Soil Samples
What’s
Beneath Your Feet?
In the long run there are only two things that are always
touching your rose bushes, soil and air.
If that air happens to be relatively dry and 75 degrees your bushes will
thrive. On the other hand, if that air is
95 degrees with 95% humidity your bushes will struggle. The same is true for soil. Healthy soil is the foundation for your
bushes and it can mean the difference between thriving and barely
surviving. Soil is the only thing that
delivers nutrients to your rose bushes which makes it the most important factor
in growing beautiful roses.
Soil chemistry is extremely complicated and there are a lot
of factors that go into healthy soil. As
with most things simple is better so we will concentrate on the big factors.
pH – it is
important to know the pH of your soil.
For roses you want the pH to be between 6.0 and 6.5. pH will affect how nutrients are made
available to your rose bush. Proper pH
will let your bushes get the most out of the nutrients in the soil and the
fertilizer that you put down. Use the
Digital Soil pH Meter to check your soil throughout the growing season.
Nutrients – we
ask a lot from our roses. They are
always growing new roses for us to cut and enjoy. All of that growth takes a lot food and roses
are definitely heavy feeders. A good
base of lots of cow manure when you plant your rose bush is extremely
important. Composted cow manure delivers
a large variety of nutrients to your rose bushes over several years. It is well worth it to spend a little more at
the beginning to give your plants the nutrients they need for years to come.
Fertilizer –
fertilizer is the main course for your roses.
The N-P-K delivered by fertilizers allows your bushes to continue to
thrive and bloom. Whether you use
Witherspoon Premium Rose Fertilizer or an organic option it is important to
remember that the fertilizer is delivering nutrients to the soil and the soil
is delivering them to the plant. Sandy
soils don’t hold on to nutrients like clay based soils do so you may have to
increase your fertilizing regimen for those types of soils. If you are not receiving a lot of rain, make
sure that your irrigation system is set up in a way that will help the
fertilizer deliver the nutrients to the soil.
Texture – roses
like to stretch. They want to spread
their feeder roots as far as possible to find every bit of nutrition they
can. If not preparing a full bed for
your roses, it is important to dig a wide hole and diligently prepare the
soil. In this case sandier soils have an
advantage because the roots easily move through the soil. On the other hand, compacted clay soil does
not grow happy roses. When planting
roses, we recommend planting with our Witherspoon Premium Planting Mix. Whether you have sandy or clay soil,
Witherspoon Premium Planting Mix is great product to use. It is a mixture of cow manure, soil
conditioner, and PermaTill (a product that helps keep clay soils from
compacting).
Our roses offer us so much joy. If they are not happy in their soil, they are
unable to get up and go find a better spot.
They depend on us to prepare and maintain their growing environment for
them. Spend a little extra time and
money to properly prepare the soil when you plant your rose bush, check it each
month, and it will thank you for years to come with bountiful bouquets of
beautiful blooms.
