Huh.. Only thing my roses are showing is being fried from the intense heat. I *really* want to deadhead & trim everyone up now that the extreme heat's past, but I can't because that'll encourage everyone to put out new growth and with my weather cooling off so fast, I'd be afraid of killing them w/a cold snap if they're putting their energy into growing rather than settling down for the winter.

What does powdery mildew look like? I have a rose that has had a whitish sheen to it all year.. Charles de Mills.

I haven't lived here long enough to know when to expect to see sawfly damage. I was thinking I saw some for the first time a few days ago, but maybe it's just Bambi who nibbles all new growth almost nightly.

Toni: For lack of a better way to describe it, Powdery Mildew looks like white powder on the foliage and flower buds on roses...like someone "dusted" those parts with an ultra fine "powder". It will rub off on your fingers if you "rub" the buds or the folaige.

Today I spent the entire day removing rose foliage that looks like lace-work from those blasted sawfly larvae. Why I'm getting it NOW is a complete mystery. Luckily, my roses recover quickly from it, so I'll still get another flush or two before January. It's almost as if it (the damage) happens overnight. The weirdest thing is that I don't even SEE the larvae nor what they morph in to.

They sit on the underside of the leaves, JD. You'd see them if you turned the leaf upside down. They're like tiny chartreause-colored worms or non-fuzzy caterpillars. The reason they're so hard to kill is that they're under the leaves, so even if you were to spray with chemicals, chances are you'd only hit the top of the leaves and not hurt the pests. I haven't used Sevin in a long time, but it used to come in a powdered form in a squeeze bottle that you could hold below the plant and squeeze. The Sevin dust would fly up and land on the underside of the leaves.

I did notice a LOT of what looked like small webs with tiny dried rose foliage wrapped up in them, but no actual larvae or insects. I was reading that Spinosad works. Have you ever used it ? I try not to use chemicals if I can avoid it...don't want to kill the bees or the praying mantises.
It's always something...

I've never tried Spinosad. You know, JD, I always mean to do great things for my garden and I buy all of the chemicals and fertilizers and various other things, but I never seem to have the time to use them, so I usually run wild with a spray can of Raid for a few minutes and feel fine until the next year.