068 Rose Basics. The Future of Gardening

Happy New Year, and welcome to the beginning of Season 2 of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. For many gardeners, planning the 2021 garden is underway this month. Perusing seed catalogs, making choices for the warm season vegetable and flower garden, and perhaps checking out all the dormant plants that are arriving, or will be arriving soon, at area nurseries and garden centers this winter.
One of those popular bare root plants that brings out the customers are all the rose varieties that are available. Don’t know much about roses? Not a problem! We cover rose basics on today’s episode with Master Rosarian Debbie Arrington. Check out her "Sacramento Digs Gardening" blog page/newsletter, too.
And, we get a sneak peak at the future of gardening with Diane Blazek of the National Garden Bureau. Plus, she has results of a survey where gardeners like you told the National Garden Bureau what they want to ease their garden chores.
It’s all on Episode 68 of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. And we will do it all in under 30 minutes.

Links:
Best Roses for Northern California
American Rose Society's Best Roses for each USDA Zone
The Best Selling Book: "Pruning and Training"
Farmer Fred Rant: Rose Pruning Time is Here
Sacramento Digs Gardening Blogpage, by Debbie Arrington and Kathy Morrison
National Garden Bureau's Future of Gardening Survey

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Transcript

Farmer Fred  0:03  
Welcome to the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. If you're just a beginning gardener or you want good gardening information, well, you've come to the right spot. Happy New Year and welcome to season two of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. You know, for many gardeners, planning the 2021 Garden is underway this month. Maybe your perusing the seed catalogs or making choices for the warm season vegetable and flower garden based on those pictures. And perhaps you're checking out all the dormant plants that are arriving or will soon be arriving, at area nurseries and garden centers this winter. One of the most popular bareroot plants that brings out the customers are all the rose varieties that are available. Don't know much about roses? Not a problem! And, we cover rose basics on today's episode and we get a sneak peek at the future of gardening with Diane Blazek of the National Garden Bureau. Plus, she has results of a survey where gardeners like you told the national garden bureau what they want in order to ease their garden chores. It's All on this, episode 68 of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. And we'll do it all in under 30 minutes. Let's go.

Farmer Fred  1:19  
We're coming up to rose time. Rose planting time. Nurseries over the next few months are going to start to get in bare root roses, or roses wrapped in plastic. What is the best way to plant a rose? We're talking with a Master Rosarian, Debbie Arrington, who is also president of the Sacramento Rose Society. And Debbie, people are going to be faced with shelves of roses at local nurseries, none of which will have flowers, just pictures of flowers. What are some criteria one should consider when picking out roses at a nursery?

Debbie Arrington  1:52  
There's lots of different things that you should consider. First, decide what kind of rose you want. But by kind of rose I mean, what size of rose. roses come in different sizes. The roses that we usually see are hybrid tea, those are fairly large bushes. When that rose is mature, it's going to take at least a three by three foot space and be at least three to four feet tall or taller. Other roses include floribundas. Those roses are a little smaller than hybrid roses, and they have more of a fuller look, though the whole bush is covered with flowers. So it looks like one giant bouquet of flowers instead of individual blips. Another category of roses are miniatures, and those sound like what they are. They're roses that have much smaller flowers. But a miniature rosebush isn't necessarily a teeny, tiny bush, although sometimes it can be. But in general, miniature roses, you can plan for miniature roses in the space that you have for a hybrid tea. Another class of roses are climbers. And those do what you would expect a climber to do. They grow really, really tall. And they can take a small root base, a small footprint, just a two by two foot space, but then have a rosebush that's 10 to 20 feet tall or taller. And then there's shrub roses and shrub roses are they come in all different sizes from only one foot tall to six or eight feet tall. But shrub roses are roses that tend to grow into hedges, where they have very dense structure where the nodes the distance between one leaf joint and another is very, very short. And the aspect about shrubs that's appealing to homeowners and gardeners is that they make excellent landscape plants that can be cut with hedge clippers. Instead of careful pruning, you can just whack them with a hedge clipper and make it into whatever shape or size you want. So those are the basic types of roses that you're finding at the nursery. So first, consider what kind of rose you want and what you want that rose to do. Do you want that rose to be a centerpiece in your garden? Then choose a hybrid tea. If you're looking for something that's going to be along a fence line, where you want several plants, then look for shrub roses. If you want something that has lots and lots of flowers, then a floribunda.If you have a wall or trellis or an arbor that needs something tall, but with flowers all over, then choose a climber.

