G OOD plants, good soil, and a suitable pot or 
container are the three essentials to good Roses 
and satisfied customers. A cheap, poor, scrubby Rose 
plant, in spite of all the care and coaxing it may re¬ 
ceive, is still a scrub and never will be anything 
but a scrub; so, therefore, we emphasize the fact that 
first of all a good strong No. 1 plant is the key to suc¬ 
cess in growing and selling loses. 
We plant in our Cloverset Rose Containers only 
No. 1 Rose plants. Our stock comes from Oregon and 
California. We make up our potting soil a year ahead, 
making it up in ricks 20 ft. wide and 100 ft. long using 
successive layers of 2 feet good pasture top soil and 1 
foot cow manure until our rick is about 8 feet high. 
A thorough watering of the finished rick will cause it 
to burn and settle to about 6 feet high by the following 
spring. At potting time which, here at Kansas City, 
is about March 20th, we add to each truck load (about 
1V 2 tons soil) 50 lbs. 5-8-6 Commercial Fertilizer, 10 
bushels rotted cow manure and 10 lbs. hydrated lime. 
It is then run through our soil shredder and ground 
as fine as possible. Let us add that speed in getting 
the roses into the containers is the important thing 
on our minds at this time. We want all our roses in 
full bloom for our Rose Show about May 20th and 
our spring rush will soon be upon us. We use 8 potters 
and 10 helpers and pot up about 2000 per day. 
The container is placed on the potting bench, 
straightened out, care being taken that the bottom 
tabs are in proper place. Then about 1 inch of soil 
is placed in the bottom. (We use fire shovels for hand¬ 
ling the soil). The Rose plant, which has been cut 
back to about 6 inches high, is placed in the container 
with roots as nearly as possible in natural position 
and more soil shoveled in; meanwhile gently shaking 
the plant so the soil will fill in around the roots (we use 
rather dry soil). As the container is filled we tamp the 
soil very hard with a potting stick made of an old 
shovel handle, Roses like tight soil. After filling con¬ 
tainer to within 1 inch of the top, the containers are 
lifted carefully and placed in flats which in turn are 
loaded on wagons to go to our cold frames, which 
are 6 feet wide and 27 feet long. Each frame will hold 
500 roses placed closely together. They are then 
thoroughly soaked, after which they are covered with 
single thickness burlap blankets 8 feet wide by 30 feet 
long which we have made here at a cost of $1.50 each 
by our bag company. 
For the next three weeks, to provide a humid at¬ 
mosphere and to prevent the drying effects of winds, 
they are sprayed 4 or 5 times per day, the object being 
to prevent the tops from shriveling before root action 
begins. 
In about 3 weeks the eyes begin to swell and then 
the blankets are removed in the day time and put 
back at night. About April 15th the breaks begin to 
show green. We then begin to space them by taking 
some of the roses out of each frame, moving them 
to our Display Gardens. As our selling season is now 
on we sell them out of the frames about as fast as we 
need the room. Spacing is absolutely necessary to 
produce bushy plants and by constantly moving the 
plants around, we give them better sunlight, and get 
a better shaped plant, and, at the same time prevent 
the plant from rooting into the soil. We try to keep 
all the roots in the container and never allow any 
tap roots to develop. 
Right now we begin to spray and spraying is kept 
up once a week and after every heavy rain all during 
the season as long as the foliage remains green. Spray¬ 
ing is all important and must never be neglected, for 
when once insects or disease get a good foothold they 
are hard to control. For lice and leaf eaters we use 
Clotragard, a rotenone spray that is very effective, 
and for control of black spot and mildew we use Clo- 
tracide, a copper solution. During April, May and 
June we mix these sprays, using them as a combina¬ 
tion spray. After July 1st the lice and leaf eaters are 
usually gone and we then use Clotracide alone. Neith¬ 
er one of these sprays discolors either the leaf or 
bloom to any appreciable extent, and both are very 
effective. 
By May 20th our roses are in full bloom and we put 
on our first Free Rose Show, using large display ads in 
the Sunday papers. By this time the cheap roses of the 
department and drug stores are off the market, and 
from the way our customers talk, 2/3 of them are 
dried up and dead so we are in a fine position to do 
some real rose business. By liberal advertising we 
keep this show going as long as the blooms look good 
which is usually about 3 weeks. Then while we are 
waiting for our next crop of blooms we put on our 
Perennial Show and mention in our ads such other 
blooming plants as are in their prime blooming condi¬ 
tion. Starting about May 10th we also liberally adver¬ 
tise our bedding plants grown in our greenhouses. 
