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Growing roses in your “up north” garden

February 15, 2024 • Leave a Comment

One of the most time-honored Michigan traditions is traveling “up north” to spend idyllic weeks in the sunshine, water and woods. Some of us have cottages or second homes up north. While we don’t want to turn a cottage into just another suburban home, many cottage dwellers like to plant a few ornamental plants to enjoy flowers. Often, roses are rejected as being too fussy for up north. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The growing conditions up north are indeed different than a typical suburban garden. The most obvious difference is the weather. That’s a big reason we trek up north—it’s cooler, both in the summer and in the winter. Those winter lows can create challenges for roses. Up north gardens often contend with much more wind than in suburbia, especially if the cottage sports a lakefront vista. The sandy soil up north is inviting to clay-challenged suburban gardeners because it is easier to dig. However, that same soil doesn’t hold water or nutrients as well as the familiar subdivision clay soil.

Further, cottage dwellers aren’t able to provide their up north gardens with consistent care. Cottages often are empty for days or even weeks during the growing season, while residents earn their living in the big city. That means that plants aren’t watered regularly and there’s little time for spraying pesticides. Besides, who wants to apply toxic chemicals in the natural, up north environment? Seasonal cottages are often shut down in late September. The dock is pulled from the lake and the plumbing is drained and turned off. That’s a little too early to winter-protect tender roses, yet it may be the last time the owners visit the cottage before spring.

Even with all these challenges, roses can thrive up north with just a few special “tricks.”

Select winter-hardy roses and plant them in a sunny spot

This simple advice goes a long way in guaranteeing success with up north roses. There’s no getting around it: roses are sun lovers—the more sun the better. Roses convert sunlight to energy and energized roses are better able to survive winter chill, drought and pests. Plant a winter-hardy rose in a sunny spot and you’ll be rewarded with decades of bloom, even up north.

Some of my favorite up north roses include the hardy, fragrant rugosas and Canadian-bred Explorer and Morden Parkland roses. If you’d like a rose for cutting, consider the many bred by Dr. Griffith Buck at Iowa State University, known fondly as “Buck” roses. His pink and red roses are the most winter-hardy, while the white, yellow and apricot ones may need some extra winter mulch to survive up north.

Don’t overlook the once-a-year-blooming antique roses. They will create 3 to 4 weeks of show in mid-to-late June up north—exactly the time you will be visiting your cottage. After blooming, these hardy survivors turn into leafy, rounded shrubs, at home in a naturalistic setting. They’re reliably winter hardy and rarely bothered by insects and diseases. They’re survivors—that’s how they’ve lived to become antique roses! Several ancient rose varieties are native to Michigan, including prairie rose (Rosa setigera) and swamp rose (Rosa palustris).

This simple advice goes a long way in guaranteeing success with up north roses. There’s no getting around it: roses are sun lovers—the more sun the better. Roses convert sunlight to energy and energized roses are better able to survive winter chill, drought and pests.

Plant when you’re going to be at the cottage for a few weeks

Spend some time working organic amendments into the planting area. Put about 1/2 cup of bone meal at the bottom of the planting hole. This provides a good, very slow-release form of phosphorous, essential for root development.

Water heavily while planting and water newly-planted roses every day for several weeks; ideally a month. Water is the best “miracle chemical” to ensure success for a newly planted rose. It’s OK to use lake water on roses and may be better than mineral-rich well water. After a few weeks, reduce the frequency of watering, but plan to supplement nature’s rainfall during the first year, when roses need water 2 or 3 times weekly, especially in sandy soil. After the first year, roses are better able to withstand periods of drought.

Hold off fertilizing a newly planted rose for about a month. Check new roses frequently for animal damage. Critters seem to be attracted to freshly worked soil and could uproot your roses looking for the bone meal or tender roots to munch.

Once the roses are established, there are two treats that will bring them from so-so to spectacular: slow-release fertilizer and organic mulch.

Apply slow-release fertilizer in late spring or early summer

The plastic-coated, slow-release fertilizer pellets release nutrients slowly over 3 or 4 months. Roses are heavy feeders and, unfortunately, sandy soil doesn’t hold nutrients well. Organic fertilizers are good as well, but in sandy soils they must be used monthly from May through August. Compost is a good organic soil amendment that improves soil structure, but it doesn’t provide enough nutrients when used as the only fertilizer.

Several inches of organic mulch corrects many problems

Shredded pine bark mulch is readily available up north and is a wonderful top-dressing around your roses. It helps moderate soil temperature and moisture level, making your roses more forgiving if you must ignore them for weeks at a time. It smothers weeds and makes it easier to pull them. Over time, bark mulch decomposes, adding much needed organic matter to sandy soil. Spread a couple inches each year to replace the mulch that’s decomposed into the soil and to dress up your garden with a fresh look.

Heap some extra mulch around the crown for the first winter

Even the very winter-hardy varieties mentioned in this article aren’t fully established for their first winter. Their roots could frost heave and the tender new canes could attract rabbits. Heap 6 to 10 inches of extra mulch around the crown for the first winter. Hardy roses won’t need any special winter mulch in subsequent years, but you may need to ring them with mesh wire if the critters enjoy your winter garden.