Farmer Fred  4:17 
And I would think, too, that if all people have is a sunny patio then miniature roses in containers would be fine.

Debbie Arrington  4:23 
Yes, miniatures work wonderfully in containers and with people with smaller gardens and or maybe no actual soil at all. Where all they have is a patio, miniatures are perfect for that because they are very happy in a container.

Farmer Fred  4:37 
One question that usually gets asked while couples are shopping for roses is, where are we going to put this? And, I think a lot of people forget that roses like full sun.

Debbie Arrington  4:47 
Well, they do. And ideally you want them to have at least five to six hours of sun a day. The caveat on that is they prefer their sun in the morning to the afternoon. In Sacramento, that can be problematic. If you put it in a spot where that six hours of the sun is all coming in the afternoon, the rose is going to fry. It gets too hot, they much would much rather have an east facing exposure where their sun is coming in the morning.

Farmer Fred  5:18 
Now for those listening who aren't in Sacramento who may be either in a colder climate or back east there are other things to consider when planting roses. And I think one of those, especially back east, might be Japanese beetles.

Debbie Arrington  5:31  
Yes, yes. And, and fortunately knock on wood, Japanese beetles aren't a problem in the Sacramento area. Japanese beetles do tend to devastate roses, they attack  the flowers and buds, which is what you grow roses for, is for their flowers. So Japanese beetles quite often will live in lawns. And so planting the roses right next to the lawn can be problematic. It's better to give them some sort of buffer zone between them in the lawn.

Farmer Fred  6:00  
Do Japanese beetles prefer one color of rose over another?

Debbie Arrington  6:04 
You know, that's a good question. Several beetles like hoplia beetles tend to go for lighter colored roses, particularly white and yellow roses and thrips also go for lighter colored flowers. But with the Japanese beetles, that's kind of up in the air. I think they they will eat anything. Basically.

Farmer Fred  6:22  
One thing people may see when shopping for roses, especially if you're shopping at a big box store, are roses that are wrapped tightly in plastic, but they will have a number on them, a grade number. And Debbie, what did those grade numbers refer to?

Debbie Arrington  6:37 
The grade numbers refer to the size and the healthiness of the the bush that you're buying. And that was set up by the American Association of Rosarians, and they have three grades for rosebushes. in bare root. There's grade one, grade one and a half and grade two. And what that means, with grade one, grade one is your best. And those bushes are big and healthy and strong bushes. And those bushes are going to be at least three years old, and have strong canes. And by strong canes,  those are the branches that the new growth is going to come out on. And on a grade one bush, they must have three or more strong canes, and at least two of them have to be 18 inches long. And the canes have to be well spaced around the bush where they're not all leaning on one side or the other. Ideally, you want the bush to look like a hand that is holding a ball. But without the ball in the middle. Hybrid teas and grandifloras, the canes should have at least three strong canes, and at least two of them are 18 inches long. With floribundas, which are a little smaller, they also need to have at least three strong canes, but the canes only need to be 15 inches. Not polyantha, is which is another class of roses. A lot of shrub roses, are close to polyantha. Those have to have four or more canes at least 12 inches long. And climbers and Ramblers have to have canes that are at least 24 inches long. And basically what that's telling you is this is a big strong, healthy bush that raring to go with a lot of growth potential. Now, grades one and a half and grade two, would be like you'd assume, where they don't quite meet all those standards. In hybrid teas, they might be 15 inches long instead of 18 inches long. And climbers instead of two feet tall canes, they might only have two canes that are 18 inches long. And grade two is all classes where they have just two canes 12 inches long. Basically what you're saying with the Grade 2 is that it might grow, but it's not going to be as good a bush as one that's a Grade 1.

Farmer Fred  8:51 
And thus that's why you might find grade twos at a cheaper price and a cheaper price is no indicator of quality.

