I never really think of gardening as a chore. It’s a chance to get down and dirty and enjoy nature as we nurture! This year, though, the challenge has been the daily watering. We all know that roses are thirsty critters, and in my neighborhood, we have had virtually no help from the clouds this summer. Every one of my 150+ roses gets five gallons of water a week. I feel like my watering wand is permanently attached to my right hand!

Our lawns browned out back in the middle of June because of the lack of rain. There is a little monk’s fringe of green around all my rose gardens! This summer has been an education on which of my roses really like hot weather. I’ve been calling this year our ‘California Summer!’ Sally Holmes, a climbing rose that blooms in huge clusters that look like a soccer ball, is grown in Connecticut as a tall shrub. Usually, our season is too short for her to attain any remarkable height. This year, she is going over the roof of the garage! Distant Drums, a gorgeous shrub rose, and a creation of Griffith Buck, was bred to sustain very cold winters. When it’s very hot, like this year, it will put up with just so much and then, overnight-POOF! The bottom leaves get covered with yellow spickles and drop off onto the ground. Just like we strip down when we get too hot!

Hot Summer Roses

Hot summers also give us lovely critters like thrips. And thrips they are, singular or plural! These are tiny little thread-like insects that get into our blooms and spoil our blossoms. Blooms bullnose, the petals sometimes become distorted, and the edges of the petals seem brownish and almost crispy. Brown stains appear within the blooms. Thrips are so small they are very hard to see, but if you breathe into the bloom you can see their tiny bodies scattering about. They have rasping mouthparts and an insatiable appetite. They blow in the breeze from nearby shrubs and weeds and wind up in our roses. Some people just like to view their gardens from a distance, but I don’t like to have my blossoms spoiled by hungry thrips. I keep a misting bottle (labeled, of course)with Monterey Garden Spray and water in it. I lightly mist the blooms between regular spraying, and that seems to do the trick. A trigger bottle of Bayer Rose and Flower Insect Spray (Merit) also works. Just a light spritz will do the job. Try to catch your blooms as they are cracking color.

There has been a lot of fun in the garden this summer in addition to all the watering. Our Elizabeth Park Rose Garden finished fifth in the America’s Best Rose Garden competition–yay! Next year, we will be an Awards of Excellence test garden: evaluating new mini and mini-flora roses.

Rose Gardens

In my own gardens at home, I saved all my rose petals for the last ten days–there were four shopping bags full, stuffed in our 1950-vintage-I Love Lucy-refrigerator in the cellar! These old fridges are great for keeping blooms and bloom material fresh, because they are not self-defrosting. Ours works like a charm after we replaced the gaskets a year ago. Why would anyone save rose petals? Well, my friend Sue’s wedding was on August 14th, and that was her request! She also came over on August 12th and raided my gardens. I sent her home with dozens of roses, hydrangeas, and lots of greens. I love supplying the blossoms for friends’ weddings, and usually I arrange them myself, but Sue wanted to do her own. It was such a pleasure to see my lovely blooms put to such good use! Sue’s wedding last Saturday unfolded on the most beautiful day I have ever seen! No humidity, 78 degrees, on the banks of the Connecticut River…just yummy! A wonderful way for two wonderful people to start their life together!

That brings us to today…a lovely, rainy day! The ground has been so parched that I swear, the earth is smiling today! It has started off gently, which is good. Hopefully when it picks up, it will really soak in rather than running off the surface. I wish you all a blessed rain for your gardens. And, I hope all of you have the opportunity to save your rose petals to soften a lovely friend’s step on her wedding day!