Give your up north roses a little extra attention each May

Wait until the rose starts to leaf out, and then pull away leaf debris around the plant to create a little basin that helps collect water around the crown. Prune off any winter-damaged canes and shape the shrub, even if it means pruning some portions that are already pushing leaves. Apply slow-release fertilizer around the drip line of the plant and scratch it into the soil or mulch. You don’t have to bury the fertilizer, just get it in contact with the soil. Spread a couple inches of fresh organic mulch and water the plant very thoroughly to get the fertilizer’s nutrients to the roots. That’s it. Now enjoy hundreds of blooms from your lake-side hammock all summer!

Nancy Lindley was the co-owner of Great Lakes Roses in Belleville, MI.

ELSEWHERE: Why are my roses changing color?

Soil health should be number one priority

January 30, 2024 • Leave a Comment

Building and managing a vegetable garden can be much simpler if we change our behavior considerably. In the “old days” we rototilled or “double dug” our patch every spring. We took soil tests to help us determine how much and what kind of fertilizer we should use each year. Watering was a real concern in the heat of the summer. We seldom caught up with the weeds. We had to always keep our eye out for any insect problem that might appear. We had to learn about disease for all the different vegetables we were growing. Some could be fixed and others required removing the plant from the garden.

Does this sound pretty much the way you tend your vegetable garden? Don’t feel bad. Many Americans grow vegetables with all those concerns just like Grandmother did.

Vegetable gardening can be much simpler and easier to manage if we would begin to focus most of our attention on the condition of the soil in which we grow our plants. I mean really focus our attention. Soil health in the garden has typically gotten the short shrift. Pay more attention to your soil’s health and a whole lot of onerous gardening tasks will disappear. We now have to start paying attention to the needs of the “soil food web” for a change.

Do an Internet search on “soil food web” and you will get a lot of good basic information discussing this incredibly complex network of soil critters, from earthworms down to the smallest bacteria. There are millions of different micro-pals in a healthy soil. This network includes bacteria, fungi, protozoa, beneficial nematodes, beneficial mites, and many more.

I suspect most vegetable gardeners in Michigan have soil that is in bad condition—a low population of the soil food web. For example, if you rototill every year, don’t use raised beds, don’t use mulch all year round, and use quick-acting nitrogen fertilizer, I can assure you that the soil in which you are trying to grow food is essentially dead.

Here are basic steps that lead to a quality of vegetables that you could never before imagine:

Use raised beds

Plants grow better in permanent raised beds that are seldom walked on. The permanent paths in between get compacted enough to discourage weeds. Raised beds warm up earlier, drain better, and are easier to work in.

Use full-time mulch

Mulch is thought to be valuable because it will keep down weeds, slow down moisture evaporation, and cool the soil in the summer. Those are good things, but the real reason for using 2 to 3 inches of organic mulch 365 days a year is that it supplies critical food to the earthworms and the other billions of creatures that make up a healthy soil food web. No mulch, no food. No food, no soil food web.

Stop rototilling

After using organic mulch such as straw for 2 or 3 years, you can stop tilling the soil in the spring. The soil food web takes care of the tilling job.

After using these steps in your vegetable garden for 2 to 3 years, you will be amazed. You will need only half the fertilizer and half the water your neighbors need to use. Insect and disease problems will decrease. You will save the time you spent rototilling each spring as well as the time and stress spent fighting pest insects and disease. About the only problem this system creates is that you will never be able to use all the harvest yourself!

Jeff Ball has authored eight books on gardening, vegetables, and lawn care.

ELSEWHERE: Vegetable Gardening

USDA releases new plant hardiness zone map

December 11, 2023 • Leave a Comment

The 2023 plant hardiness zone map is based on 30-year averages (from 1991 to 2020) of the lowest annual winter temperatures at specific locations. It is divided into 10-degree Fahrenheit zones and further divided into 5-degree Fahrenheit half-zones. The 2023 map incorporates data from 13,412 weather stations compared to the 7,983 that were used for the 2012 map.

Plant hardiness zone designations represent the “average annual extreme minimum temperature” at a given location during a particular time period (30 years, in this instance). Put another way, the designations do not reflect the coldest it has ever been or ever will be at a specific location, but simply the average lowest winter temperature for the location over a specified time. Low temperature during the winter is a crucial factor in the survival of plants.

As with the 2012 map, the new version has 13 zones across the United States and its territories. Each zone is broken into half zones, designated as “A” and “B.” For example, zone 6 is divided into 6a and 6b half zones. When compared to the 2012 map, the 2023 version reveals that about half of the country shifted to the next warmer half zone, and the other half of the country remained in the same half zone. That shift to the next warmer half zone means those areas warmed somewhere in the range of 0 to 5 degrees Fahrenheit. However, some locations experienced warming in the range of 0 to 5 degrees Fahrenheit without moving to another half zone.

The annual extreme minimum temperature represents the coldest night of the year, which can be highly variable from year to year, depending on local weather patterns. Some changes in zonal boundaries are also the result of using increasingly sophisticated mapping methods and the inclusion of data from more weather stations.

Temperature updates to plant hardiness zones are not necessarily reflective of global climate change because of the highly variable nature of the extreme minimum temperature of the year, as well as the use of increasingly sophisticated mapping methods and the inclusion of data from more weather stations. Consequently, map developers involved in the project cautioned against attributing temperature updates made to some zones as reliable and accurate indicators of global climate change (which is usually based on trends in overall average temperatures recorded over long time periods).

https://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/

ELSEWHERE: How plants survive a Michigan winter

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