Debbie Arrington  9:00 
Yes, it might still be a good bush. But at this moment in time, it's not the size of bush that you want.

Farmer Fred  9:06  
Exactly.  Now a lot of nurseries, the better independent nurseries, will usually pot up the roses, so that makes it easy to transplant. However, if you're buying your roses at a big box store, they're going to be wrapped up in plastic, you're not going to be able to see what's in there other than sawdust and some roots. What should people do to ensure that it is planted correctly when they get at home?

Debbie Arrington  9:32 
Well, the first thing to do is take it out of the plastic and hydrate it because those bushes were dug up awhile ago. The ones that we are seeing in stores in December and January, those bushes were dug up out of the ground in October and November. And so they've already been out of their element for a long period of time. And so what you need to do is rehydrate the bush and so you take all the the straw and sawdust off of it. And you put it in a bucket of water, where the roots are totally submerged. And sometimes if the, if the bush seems really dry, you know, take out a tub, or something that's large enough for you to submerge the entire bush. And just put the whole thing in there, in water, and let it soak overnight. If it doesn't look like it needs, that extreme soaking, just make sure that you get the roots soaked overnight. And that way it will rehydrate the bush and make it a lot healthier, you know, when you're planting. Now look at those roots, the bush underneath the ground should resemble the bush above the ground. Like we want to have, you know, three strong cranes, canes above ground, you want to have three strong roots below ground. And quite often, when they're packaged up in plastic like that the roots get broken or scarred or all twisted around and really damaged. And so what you want to do is, you want to cut off any broken roots,  take off those areas that are broken, and to make sure that the roots look nice, where they're going to be nice and healthy and be able to support the plant. And so you cut off the damaged areas, hydrate it, and then you get ready to plant it in the ground.

Farmer Fred  11:14  
And again, Sunny locations are best although there are a lot of, shall we say slightly shade tolerant varieties of roses aren't there?

Debbie Arrington  11:22  
Yes, sir. And in fact on the list on our Sacramento rose website, which is SactoRose.org, we do have a list of shade tolerant roses, because there are several varieties that can get by and still blend with as little as four hours of sun a day.

Farmer Fred  11:40 
sactorose.org is the website and besides information, lots of great pictures of roses there, too, to help you make your decisions when it comes to getting roses.

Debbie Arrington  11:50 
Yes, and a good website to look at for information about rose varieties is the American rose society website at rose.org.

Farmer Fred  12:00  
rose.org

Debbie Arrington  12:01  
you're gonna see some cheap roses in the stores that are non-patent roses. The non patent roses are roses that were released more than 27 years ago. That's the current patent time for roses and in the US. And when roses are released a named rose this release at the company that releases it has a patent for 27 years. And during that time, whenever that rose is replicated whenever it is grafted, and new rose is made, new rose are sold that variety, that company gets royalties, they earn some money off of it. Well, after that time period is up, anybody can propagate that rose and sell it as that name rose, and not pay the originator any royalty. So those are called non-patent roses. And you see them at huge discounts, particularly at big box stores and supermarkets and other places like that. Because anybody can make money off that rose now and sell it, you know, as their own plant without giving any royalties. And that really is an incentive to nurseries that want to sell roses, to sell these older varieties. Because there's no middleman there, they can just do their own propagation, do their own grafting and sell it themselves. And so it allows you to find many great older varieties such as Queen Elizabeth, the original grandiflora that was introduced in the early 1950s. That Rose is widely available. Mr. Lincoln, another wildly popular rose, a former all American winner, deep red rose, beautiful scent. You can find those all over the place because it's a non-patented rose. And so you can find those roses at a deep discount. And it's not because they're an inferior bush necessarily. It's just that you no longer have to pay royalties. It becomes a bargain rose.

Farmer Fred  13:57 
So if you're looking for a bargain, rose at a nursery, check out the non patented varieties. Several of them are award winning roses. Yes. Well, we learned a lot about roses today from Master rosarian Debbie Arrington, who's president of the Sacramento rose society. Debbie. Thanks for giving us the word about roses.

Debbie Arrington  14:14  
You're welcome.

