer to aid in healing and to help keep out insects and disease. Regular Elmer’s glue, diluted a bit, works just fine.

Finally, finish pruning roses by picking up all the dead stuff you’ve cut away. You don’t want to leave infected canes on the ground to spread disease and you don’t want to be surprised later when you step on an old thorny cane. Pull the weeds from around the rose bush and finish up by placing fresh mulch around the base of the rose bush.

Correct rose pruning and shaping makes for a lovelier bush and allows for appropriate air circulation which makes for a healthier plant with larger blooms. Proper rose pruning is easy, and it is the key to a happy, healthy rose garden. Enjoy your beautiful roses.

Want to find out more about garden plant care, then visit Cindy Robles’s site for the lastest garden design news trends and inspiration.

Where? – An important fact that makes it impossible to say where a Japanese garden may properly be undertaken. Wherever a garden enthusiast who is capable of fulfilling the exactions of Japanese garden design and has a bit of ground that may be set apart and hidden completely from all conflicting sights, a Japanese garden is possible.

Elsewhere, and under other auspices, it ought never to be undertaken. For there is nothing in the average community in the US than can furnish a harmonious setting for such a delicately conceived creation; and no matter with what horticultural skill it may be designed and carried out, it will fail in effectiveness for lack of proper “frame.” Within a Japanese garden one should be, in effect, in Japan – not in an American landscape at all!

The Materials – It is a dominant characteristic of Japanese craftsmen to utilize natural forms, letting fancy play with them and adapt them to the purpose of the moment. Hence it is to be expected that Nature forms will be largely used in the Japanese garden for such structures as design may require. Wood in its natural state, stone, bamboo – these are the building materials, augmented only as may be necessary with dressed timbers and slat work, both open and close-set, such as the design may demand.

Quick to seize upon the suggestion in a gnarled branch or an unusual rock formation like for example landscaping with rocks which may resemble an animal, a bird, or a human being, pleasant and poetic fancy is exercised by the Japanese artist to bring out such resemblance to the highest degree, even to the extent of making it dominate its immediate surroundings, which are then developed as adjuncts to it.

For example, imagine near the top of a splendid towering hard maple tree, there was noted by the garden maker’s keen eye, in an out-thrust branch the unmistakable half-size suggestion of a dainty woman in Japanese dress, her hands folded demurely within her sleeves, her eyes downcast. Not from every angle was this visible, but an approach to the spot from which it could be seen most clearly and in its loveliest aspect had been cunningly planned to bring out the silhouette with startling emphasis at the instant of one’s arrival before a very small shrine erected in honor of this Lady of the Treetops.

Here little tokens were placed on special occasions, and the Lady was taken quite seriously even though playfully; a festival in her honor being celebrated when the foliage and all the surrounding conditions brought out her presence sharply and clearly. Thus she brooded over her bit of the garden, wielding a pleasant influence.

We’ve created an excellent resource for you on landscaping with rocks. Drop by today at http://www.plant-care.com/1537-landscaping-rocks.html.

The “modular” concept conceived for contemporary architecture and landscaping is largely responsible for the speed with which container gardening has spread joyously from its original California home across the country. It has the economy, practicality, and flexibility that suit today’s way of life.

Modular containers are mobile boxes of one basic design, with standard measurements and proportions, that can be combined in different ways for different effects. There may be a set of square containers used in different arrangements, or a combination of square and half-square or triangular boxes. The hexagon and octagon are other functional shapes.

The important elements are mobility and adherence to one basic design, whatever it may be. Just as the homemaker rearranges her sectional sofa and other types of modular furniture, the container gardener or outdoor decorator moves modular containers to renew or refresh the garden picture. The basic design gives continuity, unity, and harmony.

As one example, a set of five or six square boxes can be arranged:

End to end, or with space between, at the edge of a patio, terrace, or garden area In a right angle to define a corner Up and down the side of garden or terrace steps In stacks of different heights against house or garden wall. (Use empty containers as “shells” on which to set other boxes, or set the higher boxes on bricks or blocks.) Corner-to-corner, like a string of diamonds, along a walk or driveway. As a three- or four-sided planter around the base of a tree

To multiply the possible arrangements, add triangular boxes to the set, or double-size rectangular boxes of the same basic design; or make the boxes in graded sizes, like a toddler’s box-in-box toy. As long as the containers are fractions or multiples of one size and design, the unit remains modular and its decorative use has unity. And, of course, construct these modular containers as sturdy and culturally practical as any other. A good example for the is the patio landscape design.

