I would suggest keeping them wrapped and in the fridge, water always seems to make the ends nasty, or at least I think it does.

Gerry

Ok, I've got the rooting hormone and I"m ready to start. I have a few questions though. Some of the cuttings have flowers, some have buds, do they need to come off before starting?

Also many of the cuttings are very long (wanted to have more than enough to work with).

Can I make multiple cuttings from each as long as there are 3 sets of leaf sets per? 2 above and one below ground?

Since I"m new to this all in all, I"m going to try a few different methods (or well a few different planting mediums).

Is the climate still pretty cool/cold at your place? If it's still cold enough, I can recommend a pretty reliable method. This method is for fairly mature stems. This is what they call hardwood rooting. I will talk about softwood rooting later.

In hardwood rooting you do it when it's still very cool or cold. You cut your stems about 20cm long. Remove all leaves. Apply hormone at the bottom end. Use wet newspapers to wrap them completely. Put them in a bucket Turn it upsidedown and stick the bottom up to get the direct sun to the top. The heat will make the bottoms form callus and start to root. Make sure you are not putting it out to hot sun. Try to shield the the bucket leaving only the little bit atthe top exposed to sun light. After 2 weeks check to see if you have callus. You can then root the ones that have callus in a bright shady area. This method speeds the rooting up a lot.

For softwood rooting you keep a couple of sets of leaves but trim them down to half a set each. Root them in shady area sheltered from wind and spray them frequent to avoid drying out.

Here is a link that might be useful: Rooting hardwood rose cuttings

One bud below ground, one bud above ground with its leaf. that's all u need. u can even do a leaf bud cutting if u really want to stretch ur stock. u must remove all the flower buds. object16 had a few nice threads about how he did it, I used his method, which is basically a modification of George Mander / Cheryl Netter. He posted them on this forum a little while back, along with photos of the successfully rooted cuttings. You can keep your cutting stock in a regular manual defrost fridge, in a plastic bag with some wet paper towels in it, for 2 weeks or even more. Sativa.

I experimented with 2, 3, and even 1 node cuttings a few years ago and didn't find them to be particularly difficult to root. They took a little longer on average, but not enough to matter much. The problem was that the fewer the nodes, the longer it took for the newly rooted cuttings to "take off" and grow large enough to plant out in the garden. The 2 node cuttings from some of the teas I was working with required a full year longer than 5 node cuttings from the same plants to graduate from my pot ghetto. The short polyantha cuttings took off a lot faster (polyanthas do tend to be fast) but were still significantly slower than the full length cuttings from the same plants. IMHO it's good to know you can root undersized cuttings if there's a real need, but not worth the bother if more optimal 4 to 6 node cuttings are available. So unless propagation material is in short supply, I'd put 2 nodes below and at least 2, maybe 3 nodes above. With my misting system I like to start with 2 below and 4 or 5 above, but it's difficult to keep such long cuttings adequately hydrated without mist.

Well they are all done, trimmed, dipped in hormone, and planted into damp perlite.

I will try to post this next series of questions here, but will start a new thread if need be.

Location question.

I will have to hand mist these, I have a greenhouse (pretty hot out (like near 100 F, shaded with 70% aluminet shade cloth and I have fans etc.) I suspect that the perlite would dry out really quick out there. Would this still be a good option?

I cant leave them inside (pesky nosey cat will surely disturb them).

I could put them in my garage on top of my deep freeze and they would be very close by to mist regularly. But they will be in the dark unless I keep the door open partially. would this be doable?

Any other options I may not have considered?

temp must be 70-80max for rooting

guess I'll have to get my thermometer out there and see what the temp really is.

Maybe I could move it into my laundry room area...but we keep the house at like 72 and it would get filtered sun from the covered bay windows nearby.

would that be better?

yes.
Rosyone, I keep my cuttings under artificial light 24/7. The cuttings I took last November look more like 2 year old cuttings, after 6 months of indoor growing. They were all 2 node cuttings. I kept a cutting from July 07 that a friend of mine had stuck, grew it indoors for her, and she has a nice mature bush now, looks like a 3 year old bush. A proper indoor light set up can work wonders. I use a bank of 11 shoplight fixtures mounted back to back on my ceiling, and have a 24 square foot garden underneath. I keep my plants within 3-4" from the lights, they grow like Billy-O. Sativa.

Sativa, have you actually compared 2 node cuttings to 4 or 5 node cuttings taken from the same plants and grown under the same conditions? The node count won't make a noticeable difference by the time the plants are 6 months old if the rose is a sort takes off relatively quickly after rooting, but with other, slower building roses it can make a huge difference. The problem with starting all roses from undersized cuttings, whether or not a short supply of propagation material makes it necessary, is that you'll never know whether a lagging cutting is inherently less vigorous than the others or just needed an extra node or 2 to kick start new growth at the beginning.

I rooted cuttings under close, 24/7 lights for a while when I first developed an interest in this hobby, but have since found that starting them under mist out of doors and then growing them on in real sunlight yields better results in my southern zone 8 climate. And it's a lot less of a hassle. The growing season is long here, and I'm usually ready to take a break from all things roses by the time winter rolls around. If I lived in zone 4b I'd probably be doing it the way you do, though.

It's been one week, leaves are still in good shape some are wilted and sorta dry, but none have fallen off, I've been misting using a spray bottle everytime I think about it. (4 or 5 times a day)

I moved them inside from the garage so they are now on top of my dryer. they are getting filtered sunlight from the blinds in that room.

When should/can I peek to see what's going on below?

If in 4 weeks your cuttings still look good, and the top buds have sprouted and are actively growing, then it's rooted. Looking down below will not do anything to help what's going on down below, and usually just kills it. You now must be patient. Only look down below when you're sure it's dead, judging from nothing happening up top after 4-6 weeks, and the top withering away and turning brown/black.
If you tug on it at that point, and it won't come up, it's rooted, but usually it comes up easily, and the whole thing is obviously dead. By the way, leaves wilted and sorta dry is a bad sign. Check George Mander's advice and Cheryl Netter's advice if yours all fail. Theirs is the way I do it, and I get very good results. Also, object16 has a couple of nice rose cuttings threads in this forum, although I haven't heard anything from him/her in a while. Sativa.