Farmer Fred  14:17 
The Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast has a lot of information posted at each episode: transcripts, links to any products or books mentioned during the show, and other helpful links for even more information. Plus, you can listen to just the portions of the show that interest you, it’s been divided into easily accessible chapters.  Plus you’ll find more information about how to get in touch with us. Leave an audio question without making a phone call via Speakpipe, at speakpipe dot com. it’s easy, give it a try. And you just might hear your voice on the Garden Basics podcast! If you’re listening to us via Apple podcasts, put your question in the Ratings and Reviews section. Text us the question and pictures, or leave us your question at: 916-292-8964.916-292-8964. E-mail: fred@farmerfred.com . If you tell us where you’re from, that will help us greatly to accurately answer your garden questions. Because all gardening is local. In the show notes you’ll find links to all our social media outlets, including facebook, instagram, twitter, and youtube. Also, a link to the farmerfred.com website. And thanks for listening.

Farmer Fred  15:46 
In celebration of the National Garden Bureau's 100th anniversary, they conducted a survey of gardeners to find out, how are their kids going to garden now, their grandchildren going to garden? How are we gardening now? What sort of improvements would we like to see in gardening? We're talking with Diane Blazek. She's the executive director of All America Selections of the National Garden Bureau. And Diane, we should point out that this survey was taken pre COVID, wasn't it?

Diane Blazek  16:16  
Exactly. It was taken in October of 2019. And of course, little did we or anybody else know how COVID might have changed things in the gardening world.

Farmer Fred  16:26 
I think we've got a pretty good idea, at least here in California, we know that nurseries have been slammed year round, the shelves are empty, and things are just flying out of nurseries. Because more and more people are gardening, being sheltered in place. Even Christmas trees were running out here at Christmas time. And what was unusual too,  I mean, we kind of expected the April-May rush on summer plants. But here in California, we found a big demand for winter plants, cool season vegetables, cool season annuals, and the nursery owners I talked to tell me those flew off the shelf just as quickly as the spring crop flew off the shelves.

Diane Blazek  17:10 
That is exactly what we are hearing too. So our members, our retail garden centers, like your nurseries that you're talking about, as well as online seed sellers. And everybody they said they didn't get a break. Nothing slowed down in the summer, nothing slowed down in the fall. Even now when a lot of people will typically start ordering seeds in January. They have been slammed in October, November, December.

Farmer Fred  17:37 
Yes. So I think the future of gardening looks actually promising.

Diane Blazek  17:41 
It does. I think it's very promising. I mean, you know, I would love for this COVID thing to be over and us to get back to our normal lives. But it looks like, even with the vaccine, how long will it be before things are back to normal. So we are expecting this spring to be another big boom in gardening.

Farmer Fred  18:03 
I think the task now for all of us in the gardening business is to make sure that the new gardeners enjoy what they're doing and will continue gardening.

Diane Blazek  18:13 
I agree 1,000%. With that one, you know everything we do try to educate and inform,  and help people be successful. So that's what we're trying to put out, you know, through  our blog posts or our newsletters, everything on our website and social media, just trying to really make it less intimidating for all these new gardeners and hopefully then they'll be successful. And will stay lifelong gardeners.

Farmer Fred  18:40  
And that goes straight to the heart of the survey questions that you asked people back in October of 2019. The first question is why don't people garden more? And the people said, Well, we don't have enough space, others said we don't have enough time.

Diane Blazek  18:55 
Covid kind of solved that for some people. I know it's kind of two extremes. I think a lot of the young families, young parents that were both working and now suddenly they're both at home and they're having to manage childcare and education. They probably have less time. But the results definitely say that this year more people had time more people wanted to get outside. So seeing is how 54% of the people said they didn't have enough time. We're we're I think we're gonna see that number decrease when we do the next survey, which I didn't mention that we are doing a follow up survey right now that just went out yesterday. So we'll see how things change in, you know, a 14-15 month time span.

