Hi, I don't know anything about Roses, but the UGA CAES puts out good publications and here is one on roses.

Hopefully some gardeners will chime in too. Are you in North Georgia like near Atlanta?

Here is a link that might be useful: Rose culture for Georgia Gardeners

You will need to find a book for SOUTHERN rose culture, as we don't do some of the things northerners have to do. The rose forum on GW has some Atlanta rosarians, and you can contact the rose society of Georgia and ask lots of questions.
When does your rose bloom? All year, or spring?

When a rose throws out a really long cane it can be for several reasons. It could be a climber or a rambler that has just been pruned to a rose form. Your rose could also be grafted to a root stock, and the stock has grown a cane..the canes of rootstock are generally long and whippy, and need to be removed. If you search on "google" you can see photos of "own root" and "grafted" roses (look for pictures of the graft junction) so you know what to look for.
I'm in Atlanta, and I normally leave my roses all winter and prune them in February after I see initial budding up. I prune them as they prefer (over time I've figured out what suits each where it is located). If you are finding they are rather slow, they may need to be fertilized. The rose forum and Esh's link should tell you what they need. Mine get compost tea & alfalfa pellets. Frankly, I don't worry too much about black spot. I have been growing resistant but not clean varieties of roses, but if need be I use a home made spray (cornell formula).

Thanks for the advice! I have downloaded the book from UGA and am perusing it. I believe the one cane growing on the side of the house must be from rootstock, because it is thin and whip like as you described. My plan at this point is to take some pictures of the roses and consult with a rosarian.

Hi there, I'm guessing the roses you have is Dr. Huey. It's the root stock of most roses and I see it quite often here in North Georgia. It's actually a nice rose, but it's blackspot prone and only blooms once a year in the spring. If you want to keep it, you can train that cane horizontally and it will put out flowers along the cane.

Does the bloom look like this?:

{{gwi:845240}}

Unfortunately most roses will black spot here in Georgia. If you don't want to spray fungicide, you may want to look at knock out roses. They are landscape roses, meaning they will be a full bush with nice blooms, but don't have any scent and don't make good cutting roses. Think of them as summer azaleas.

There are many other roses out there, if you go on the Rose forums, you will be enable to may different kinds.

My roses don't black spot. You must choose carefully. The rose forum offers wonderful suggestions in alternative to Knock Out roses if you'd like no-spray, clean roses.

I'm not sure where you are in Georgia... but if you're anywhere near Marietta, there's going to be a one hour free discussion at Cobb Central library in February all about SOUTHERN Rose gardening. I'm planning on going because I've had lots of issues with trying to grow roses as well. The date is February 11th. I have the link saved somewhere.. but if you're interested, let me know and I'll find it and send it to you. Meanwhile, good luck! :)

~Wendy

Darn, I'd love to go but it's on a Friday :(