Use vines in modular containers to tie a series or group together. Let them trail from one box to another. Or use one variety of vine to unify mixed plantings in several boxes. Or combine two hanging edgers in a repetitive pattern. Vines blend broken staccato lines, dissolve space separating containers, create homogeneity in the overall design.

Now you can remove the confusion in your mind on the topic of patio landscape design. Drop by today at http://www.plant-care.com/1543-patio-landscaping.html.

Some say you can, some say you can’t. All I know is that we do grow orchids in our living-room. Quietly defying all the people who said we could never grow them at home, we brought some budding plants back with us from Guatemala after getting permission from the proper authorities.

To the amazement of our skeptical friends and even our own, they began to thrive and flower. Gradually we slipped deeper and deeper into a world of pseudobulbs and back bulbs, osmunda fiber, fir bark and sphagnum and always more and more orchids.

What we’re doing anyone who wants to can do. Although many protest that orchid growing in the average home is not possible, presently I will tell you how we did it.

But first, why grow orchids? What is the charm of this plant? Why is it considered exciting to raise?

One of our first discoveries was that orchid flowers last a long time. One year a Cypripedium lasted six weeks.

Then we found that orchids come in every color, shape and size from huge cattleyas to tiny spray orchids with exquisite markings on the petals of some and designs in the hearts of others. What a range to choose from !

Furthermore, most orchids are fragrant. When bought from a florist, their perfume is often lost but the scent of the home grown kinds is another reason why there is joy in growing them.

So much for the “why,” now for the “how to.”

After asking questions, experimenting and reading a book or two, this is what we tliscovered about growing orchids indoors, and this is a pleasure to share.

Good ventilation and fresh air, orchids must have. For ample light, they should be grown in a southern, eastern or western window where direct sunlight is allowed to hit them only from mid-October to mid-February.

Most important of all is humidity. It is possible to grow some orchids loose in the house in trays full of water and pebbles. Certain sorts will thrive this way if they’re top-sprayed several times a day.

A more successful way is to enclose them in some sort of glass case. One orchid plant will flourish under a bell jar like phalaenopsis orchid. A few will settle happily in an aquarium with a glass top. But, any kind of glass case will do. One may be made of an old-fashioned book case or dish cupboard with glass doors. Substitute glass for the wooden back, set it in a window and there is a perfect orchidarium.

In making an orchidarium, provisions should be made for glass on all sides, adjustable vents top and bottom and a tray, to fit inside the case, with pebbles and water in it. These provisions result in plenty of light, circulation of warm air from room and humidity.

Find out for yourself the essentials on phalaenopsis orchid. Visit us for lots of free information at http://www.plant-care.com/phalaenopsis-orchid-care.html.

In spite of – or perhaps because of – the many virtues that vines hold they should be planted with discrimination and respect. Too many vines are too much of a good thing. Misplaced, they are an eyesore. Growing rampant, untrained and unpruned, their disorderly conduct creates a bramble patch.

First of all, a vine must have a definite purpose to serve, a clearly visualized decorative effect to achieve. In selecting the specific vine, several qualities should be kept in mind

Consider, of course, a vine’s color, texture, structural form, at its ultimate maturity. Know that it will neither overwhelm its allotted space nor be dwarfed by it. And consider a vine’s “personality.” Native vines lend charm to a country setting; suave, sophisticated types fit into formal gardens. And consider growth cycle – annuals for quick or changeable effect; perennials more continuing and permanent. Of the woody vines, use evergreens where you need year-round greenery, deciduous types where the tracery of bare stems in winter is to your advantage.

Consider a vine’s climbing habit in relation to the spot where it will grow and the support it will grow on. Stem or tendril twisters need something slim, like wire; clingers will adhere to a rough surface.

And, of course, take hardiness and cultural requirements into account. It’s wasteful to plant a sun-lover where it will be shaded by a tree or wall, a shade-lover where the sun will burn it. Virginia’s favorite vines are risky in northern Maine, or desert growers on California’s cool, foggy coast. Cultural factors should be explored before planting. Your local nurseryman can also tell you what grows well in your area. In a nutshell, be sure you get the right vine for the right decorative purpose, planted in the right place.

