Spraying and freeze damage

Sunday, Apr. 15, 2007 – 10:34 a.m.

2007-04-15 10:34

Yesterday, I sprayed the roses for the first time for the season with usual Banner Maxx/Mancozeb combination (in the afternoon). Of course, it rained last night… 3 inches! [sigh] Oh well. It did have enough time to dry before it started raining (about 6 hours) so it will probably have some positive effect.
Oh, and it is raining again now.

However, the 3-4 days of cold weather we had last week (Apr 6-8) really nailed my bushes. We had 3 nights of hard freeze (~25 at night) after the prior week of record HIGH temperatures (highs in the mid 80s) so there was plenty of new young growth to freeze. (sigh) Looking at the bushes as I sprayed, there was a lot of damaged leaves and wilted canes. At this point, I have not pruned any of the damage; I am waiting to see if any of it recovers. Of course, it is the HT and Floribundas bushes that got nailed. The OGRs (which didn’t get pruned) seemed to have weather the cold fine.

At this point, I have blooms on Old Blush and the Lady Banks that I rescued from SC. In addition, the climbing Souv. dela Malmaison has a number of buds that are in the process of opening.

Given the amount of rain, I probably should have put down fertilizer yesterday. I did buy some fish emulsion but decided to spray rather than feed. Well, I guess I have something to do next weekend.

I may need to prune back the Old Blush; it is overshadowing Peace and the Orange Garnet (as well as grabbing me when I walk by). Maybe I need to get a real arbor, attach that to the fence post and wire the rose to that. In addition, I think I need to move the Eugène de Beauharnais. It is really being overshadowed by the stuff around it. Now I just need to find a place to PUT it.

One of the tasks that I did get done was to trim the grass around the fence line. I had originally just planned do the area bordering the rose bed but just kept going around and did the north and west fence lines. Did manage to finally meet David & Angela, the neighbors that share the “back 40” fence line (which I didn’t not trim). I have lived here for how long?? but they actually have been in their house longer.

Enough for now…