Farmer Fred  19:41  
And the other segment of those surveyed, which I guess were people over the age of 35 who said they don't feel they have enough space. And that's where container gardening comes in. And what we like to call backyard orchard culture of keeping fruit trees at a very manageable height of six feet or seven feet

Diane Blazek  19:59 
Right. Yeah, so fruit trees are more compact, shall we say. And when I talk about trends that I see among breeding companies, I would say more compact, a higher yield, and disease free or disease resistant are the three primary trends that I see on breeding. And it's interesting because our survey, that's what people were saying, it's like, Okay, well, I don't have enough space. So we're accommodating that we're making smaller things. I want plants that are easier to care for, okay, we're solving that by making them more disease resistant or pest resistant. And then the more yield, no, they don't want to plant one pepper plant and get to two bell peppers off of it. And that's another thing that we are seeing with hybridizing. And everything is, there are definitely more fruits per plant now than the breeding work that was being done like 10-20 years ago.

Farmer Fred  20:52  
 And especially if people follow the rules that come with those plants, like planting in full sun, a lot of people are trying to grow heat and light loving vegetables in perhaps too much shade as a result, you get less yield.

Diane Blazek  21:05 
Yeah, I kind of laugh at that. I mean, that was probably one of the big mistakes I made first when I was first gardening and you know, had our first house. And when we didn't even talk about those. We relaunched the Victory Garden thing last March for our 100th anniversary, Mr. Hastings, wrote the original Victory Garden manual in the early 1940s. So last March, we relaunched Victory Garden 2.0. And that's one of the things, the primary things, we talked about, is enough sun. Is it planted in enough sun and planted in good soil. So those were kind of two of the things we were harping on last March.

Farmer Fred  21:48 
And we should point out too, that we had a chat back last April about Victory Garden two and that was actually in the very first episode of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast, and people can go way back in the annals of that and  enjoy that one.

Diane Blazek  22:04  
Right, right.

Farmer Fred  22:05 
and get some tips on basically how to plant. and following some basic rules can lead to success in gardening, and we have found a lot of people had enough success. Of course, there's always Beginner's luck.

Diane Blazek  22:18  
there is. that's a good thing. There's also beginner's failures, but that's how you learn. I mean, it's almost like a scientific experiment, do something, learn from it, go on, change things and do the next experiment the next year.

Farmer Fred  22:30 
Right. Now I know that in your survey, people wanted plants that produce more fruits. And yet one way to get around that to get more fruits is also pruning fruit trees at the right time. I think a lot of people make the mistake of pruning fruit trees in the dead of winter, and they're cutting off the buds for next year's fruit production. We've learned over the last few years that it's better to do some summer pruning after harvest, and leave the tree to mature through the winter and then produce more fruit the following year.

Diane Blazek  23:05  
Oh, I'm so glad you brought that up. Because it's interesting with when we're looking at Google Analytics and hits on our blogs everything. Pruning is like one of the number one things that people search for online. How do I prune? How do I prune and it's, you know, it's different for a flowering shrub versus an indeterminate tomato versus a fruit tree or something. But that is one of those things that there's a real need for good information.

Farmer Fred  23:30  
One of my favorite books on pruning is called Pruning and Training. It's produced by the American Horticultural Society. And it's an excellent reference book for pruning just about any plant you might own. I recommend it.

Diane Blazek  23:43  
That's a good recommendation.

Farmer Fred  23:44 
In your survey, you also asked which sources of gardening information are used. And as you would might expect, older people prefer either face to face information or written information and younger gardeners are going to the internet.

Diane Blazek  24:02 
Absolutely, yeah. We do a lot of advice giving, you know like to garden retailers, to nurseries and everything. And one of the big things that we're doing this coming year is helping them establish or refine their online presence because you have to have it and a lot of those nurseries and garden centers found it this past year, you know, if they weren't selling online, they suddenly had to because of the restrictions that were put in place. So not only do they need a website where people can order online, but they also need to be on social media so that the younger set, their younger customers, can interact and learn from them and kind of understand who this garden center is and that they are a really good source for information.

Farmer Fred  24:46 
And of course, even us oldsters are in the Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest habit as well.

Diane Blazek  24:52  
Absolutely. Yeah. So it's not like it was just for your younger customers. I mean, those are, there are those of us who are over a certain age who Certainly use all the social media and online accounts.