Beautiful landscapes are not completed in a season. Long-lived plants take time to establish themselves and provide shade or screening, become a specimen, or cover a wall. While you wait, or whenever you need a thriving vine in a hurry, plant seeds of annuals, or perennials that flower the first season.

There are annual vines and garden vines in scale with small gardens and large ones; to train over fences, wire, twine, netting, trellises, or posts; to climb up and drape a mailbox or scramble down a stony bank. In sections where growing seasons are short, seeds should be started indoors in spring – the vines have a long way to grow. Once they’re outdoors in warm ground, where they get plentiful sun, moisture, and fresh-air circulation, they’ll grow on their own with little care. They make a brand-new house with barren surroundings look like home in a few short weeks.

The familiar morning glories are by no means all the annuals (or tender perennials grown as annuals) you have to work with. There are many colorful and rewarding plants.

Various methods have been published on garden vines. Most of these methods can be found on our evergrowing library at http://www.plant-care.com/1568-choosing-planting-vines-garden.html.

In the south shrub and tree planting projects are about to get under way. Everywhere people are beginning to recognize the economic and aesthetic values of shrubs and trees. This is particularly true of trees. Large producers of forest products are planting vast acreages with trees; the owners of woodland plots are utilizing every available acre; and the occupants of even the smallest lots in new developments are planting young trees of various kinds.

When I recently visited the state forest tree nursery, I learned that the more than sixteen million seedlings grown last season did not nearly meet the demand.

Our towns and cities are growing so fast, they are literally bursting their seams. Real estate developers have to reach far out beyond the suburbs, taking in large areas where there are either no trees to start with or where, in the process of preparing for construction, it is necessary to remove most, if not all, of the trees. Most builders and developers are apparently doing what they can to save the trees, but in many developments most trees ore sacrificed.

Fast-growing trees for the home – Fortunately there are several fast-growing trees well adapted to planting around the Southern home. A lot, after being planted with a few of these trees, will soon lose its bareness and also be considerably shaded from the hot sun.

Mimosa – One of the best is the mimosa, but in some areas it is subject to a wilt that causes the tree to lose its leaves and finally die. There seems to be no cure for the disease. Your only safety is to procure trees grown in a disease-free area.

Chinese parasol-tree – This species, known botanically as Firmiana simplex, is a large-leaved, tropical-looking small tree that grows rapidly to 25 or 30 feet, but then stops at that height. It has large heads of interesting cream-colored flowers, followed by bladder-like seed pods.

Goldenrain-tree – Another fast-growing small tree well suited to the small lot is the goldenrain-tree (Koelreuteria paniculata). Its compound leaves and great profusion of small yellow flowers add to its attractiveness. Unfortunately, neither the Chinese parasol-tree nor the goldenrain-tree is easily had from nurseries, as only a few concerns in the South handle them.

Chinese elm – For the larger lot, where a mature tree 45 feet high would be in scale, the Chinese elm is a good choice. It grows rapidly, thrives in poor soil and endures much dry weather.

Dogwood and redbud – Two native trees that are lovely and fit well into any home landscape or backyard landscape ideas are the dogwood and the redbud. We can hardly have too many of them. Many of the numerous tree-planting projects sponsored by garden and civic clubs have featured these two trees, and as a result tens of thousands of them have been planted in the South during the last five years. In a few years they will transform many of our now-uninteresting streets and roadways into avenues of great beauty.

Red maple – The red maple is another medium-sized tree that is well suited to home-grounds planting in the South.

Pine – The native pines continue in strong demand for planting on home grounds in the South. We did not realize how very rapidly these trees grew until we began growing them under cultivation. A pine’s growth is comparatively slow in the forest, but on the home grounds, where it is fed and watered, it is rather exciting. If you are planting for heavy shade, loblolly pine is preferable to slash or yellow pine.

Thomas Fryd frequently contributes to http://www.plant-care.com. This time he is ready with something on backyard landscape ideas. that can roll back all the confusion

categories: garden,garden design,gardening,home improvement,plant care

This is the only practical way to identify plants. Botanical names are specific, and each plant has its own name which it shares with no other. Popular names may be more colorful and easier to remember and pronounce; but they are anything but specific and exclusive, and they vary widely in different parts of the country. For instance, if you describe the full-flowering beauty of your hanging basket overflowing with Campanula isophylla as “Star of Bethlehem,” your listener may be both incredulous and confused because, to him, that name belongs to a tuberous-rooted, upright-growing ornithogalum. And just look a the long list of “ivies” (including “poison”) most in the list of popular plant names are not even distantly related to the hederas.

