The very first thing most of you will do is to ensure the mulch soil and otherwise is removed from around the base of your canes. Take the soil back to another part of the garden and scatter the mulch here and there where it is needed. If you neglect to remove the soil, every year your rose bed will get higher and higher and you ll begin to have cultural problems mostly water-related during the hot summers. If you are using one of those fancy styrofoam overwintering cones let me suggest you take it out of the sun as soon as possible. Sunlight breaks foam down and instead of a rose covering after a summer of sunlight you ll have styrofoam chunks.
Early spring is an excellent time to do the pruning on the big old bush and species roses.
Remember that we want to remove dead canes, crossing or rubbing canes and small weak canes from the mass of old wood. Cleaning up the dead, old and weak canes will greatly improve the health of the rose and will lead to improved shoot development and heavier flowering. Do make the cuts on these canes as close to the ground as possible leaving tall stubs is never a good idea. This creates a rose bush where the canes are constantly being renovated and the older canes that produce fewer flowers are replaced with strong new canes that will produce good blooms on thick stalks. Any rose that has had a bad case of black spot in the previous summer should be started on a spray programme right away .