Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1951-09-30
Fall Planting of Roses
Prepare Thot Bed Well in Advance
OftFe Arrival of New Varieties
By W. n. Younomon

With the arrival Of the rose cat
alogues, thoughts turn to a new
rose bed. Where shall it be To-
Gated; how shall it be prepared,
and of course, how big can we
make it? Fall is the normal rose
planting time in the Washington
area. and while the actual plant
ing seldom begins before the mid
die of November, we should begin
preparations now if we are to
prepare the beds according to the
recommendations Of roSarians.
The preparation of a rose bed
can be most elaborate, or it may
be relatively simple For years,
We have been told to dig the bed
to depth of two feet or more,
to install a layer of gravel or
clnders for drainage SO that the
roots would not stand in water.
This, however. seems to be double
talk because, if subsoil damage
is lacking, the layer of gravel will
accomplish very little. The first
step should be to check the sub
soikdrainage. Dig a hole and pour
a pail of water into it. if in "a
hours the water has not appreci-
ably seeped into the subSoil, steps
should be taken to provide drain
age. In many parts of the Wash
ington area. subsoils are tight,
impervious clay. In such soils
tile outlet is needed to carry away
excess moisture, and. it is likely
that a layer of gravel will be
needed to carry the water from the
far corners of the bed to the tile.
A second method of dealing
with this problem consists of
planting the roses without any
soil preparation. Simply dig hole
and plant the bush in the clay
that was removed in digging
The reason why this method works
is that the soil is not broken
up through the incorporation of
humus hence, it does not take in
quantities of moisture during a.
rain or copious watering. However,
when such a method of planting is
followed more care will be needed
in keeping the bushes mulched
and fed. if strong growth is to be
obtained.
Spreading Compost.
With the soil dug and removed
to depth of 2 feet, spread
layer of well-rotted manure or
compost over the bottom of the
bed. Add 10 pounds Of raw bone
meal per 100 square feet of bed.
Fork these materials into the soil
to a depth of 6 to 8 inches.
Thorough mixing will require
spading the bottom Of the bed
twice or more
The soil removed in digging is
then mixed with compost before
filling the bed. Some will shovel
in part, spread q layer of compost
and fork it over once or twice to
get good mixing. The method
makes little difference since the
thoroughness of mixing is the i'm
portant part.
When the work is finished the
bed will be several inches higher
than the surrounding lawn. After
settling, the bed will not be so
high. 1t is to provide ample time
for settling that the preparation
job is done several weeks in ad-
vance of planting time. If the
quantities of manure, compost or
peat moss were added, there will
be some surplus of soil to be re-
moved at planting time. The bed
when finished and planted should
be an inch or two lower than the
lawn. The reason back of this
is that rainfall should soak into
the bed. not run off.
The theory back of this prepa-
ration is that an ample supply of
humus should be incorporated into
the soil at planting time so that
the soil will be porous, will hold
an ample supply of moisture &C
cessibie to the roots, and that the
roots will have cool. moist STU
alton. In our hot. muggy climate
it is questionable as to how long
the humus will remain. There are
rose beds that were prepared
many years ago and the roses
still thrive, although it is a safe
guess that the humus has long
since disappeared.
In line with this thinking we
might try planting our roses in
beds that have been deeply dug
10 to "a inches-and supplied with
compost and bone meal. This
saves moving a tremendous
amount of soil since double dig
ging should work up the soil to
the full planting depth. This will
supply the aeration needed and
provide humus for the initial
/ growth. In the spring, mulch the
beds deeply with any good mulch