Principles of capitalizing, italicizing, and otherwise distinguishing plant names in most books and printed material are based on the system used in many horticultural books and magazines. For spelling, the authority is Hortus II, except for a number of indoor and tropical plants classified since its publication. For these the authority is Exotica, by A. B. Graf. For the sake of simplicity and easy pronunciation, the double “i” ending is reduced to a single “i”. And there are other modifications.

Unless a plant name is complete (genus plus species – plus variety, if any), it is neither capitalized nor italicized. (On rock walls clematis, makes a beautiful display.) Complete botanical names are italicized, but only the generic name has an initial capital letter, even when the specific name has been derived from the proper name of some person or place. (For fall flowering, Clematis texensis is outstanding.) When you see a plant name in italics, you will know that this is a recognized botanical species or one of its varieties, and not a man-made hybrid.

The names of recognized hybrids, seedlings, and mutations of either or both are not italicized, but are capitalized and enclosed in single quotation marks. (Clematis ‘Crimson Star’) Common or popular names are set in regular type like janet craig compacta plant with initial capital letters only for proper nouns, when they appear in text. In separate listings each word is capitalized.

Hopefully this provides you with a clearer understanding of botanical names and their usage and allow you to communicate and “speak plants” better.

Are you ready to learn janet craig compacta plant. Join us http://www.plant-care.com/dracaena-janet-craig-compacta-i809.html.

From a kerchief-sized city back yard to the rolling hills of a magnificent country estate, there is hardly a garden or landscape where vines can’t be used to give the scene graceful beauty and vitality. And few other plants serve so many practical purposes as well.

Vines have character and individuality. Some are modest, and attract attention to the patterned texture of a wall rather than to themselves. Some are bold and brilliant, and command the eye. All give a fluid impression of movement no other plant form provides.

Vines are adaptable, versatile, can be trained to almost any shape or line, formal or informal, horizontal or vertical, sweeping or restrained. A controllable line is one of the landscape architect’s most potent tools.

And vines have variety in size, shape, color, contour, texture. There are fast- and slow-growing, deciduous and evergreen, annual and perennial vines. Some feature foliage, flowers, or colorful fall and winter fruit; some paragons provide all three.

Practically speaking, vines can do more for a garden, yet require less space and less care, than most people realize. They are generally strong-rooted, prefer not to be pampered, are subject to relatively few diseases. They occupy a small area, yet their tops are arranged to get full benefit of all available light and sunlight.

Name your landscaping problem, there is surely a vine to help solve it. Limited space for flower beds? A clematis or climbing rose will give tremendous flowering display for small root space. Train one, or both together, on a pillar for dramatic accent. Your garden doesn’t hang together? Use vines to make a smooth transition from one area or level to another, to help create harmony and unity.

House looks too high? A vine or a flowering vine will pull it down, anchor it to the ground. House too low and broad? A vertical vine will make it look higher. House plain, lacks style? Vines break and soften sharp lines, create ornamental patterns. House too ornate? Vines hide or correct errors and abuses.

When the bulldozer leaves bare grounds, vines make shade faster than trees, flower faster than herbaceous perennials. Where there’s a clutter of small, unrelated buildings, vines will tie them together. When you want privacy for an outdoor living area, vines make a screen without eliminating light.

Learn more of what Thomas Fryd has to share over at http://www.plant-care.com. And be the first to master the methods on flowering vine.

categories: landscape,landscaping,garden,home improvement,plant care

In Northern United States and Canada

Plant deciduous trees and shrubs that are to be set this Fall without delay. Stake any that need support to prevent them being damaged by Winter gales. A mulch placed over the ground around newly planted trees and shrubs is helpful. The first part of November is Tulip planting time. Set the bulbs in deeply prepared, well-drained, fertile soil at even depth.

Now is the time to make hardwood cuttings of a wide variety of deciduous shrubs and some trees. Let the cuttings be pieces of shoots that have grown this year, eight to ten inches long and of healthy, well-ripened wood. After the cuttings are made, tie them in bundles and bury them horizontally outdoors or in a coldframe or cool cellar under six to eight inches of moist sand. In early Spring remove the bundles from the sand, untie them, and plant the cuttings vertically in nursery rows with just their tips showing above the surface.

