100 Wheelchair-Accessible Roses: Cleared & Cleaned-up!

A great sunny and warm day to be out tending to the roses in our garden… 100 are now wheelchair-accessible thanks again to our 2019 paver donors and Karl’s excellent brick-laying skills. Usually April 1 is when I tackle this Spring project, but 10 yards of compost arrives on Monday and I wanted the roses to be ready for it. We will dress each shrub with 2-3 inches of compost, and hope this deters the unwanted Rose Midge… a tiny fly who loves to make a home in rose shrubs and rob them of flowers.

Each rose has weathered the winter… most… successfully. Only one or two roses is worse for the wear. Clearing a rose, I get down on knees, sometimes lay on my side, and with hands cupped, create again an empty bowl or trench around the base of the plant. This trench allows the rain water to collect towards the rootball of the plant. I clear away most of the fall leaves and other materials caught up in the branches. With pruners, I then look for the dead branches or branch tips and clip these away. The result is a cleaned-up rose shrub ready to grow easy and flower.

Karl burned a pile (winter branches, fall and winter garden natural materials) in the Roses & Kitchen Garden from 12p-4p. He used the lawnmower and leaf-blower to clean up the raised garden beds and trails.