Farmer Fred  25:04 
Another question on your survey, you ask people, what do you want to grow indoors? The great indoors...a great place to have a little garden. And what were their responses?

Diane Blazek  25:14  
Well, they definitely want to grow herbs, which does not surprise me because a lot of people already are. Part of this surprise is that vegetables and fruits weren't further up, I think maybe they weren't thinking too far outside the box. But what consumers said they wanted to grow more was herbs and tropical foliage or house plants, which I think they already are, then it went to flowers, then vegetables and fruit.

Farmer Fred  25:40 
And we've done a lot of segments on the garden basics podcast about growing edibles indoors, and it doesn't take much. A sunny window, and basically keeping the plants small, like microgreens, or, or baby greens. And those can succeed very well if they're in the right location.

Diane Blazek  25:58 
Exactly. And my hope is, you know,  if you really go out and Google futuristic gardens or indoor gardens or something like that, you see some really cool lighting, apartments or appliances or something like that. I mean, some are as large as a refrigerator. yes, really would be able to grow more of your own produce, with some of these indoor things. Of course, at this point, they're cost prohibitive, and probably size prohibitive,

Farmer Fred  26:26 
As expected, one of the survey questions related to automation of the garden about what sort of gadgets would you like to see available for the future? And we're starting to see that in the world of commercial agriculture. And so it's just a short hop into the home garden for things like soil moisture sensors.

Diane Blazek  26:48 
Exactly. Right. I mean, isn't that the fear that a lot of people have is, oh, I'm not gonna water it enough, or I'm gonna water it too much. So anything that would help people know how much to water? How much light to give it? I mean, you were just talking about artificial light. So you know, could there be a way to program? I'm growing basil for how much light do I need? I'm growing some miniature peppers in a container. So how much light do I need? And that's in looking at these survey results and reading some of the responses, and then you're right, knowing what the commercial industry is using, especially a lot of these big indoor farms, I think we're gonna see that transition over. So it's affordable for the homeowner. And you know, the home gardener does it, they can use those same types of tools to make them more successful.

Farmer Fred  27:38 
And we're also seeing in commercial agriculture as well, soil sensors that take measurements of the nutrients in the soil. So that, too, will probably be coming to home gardening within a decade.

Diane Blazek  27:50  
I hope so, because I think that's one of the really intimidating things also. And for a newbie garden... fertilize, how much? How much do I fertilize? What do I know what kind of fertilizer? So yeah, any kind of tool that would help in that aspect of gardening would be very, very helpful.

Farmer Fred  28:07  
And the sixth and final question that was in your survey is gardening as an escape. Now again, the survey was taken in October of 2019. And I guess in the meantime, we found out the answer to that question.

Diane Blazek  28:20 
Oh, my gosh, yeah, I would, I would guess that  was probably the number one reason I'm stuck at home. What can I do? Oh, look, you know, I can start seeds, I can go outdoors, I can spend time with my family, I can raise my own food. Or, I'm gonna get away from 10 zoom calls per day, you know, going out and being in the garden was really good for mental health as well as physical health.

Farmer Fred  28:43 
It certainly is. It was a survey produced by the National Garden Bureau. Diane Blazek with the All America Selections. She's the executive director. And I think the future of gardening is very bright, Diane.

Diane Blazek  28:54  
I completely agree. I have my sunglasses on right now.

Farmer Fred  28:58 
If people want more information about the National Garden Bureau and the survey, what's a good website to go to?

Diane Blazek  29:04 
Well, it's very easy. It's three letters: NGB, which stands for national garden Bureau, so ngb.org and that's where you'll find all the results from our survey plus a lot of other good gardening tips.

Farmer Fred  29:18  
Once again, Diane Blazek, Executive Director of the All America Selections of the National Garden Bureau. Thanks for telling us about the future of gardening.

Farmer Fred  29:29  
The Garden Basics podcast is going to a winter schedule, maybe just like your favorite local nursery. November through January, Garden Basics will come out once a week on Fridays. Then, as the weather warms back up in February, we'll return to our twice a week schedule. Thank you for listening, subscribing, and leaving comments. We appreciate that you've included us in your garden life.