There is still time to insert cuttings of evergreens, such as Hollies, Boxwood, Yews, English Ivy and Euonymus in a propagating bed of sand and peat moss in a cool greenhouse, but the cuttings should be made before they have been subjected to very severe freezing. Complete without delay the Fall clean-up of the garden. Make sure that everything is shipshape for Winter.

Don’t be in too great a hurry to apply Winter cover to Roses, perennials, biennials and other plants. Not until permanent frost to a depth of three or four inches is in the ground should such protective materials as salt hay, branches of evergreens and cut Corn stalks be applied. Cover lightly rather than heavily and take particular care that the covering material permits the admittance of some light and the circulation of air about plants that retain their foliage through the Winter.

In locations where evergreens need protection from strong Winter sun and sweeping winds (by screening them with branches of Pine or other evergreen or with screens of burlap) install the screens before the ground freezes so deeply that it is difficult to push stakes into it. Coldframes filled with plants need care, especially in the matter of ventilating. Don’t try to keep the climate inside them too warm and cosy. The plants they shelter must be prepared for severer weather to come. Ventilate freely whenever the outside temperature is above freezing, and cautiously whenever the outside temperature is between 32 degrees and some five or ten degrees below freezing. Now is a good time to lift from the garden and to set in coldframes stock plants of hardy Chrysanthemums that you will need next Spring for cuttings.

In the South

Plant deciduous trees and shrubs as soon as they have had a heavy leaf fall. This will usually mean the latter part of this month or early next. Roses and most fruits are included in this category. Late November and early December is the time to plant, in coldframes or outdoors, hardwood cuttings of many deciduous shrubs and a few trees.

Sow seeds of many vegetables in the lower and middle South. Kinds include Lettuce, Radish, Spinach, Cabbage and Kale in the middle South, and all of these, plus Carrots, Beets, Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Celery, Swiss Chard, Onions, English Peas and Turnips in more southerly parts. November is a good month in which to lift, divide and replant perennials.

On the West Coast

Proceed as long as weather permits with the important work of making ground ready for planting to be done this Winter and Spring. In some parts of this area this is the time to plant Roses, fruit trees and other deciduous trees, asparagus plumosus and shrubs. In northern sections sow seeds of asparagus plumosus and hardy annuals where they are to bloom.

In southern California make sowings of Peas, Lettuce, Beets, Carrots and Turnips. In the Northwest clean up the garden in preparation for Winter. In colder sections give thought to preparations for protecting plants that need this care over Winter. Push ahead with the planting of any bulbs that have not yet been set out.

October the month when the verdant garden changes her dress to autumnal shades with a blend of gold. This is a beautiful time of year in the South of Mid-America, when the last splash of color in the garden mingles with the colors of foliage brought out by frosts. The geographical location of the South makes the countryside and gardens truly the crossroads of Nature’s Paradise.

Where else can a gardener grow plant materials in the North, East, South and West, and have better than average success? This overlapping of vegetative zones contributes immeasurably to the riot of autumnal colors found both in our garden and throughout our countryside. Though tempted to pause and feast on all this fall beauty, the wise gardener realizes the importance of October as investment month. There are many jobs to be done that will give rich dividends next spring.

Bulbs – October is the month to make the heaviest plantings of bulbs and glory bower vine for spring blooms. As most of these will remain undisturbed for years, thorough preparation of the soil is essential. Proper drainage is necessary to prevent rotting of the bulbs and glory bower vine. The right planting depth is often debatable, and a good yardstick for this is to cover the growing point to a depth that is twice the greatest dimension of the bulb.

Narcissus is the generic name of one of the largest groups of easy to grow and early to bloom spring bulbs.

Although the common name daffodil has been used in speaking of the whole lot, this name is more correctly used when speaking of the trumpet varieties. These bulbs prefer a soil that is not too heavy and has good drainage. The physical condition of the soil is greatly improved by adding sharp sand as the planting area is prepared. Liberal amounts of bone meal should be dug into the soil to provide a source of long lasting food. Well-rotted manure placed deep in the hole with a layer of top soil between it and the bulbs will always improve the quality of flowers. Manure will cause bulbs to rot if it is in direct contact with them.