I know, I know it is just the beginning of October. And believe me here in the humid east coast one needs to spray with systemic fungicide every two weeks to keep those roses blackspot free. I really am very good at doing exactly that and keeping to my spraying routine starting early in the spring as soon as the leaves start growing. But I quit this year in late September already as I get tired of the spray routine come Fall each year.

Congrats!

Now I understand why your roses do so well and your gardens look so fantastic. I think I sprayed six times altogether in the thirteen years I lived in NJ. And I lost a lot of roses.

I've reached the end of feeding sprays for the season, but need to apply 'antifreeze' so that the roses can capitalize on new growth they've been putting out the last several weeks.

Your hard work certainly pays off, Rita.

I just hate the look of blackspot on roses. To me the rose as a green leafed shrub has to look good in the landscape. Not just look good in bloom. Of course they look fabulous in bloom, they just need to look decent out of bloom also. It needs to fit into the garden in whole. I have so many things here, hardly just roses.

I know there are many people who say live with some blackspot and choose resistant varieties. Even a resistant variety can't stay clean in our humid weather and any blackspot is more than I want to tolerate.

I spay with the liquid fertilizer here the same every two weeks as I do with the fungicide. I just wait until there is a bit of spring growth as I have always just put on the bagged Rose Tone first thing in the spring after I see new growth coming.

I'll just add that on to the long list of things I'm going to do if and when I ever retire. Of course, I'll have to buy a hazmat suit for myself and little ones for all the cats.

Do you take precautions, Rita? Do you wear a mask and do you stagger the applications so that you don't do too much in one day?

I remember a story from a few years ago about a woman in San Francisco who took a trip to England and was so charmed by the gardens there that she came home and bought 200 rose bushes for her garden. She treated them with a systemic rose fertilizer-fungicide-pesticide and dropped down dead. I forget the name of the particular preparation she used, but it was one of the ones put out by a big oil company. Her family sued the company and the company's defense was that no one should treat more than 25 rose bushes on any given day.

I do the entire garden all at once. Doesn't take very long to do, maybe an hour or so. I do change into long pants, no shorts and wear shoes and socks, no sandels. And I wear rubber gloves. But no hasmat suit required. I simply use a hose end sprayer. One of those no premix dial and spray types. Just don't do this on a windy day and be aware of were you are pointing the spray. I don't get any on my skin with this method. And since it does not make tiny air born particles there is nothing dangerous to breath in. Works great. I have been using this method for years.

The results speak for themselves!

I'm afraid I don't spray mainly because I really don't have the time; my roses are scattered all over the farm. (Also the cows and horses occasionally snack on the plants planted outside the pasture fence lines.) So I have learned to concentrate on the resistant varieties. I also don't like the look of a leafless bush even if it is covered with blooms.

No cows or horses at my place And I only have an average size surburban lot.

Oh and I want to make sure everyone understands that I use a systemic fungicide only. No pesticide.

Someone once asked me what my secret for bug free roses was. I have no great secret. I doubt they are bug free but the birds around here just condider the roses one more shrub were there might be something to snack on.

No Japanese beetles here so I am very fortunate in that.

took me a minute to figure out why you were spraying. Only thing I spray here is water. Don't have fungus, blackspot (except for on Austrian Copper.. and even then not too bad, just a little unsightly), mold, etc etc etc. Guess that's one advantage to living in a desert. On the rare occasion where I *do* see blackspot, I just spot-spray it with GreenLight. Usually only problem I have is aphids!

No black spot or aphids or anything here this summer; the drought killed practically everything. BUT we got 1 1/2" of rain yesterday!

Yay for rain!!

I do not spray here. I sometimes have a few aphids in the early summer and a little mildew but no other problems.

thats becouse I have it all here I would share I realy don't need it all

I never spray pesticides either. I have occasionally used potassium bicarbonate (Green Thumb) to kill fungus. It makes for a great plant dip to use on plants arriving from somewhere else with fungus. It's generally too dry here for black spot. Saw some mildew recently on dahlias.

It is very humid here on Long Island. Our summers are usually warm but that wouldn't be so bad. It is the humidity that makes it feel yucky in the summertime. That means the roses will get blackspot for sure unless they are sprayed.

I've lived in Michigan and I've lived in Colorado. At the Michigan house, spraying was needed or the roses would be covered in blackspot. In Colorado, the same roses haven't needed spraying in 30 years. Climate makes such a difference.

It sure does.

So here is proof that my roses would not look green leafed and perfect if I didn't spray the fungicide. Not spraying any more and here is an example of a rose leaf closeup I took today. Look carefully and the start of blackspot.





Then there are the ones that are always perfect no matter what. Here is WESTERLAND one of my few climbers. This rose is extremely desease resistant.