Taking rose cuttings

Skydancer

Thanks, David49. We have a small garden so, apart from one climber, all roses have to be kept fairly small. Do you know how I should prune the climber? It is lovely but is sending out branches all over the place.

Tie them in to get the shape you want, cut off any pointing the wrong direction, tidy it all up for winter.

Thanks, David49. We have a small garden so, apart from one climber, all roses have to be kept fairly small. Do you know how I should prune the climber? It is lovely but is sending out branches all over the place.

Pruning depends on the type of rose and what you want to achieve, if you have plenty of space you can do nothing, they will reach their natural size, or prune them to a size and shape.
Deadhead them if you want them to flower twice, and if you do nothing else cut them back to half their full size for winter.

The thing to remember - months later - is where you have put them and not pull them up when tidying the garden. I've mistakenly done this.
My problem is pruning rose. There seems to be so much information about it that I am totally confused. However, with all aspects of gardening, I sort of muddle along and the end result is usually quite pretty.

Thanks Skydancer. I have done that too but couldn't remember when you were supposed to take the cuttings. I'll try both!

I do it in winter. I cut off 6" or so of hardwood stem (obviously no leaves are left) and push it into the ground. This isn't very professional I'm sure but, come the Spring, I often find one or two have rooted. In fact my garden contains 4 roses that I have created this way. The most stunning is a climber which is enormous after about 2 years. I put about 5 pieces into the ground and only one took but it is fabulous. I believe you can also do this earlier in the year with softwood. In fact it isn't nearly as difficult as it sounds.