306 
THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA 
THE ETHICS OF ROSE PRUNING. 
PHESE may be very conveniently divided into two 
great divisions, primarily, "Pruning Proper," and, 
secondly, "On Ripening the Wood." Considering the 
first, to prune, or not to prune, is a question of serious 
importance to the amateur rusarian. A jobbing gar- 
dener, with his fondness for "making 'em tidy," has no 
such heart-searching scruples. If the Roses are of the 
nature of a bush, he tops them, cutting them down 
evenly ; and if scandent in character, the young shoots 
from the base are carefully cut away year by year, 
leaving the older ones; and the blooms, strange to say 
— the ground, really, cannot quite be suitable for 
Roses — become fewer and poorer as year chases year. 
The reader is earnestly urged to attend, as our Dean 
Hole did, to the pruning of his Roses himself; or, at 
least, call in the services of some more experienced 
brother rosarian — services, by the way, which are al- 
ways cheerfully given. 
"A master's hand disposing well 
The gay diversities of leaf and flower, 
Must lend its aid to illustrate their charms 
And dress the regular yet various scene." 
Dahlias, Chrysanthemums, Sweet Peas and Cab- 
bages are very nice, and make a garden pleasant and 
useful ; but if you know how to grow one Dahlia, you 
know how to grow others. Not so with Rosa ! Her 
forms are so many and so diverse in growth and habit 
that a man may be able to grow Crimson Rambler and 
yet make a decided failure of Reve d'Or ; he may be 
able to prune scandent Teas to a nicety, and yet the 
same practice carried out with those possessing Dijon 
blood would be worthless if an ample supply of good 
blooms were required; and who would prune Caroline 
Testout the same as he would Dean Hole? 
Why prune at all? Let us ramble in the country 
and have a look at the wild Roses in our hedgerows, 
such as the common Dog Rose (Rosa cauina), when in 
flower, and again as autumn gathers strength. It will 
be noticed that new shoots are springing from the 
base for the next summer's bloom, and that the shoots 
alreadv in bloom exist mainly of year-old shoots, two- 
year old, and even three-year old. The one-year and 
the two-year ones are carrying the majority of the best 
blooms ; but the still older shoots have a paucity of 
bloom, and are commencing to dwindle and die back 
— indeed, many already ma}' be practically dead. This 
condition of circumstances would prove disfiguring to, 
and disastrous in, one's garden. Hence the value of 
pruning to anticipate these conditions. The value of 
pruning may be summarized under three headings : 
(1) To keep a plant in full vigor — this is the main ob- 
ject — by the production of new basal shoots. (2) To 
secure flowers of good shape, and yet in sufficient 
abundance to merit the Rose a position in the garden. 
(3) To preserve, as far as naturally can be done, the 
native symmetry of each individual Rose, regardless of 
the way in which it is cultivated. 
"A Rose is not a tree to grow onwards and upwards, 
but a plant which, in the natural course, every year or 
two forms fresh channels for the major portion of the sap ; 
and thus causes the branches and twigs above the new 
shoots to diminish in vitality." Rosa does not grow like 
an Oak or an Elm upon the same original trunk ; and the 
life of the original basals, while in a healthy floral con- 
dition, is rarely more than three or four years. The 
reader can now understand why standards are so soon 
past their prime. 
Pruning consists of three distinct operations: (1) 
Removal of all dead, weak, or overcrowded shoots and 
laterals; or of unripe wood that has been damaged bv 
the frosts of winter, and is therefore valueless for the 
production of bloom. (2) Pruning proper, which 
means the necessary shortening of all shoots and their 
attendant laterals which now remain on the thinned- 
out Rose tree. (3) Disbudding, which is a subsequent 
operation and yet an adjunct to the first two. The 
removal of all buds, whether floral or leaf, which tend, 
in the case of laterals, to crowd the center of the tree ; 
and in the case of the floral, to damage the size and 
symmetry of the central (usually) floral bud. 
The inexperienced amateur makes many blunders in 
priming his Roses. Even with a handbook to guide 
him and the valuable articles on pruning, a vigorous 
variety, which may demand a certain type of pruning 
in his garden, may only require such pruning modified 
in the garden of his neighbor. Perhaps, taking the 
same variety, the one in his garden may have a more 
congenial home and, consequently, is in a more healthy 
and vigorous condition ; while that of his unhappy 
neighbor, who cannot grow Roses for his sins, is far 
from well. Although the same variety, both cannot 
be pruned exactly alike. Another fault is leaving too 
many shoots when thinning out ; but a more serious 
one is to prune severely those that only need light 
pruning, or those that require severe pruning to prune 
as lightly as possible. Two typical faults can be men- 
tioned here. First, he leaves the trees crowded with 
shoots good and bad, pruning the Rose as he would 
prune a Privet or Box hedge; and in the case of scan- 
dent Roses, removes entirely the new, outside strag- 
gling shoots, indifferent as to whether they mav be 
basal or lateral. Secondly, he does not prune carefully 
upwards to a bud pointing outwards, as that is too 
much trouble, or he is too conceited to know such. 
He prefers to leave what are known as "zags," which, 
dying back, are very apt to injure the tree, besides pro- 
viding comfortable homes for parasitic and other ene- 
mies. 
The implements for the operation of pruning are 
many and wonderful — and unnecessarily diverse in 
character; though some of the leading rosarians differ 
much from the writer in this respect. The only essen- 
tial things are, first, a good knife, which has been pre- 
viously sharpened on a hone ; and, secondly, a fine saw, 
which is necessary to remove any shoots too stout for 
the knife. All else are superfluous and luxuries. 
Pruning', in itself, is an extremely easy operation, 
the only principal difficulty being how much of the 
tree and its attendant shoots and laterals to remove ; 
but a few essentias are worth remembrance. The ama- 
teur should always cut upwards at an angle of 45 de- 
grees, coming out at the top. and then leaving a plump 
and healthy-looking bud immediately above. This 
bud should point outwards and away from the center 
of the tree. The cut must be a clean one, leaving no 
jagged or damaged bark. In some cases, as when a 
sucker is to be removed or a basal shoot pruned away, 
no buds of any sort should be left, though some well- 
known rosarians believe in leaving a bud behind when 
cutting away old and worn-out basals. A basal, it 
should be noted, is a ground shoot, growing more or 
less upright; but a lateral is a side shoot proceeding 
out of a basal one. Sometimes a basal is known as a 
terminal, when it grows a certain height, according to 
the vigor (or lack of it) of the variety, and then break- 
ing into one or more flowers at the tip. A basal or 
lateral bud — not a floral one — is horticulturally recog- 
nized as an eye. — The Garden ( Rn^lixh I. 
