In my first thread, someone asked me for do's and don'ts so I am posting a link to that thread. Go to the bottom, for my very long comment, with my own do's and don'ts.

Here is a link that might be useful: My initial thread, go to bottom for do's and don'ts.

Thanks so much for the update Paul. What will you do with all these baby plants. Do you have room on your property to plant them for yourself, have a plant sale. I've also read the rules of propogating for a profit is not allowed unless the 20 years has expired.

I've been off work due to surgery and have really taken an interest in trying to grow more roses. I started reading a lot of the posts here and came upon lost of propogating from cutting info and growing from seed info. I've been reading about 6 hours a day, and have gone as far back as 2006 for a lot of the posts. Needless to say .. I'm all fired up to try my hand at cuttings and maybe a few seeds as well. I know the seeds will not come true to the parent plant, but the fun of waiting to see what the flower will look like is great. I've done clematis from seed and cuttings in straight perlite, and I know you need lots of patience to wait for your first flowers. My biggest challenge is hardiness in my cold 4b zone.

Where do the spider mites and aphids come from during the winter in the house?

Joan

As I'm sure you've noticed, I'm also 4b.
Fair Bianca is from 1982, 26 years, so quite safe to propagate. We have a community garden here called Lighted Cross, a huge steel cross lit up with fluorescent lamps, in Sault Ste. Marie. Around the edge of the park, is an immense circle of red Parkland roses, or something like that. The pathway to the cross is usually planted with annuals, but this year I will be putting in 25 FB on each side of the path, and leave room to expand the bushes by propagation by layering.
The path is at least 120 feet, so my main challenge will be to adequately ammend the soil before planting. I'll make sure to work in plenty of bonemeal, and give the surface a nice heavy topdressing of Christmas tree compost mulch from the community tree chipping program. Otherwise, I would hold a fundraiser for the hospital, or sell them at the horticultural society plant sale. I will keep about 10 for myself.

Spider mites and aphids come in as eggs, then hatch and propagate furiously. Aphids propagate asexually, so it only takes one viable egg. I've just sprayed all of my plants with Befenthrin, the SpeckOz brand, that is quite cheap.

Ohhh sounds like it will be a beautiful park once all is in bloom. Sounds like you've got lots of work ahead of you. Hope some other volunteers have offered to help you out with the preparation and planting. Do post a picture later in the summer.

Bugs - Do you mean the eggs are on the cuttings when brought in ? If the potting medium is new bagged stuff, could a person not soak the cuttings in some solution before sticking them in pots and that would take care of the problem?

To kill eggs you need to smother them with something like neem oil. I have not had good luck with using neem oil on rooted cuttings- several of them died.
Sticking piles of cuttings is already tedious, adding another step of treating the cutting with neem oil is even worse. Actually it would probably be a better idea to give the mother plant a good treatment with pyrethrin a few weeks prior to taking cuttings, and then follow with neem oil a week prior to cuttings.
It would be nice if someone else could chime in, but next season that's what I'm going to try: heavily treat the mother bush, even though I take my cuttings in cold weather which inhibits aphids, go after them anyway with a double whammy. My battles with infestations were horrendous, I could have done so much more with healthy plants, even would have mailed out cuttings from cuttings to other forum members. pm.

Wow, Paul! I am totally impressed!

I second that...WOW! It is very encouraging to us newbies who wants to learn how to propagate roses. Again, congratulations and thank you for sharing.

Kasie

Thanks guys and gals. What's really neat is that I've made use of a winter that is usually wasted as far as gardening goes. I've made use of rose bush branches that would be normally winter killed. And I laid to rest the belief that cuttings are best taken at the end of the first flush of blooms. Also the energy bill for the lights is not wasted either, because the light is first converted to plant growth, and then the byproduct of heat then helps to keep my house warm, so my heating bill is less. And, as you can see, the size of the bushes is impressive enough - they are quite a bit larger than what you would accomplish by sticking outdoor cuttings at the end of June and growing them on outdoors. All in all, not too bad. My success rate was 72 plants out of 200 cuttings, but I lost about a dozen after I sprayed them with a Neem oil/ rubbing alcohol / soap mix to get rid of aphids. The bushes would actually even been quite a bit bigger if it hadn't been for that setback.

Another bonus: With all this newfound mojo, I am now considered the "rose expert" of the horticultural society.

What a nice way to scratch an itch, Paul. Congratulations,
Steve.