Rose sick soil.

I was wondering if I am being stupid thinking about planting some new bare rooted Roses I have on order in a bed which had 3 ancient Roses in it until Spring of this year when I took them out.
The old Roses were I reckon about 75 years old and WELL passed their best. Since removal I have fertizlised the bed with lashings of well rotted horse manure and covered the bed with grass clippings a few times too to increase the bed's fertility. What I haven't done is remove any top soil and exchange it for soil from another part of the garden. To be honest that would be a BIG job as the bed is not small (well big enough to accommodate 20 new Roses). I could plant the Roses in another part of the garden I suppose but this bed would be ideal as South facing and not shaded by any of my huge trees.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated as don't want to waste new Roses if they are not going to be happy. Thanks.

 

I've heard much about this sick rose soil thingy, but so far I have yet to read of any actual science about it (and being a bit of a geek, I always look for the science before I believe anything ).

The idea is the that soil that has contained roses for any length of time somehow becomes 'bad' for new roses.

If its true, then I wonder how come wild roses seem to manage so well in unmanaged land.

My gut feeling is that if there is any truth to it, it is probably just about the nutrient content in the soil. If you're going to fill the area with a load of manure, than with my lack of rose growing experience, I can't see how there'd be a problem.

In one of our local parks there are the rose gardens. They were very well established when I was little, and from what I've read about local history they've been there for almost as long as the park itself, which was opened in 1929. All the roses there do ok, and I know they plant a few news ones every few years.

 

Thanks Clueless I too am a little dubious about the condition, however knowing sweet .. about Roses I thought I'd ask the experts on here. If it is a complete no no to use the same area again them I'm to put it politely somewhat stuffed as there were hybrid teas EVERYWHERE when we moved here. I yanked out over 100, none of which were looking very well as had had no attention for years.I'd be struggling now to remember where there haven't been Roses so my previous post wasn't strictly speaking correct when I said there was another area I could use. The mass removal took place 10 years ago so surely that ground can't be still sick can it?

 

Silu......though the roses you removed were old it doesn't exactly suggest that the bed should now be diseased. You have done all you can with the soil, if it were me I'd risk it with a couple of the new roses and see how they go. The problem is, if you don't take the chance you will never find out whether you can plant there again. Meanwhile the rest of the new roses can be planted elsewhere for a year and if the roses in the 'dodgy' bed look okay after that time, then it's obviously safe and you can lift and re-plant the others there too.

 

Good idea Sheal, it will be interesting to see if there is any difference.I'll do what you suggest and have remembered there is an area which didn't have Roses in it when we moved here so surely that has to be fine for some and I'll plant the others where I want them and wait and see pudding!

 

I have read that if you use mycorrhizal fungi when replanting a rose bed that is effective. Not tried it, but if I was replanting mine I would get a JCB in and replace the soil as I think the anecdotal evidence is strong that Roses do not thrive in beds that previously had Roses.

 

You don't need to change the soil in the whole area. When I planted a couple of roses last year where I had removed old roses, I just took soil out of the area where I wanted to plant, replaced with John Innes no 3 and added some Root Grow to the roots of the roses. I used about 10L for each rose, ie half a bag from B and Q.

 

I'll pass on the idea of a JCB thanks Kristen, especially as we have had just about nonstop rain for the last week and can only begin to imagine what my garden would look like if I had 1 of those trundling about in it! I'll do what both Sheal and Merleworld have suggested and plant in 2 different places plus in the area where there has been Roses before I will change a good bit of soil and then fingers crossed.

 

I heard of an idea ...dig your holes for the roses and place good sized cardboard boxes in them...plant up them up with soil from a rose free part of the garden....by the time the cardboard disintegrates the ground should have 'recovered'....if you have lots of Roses to plant it could be a bit of a faff but but better safe than sorry

 

I can confirm that there is such a maladie. One of the first things I did when I started dabbling with gardening was to replant an established rose bed. Every one of the new roses sickened and died The cardboard box trick sounds a good idea.....

 

How do you know it was the soil that was the problem?

Could the new roses have been a duff batch? Perhaps left in storage too long? Were they water enough? Were they watered too much? Were they fed? etc etc.

I'm not doubting you, but I am interested in trying to find out more about this phenomenon that lots of people talk about, but that nobody seems to know any facts about.

Is this soil ailment a fungi? A bacteria? A virus? Something else? Does it affect all roses? How come it doesn't seem to appear in the wild where wild roses thrive?

I planted three new roses out the front in the same soil as a well established rose. 2 out of 3 died, 'confirming' the sick rose soil thingy. Then the third, planted later, is still alive and well. The first two, as I recall, were not looking so great when I bought them, and to be fair, I did plant them in the single warmest spot on my whole empire, and then forget I'd done so and failed to water them enough.

I've lost other plants too in the same soil, and I've lost other plants in completely different soil. And I've had plants thrive too.

I'm not suggesting that such a condition does not exist, because I don't know one way or the other, but it seems to me that nobody can offer compelling evidence one way or the other, and any rose failures are put down too quickly to 'sick soil' because there are so many anecdotes about that the anecdotes have become the gospel.

 

I'll get to the bottom of it for you, Clueless. I'm in touch with Ann Bird, the Pres of the RNRS. If she can't explain it then there's no hope! (Although the RHS weren't able to shed any light the last time I looked). To a certain extent, the same problem occurs with fruit trees.

 

Those roses have established in soil where previous roses haven't grown and are unlikely to be disturbed or replaced.

Take a look at this Clueless.

http://www.classicroses.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=1450

 

So even the boffins can't explain it then.

There was one bit that caught my eye.

So while I accept that there is something going on, otherwise people wouldn't be spending money on researching it, I still think, as I mentioned earlier, than any problem is related to the soil condition, rather than some phantom disease as such.

I saw the bit about possible phyto-toxins exuded from roots, and this seems plausible to me, as I know there are many plants that use such a technique to gain the advantage, but that still doesn't explain how the rose gardens at our local park and many like it can thrive for so long. I can say with some degree of certainty that the parkies round here don't replace the soil. They feed and mulch it, but its the same soil as it always was.

I guess it will remain a mystery for a while longer yet.

 

It could well be soil condition but we can't be sure. After all, if we think about crop rotation, vegetables that can't be grown in the same place twice, could that be put down to a similar problem as with the roses?

The rose gardens in your park could have been established for many years because roses grow to a good age, so if those plants have never been replaced there is no reason for 'sickness' and the soil wouldn't have been replaced, but no doubt, replenished at least once a year with fertiliser/ compost etc.

As our very own Rose expert who has spent many years working with them, I would like to hear Wiseowl's opinion on this subject.