| I'm also new to roses, so I may not be the best advisor, but I see no one has addressed this yet... however, when I planted a new rose, it lost most of its foliage and sulked with only 3 leaves for weeks - then suddenly burst into growth. This has been my experience with transplants generally, not just roses - they don't like being moved, and they take time to recover from root-shock. This is not the end of the world, just an adjustment period. Ideally, roots shoot be kept moist but not soaked, but when it rains a lot you don't have the choice! My only fertilizer so far has been homemade leaf-mulch weighed down with compost - this seems to make both the original pink floribunda and the new yellow HT happy. If your soil is reasonably rich, and/or you put mulch or compost in with your rose, you should be fine on fertilizer, at least to establish the roses. I wouldn't mess with the balance unless you know something needs to be done. It is possible to over-fertilize a particular compound and mess up already balanced soil, but I'm not experienced enough to say off the top of my head how much of what is dangerous. As to the fungus, I'd think pretty strongly about spraying with either the baking-soda solution or the vinegar solution discussed elsewhere in this forum for fungus control. With transplant-shocked plants, you're not going to really have the option of cutting back infected foliage. If that doesn't work and you're not dedicated to the idea of a no-spray garden, you can try something else at that point. Most of what I know about rose-growing, I know from the FAQ and searching out relevant threads, so, even if nobody else replies, I know from experience you -can- get information out of these forums with creative enough searching. ;) Hope this helps, and good luck! --Chris |
