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Friday 1st December, 2017
Hi
It's bloomin luvley...
It's time to reflect on roses and which ones have done really well this year. I have to say that the growers and breeders are offering many new roses that are of much higher health than the old ones that we all know and tend to cling too. The is becoming more and more relevant as the chemicals or sprays that we used to use are less available to the general public and with the view that many just don't want to spray.
I hear it all the time when I suggest that some roses are more susceptible than other roses, to downy mildew or other issues, that some people never have a problem and that's potentially true. In my experience of the last 25 odd years, and the quantities that we pot of some 14000 plants and onward of 600 varieties that the same ones can be tricky. Its a bit like the canary in the coal mine, some roses are the precursor for the next fungal infection.
In dealing with all things that are living, there are many factors involved, environment, age, location and the infinitesimal differences included in these factors, that contribute to a roses well being and in the right place, with the right care, some of the old roses do perform. But we live in a fast and busy world where time is a premium commodity, so the breeders have excelled themselves by focusing on high health rose cultivars for us to plant in our gardens and potentially not have to spray. But how do we shift ourselves away from what we grew up with and into trialling some of the newbies? Tongue in cheek, we have a new generation of young gardeners that don't necessarily have the skills that we do or those of our parents, or the time to devote to rose care (too much time on a ipad or iphone), but still want gorgeous roses in their gardens so these cultivars are being snatched up for their easy care properties. If you are finding that your roses are not recovering from the spring rains as you would like or you have some older roses that are nearing the end of their flowering climax then consider some of the new disease resistant varieties as possible replacements.
December is deadline month for us to have to have pen on paper, and orders in, to secure next years range of roses and trees and I am planning to have more and more of the roses that will be less work.. Just on that note though if you do want something in particular, or you have a project that requires larger numbers of trees or roses, then now is the time to put your hand up and say so by putting in your backorder because if its available then we can get it for you... or email us as we are taking order for June 2018 .... backorders@wairere.co.nz
Newer Rose Varieties with awesome qualities
Little Angel, OMG what a doer.. I have been so impressed with this one... Last year I liked it and this year I love it... I rate it better than Iceberg ... more compact and better flower form, love its crisp white colour and glossier green leaf than Iceberg.
Lemon n Lime... Saw this in the Hamilton gardens and what a standout rose, customer and clients just rave about the Somerville bred beauty, gorgeous colour free flowering. The glowing florescent cream blooms with lime tinges are distinctive and certainly make a statement. Good repeat flowering and fragrant as well.
Eye Candy this one is totally new to us this year but plants that flowered here had good foliage and the flowers glowed pink.. I was quite taken with this one. NZ bred by Rob Somerfield Eye Candy offers plentiful clusters of soft medium pink blooms. It has a tidy, compact, growth habit and is an extremely healthy rose.
Love Me Do White Hybrid Tea. Fragrance to die for and classic HT ivory white blooms that open to reveal soft peach centres. Flowers appear with generous abundance and carry an intense sweet fragrance.
White Romance White Floribunda. Add a touch of romance to your garden with this gorgeous white rose that has masses of double white flowers. If you treat it with lots of love you will be rewarded with flowers from spring until autumn. Lovely dark green foliage with good disease resistance. Bred by Rob Somerfield.
Best wishes Yellow Floribunda.A showy rose with an amazingly generous display of deep rich yellow flowers throughout the season. A very vigorous healthy grower with a tidy upright growth habit.
Christchurch Remembers This award winning rose is stunningly bright red and borne on disease resistant healthy bushes.
Absolutely Fabulous You'll just love this rose darling as it's absolutely fabulous. Healthy, dark green, disease resistant foliage and stems of showy golden blooms that are produced in abundance. Nice strong fragrance and all together a must have.
Hot Topic is certainly the right name for this stunning rose, the flaming hot orange colour just engulfs you with it's brilliance! These orange blooms have a flush of red as the petals age and yellow stamens finish the picture and the gorgeous dark green, disease resistant leaves make the perfect compliment..
Parnell Heritage gives you the best of both worlds as it has all the good attributes of modern breeding with a beautiful old fashioned look. The double, red, fragrant blooms are opulent, full and produced in good quantities. Named to celebrate Parnell's heritage - a suburb of Auckland.
We were given an opportunity this year to select which Austin roses we would have standardised for the 2018 season. These are being grown especially for us and it is the biggest ranges of David Austin rose standards we have ever been able to have available in a single season. These will be available June 2018 so if you have ever wanted the standard form of your favourite Austin rose then check out the list available on the website. I have filtered them for you so just click this link to check them out.
Rugosas are traditionally high health roses that have distinctive leaves, simple but usually very fragrant flowers followed in most cases by gorgeous hips. I'm thinking rose hip syrup! If you have a hankering to make your own then these would be a great choice.
Get that second Rose flush happening
As we rock into December the main rose flush is all but finished (well here in the Waikato anyways) and its time to dead head all those spent flowers. You will find that most modern roses will already be throwing new shoots up that will flower but I like to bring our roses back by giving then a good prune, similar to what I would do in the winter and get an almost spring like flush again.
To that end I will leave about three to four leaves / buds (4 to 6cm) from the bottom of the flowered canes near the framework and cut back to these all over the rose bush. Potentially all three to four buds could produce the new flowering shoots. Cutting back this firmly also means that you maintain the size of the rose bush and not end up with a very tall plant that becomes three flowering flushes high.
There is more to this than just the pruning and that is to feed the roses again and then keep them well watered. Roses do like lots of food so anything organic like sheep pellets, bioboost, compost, as well as propriety rose fertilizer will get them going ... As we move into that gorgeous summer, that we are owed and due, watering will be the key to the next gorgeous flush of flowers.
Try to water under the leaves as sprinklers are like the rain and can promote fungal infections like Black spot and downy mildew.
Black spot could be a bit of a summer problem, on susceptible roses, and a couple of sprays of Super Shield should keep it under control. Now I'm not that keen on spraying so tend to do this chore if its necessary rather than for the sake of it. A couple of sprays two days apart should deal with the spores and then spray, if rain is imminent, before and after. No rain equates to no spraying in my book.
If your roses have a bad infection then cutting them back, making them start over again clean, isn't a bad solution, but still do a couple of sprays as above to break the spore count.
Mites can be a bit of a problem if the summer actually does become hot and dry as they just love hot dry weather and the undersides of your rose leaves. They are pretty hard to see if you dont have young eyes (LOL) and suck the green out of the leaves making them look a patchy yellow kind of green. Cattle drench will deal to these little chlorophyll suckers at the rate of 1 ml per litre of water which I just add to my tank of fungicide.
Hydrangeas just coming in to their own
Many of the hydrangeas are showing their heads now and looking just gorgeous. All colours available, blues, reds and whites and of course with ph levels differing, everything in between.
The new Sweet Spot roses are just perfect for colouring around your home and patio, these vibrant roses are high health and long blooming their season starting from early spring and continuing into autumn. Excellent disease resistance just like flower carpet. Yellow has a rich red spot at it's center as does Callypso which is a vibrant blend of orange and red.
Hammets dahlias just in, amazing coloured flowers on deep purple green stems. Full colour selection available.
Verbena Empress Flair collection, always full of brilliant colour, great spreading ground plants, good for edges or trailing from pots, hanging or otherwise.
Thinking of Christmas
Cups, not something you would think to buy from a nursery but Harry found some handleless ceramic black mugs and thought they would be a great idea as Xmas pressies so you can get a set of 6 for $20 and only $8 freight.
Splish, splash I'm taking a bath, well no, actually it would be the birds having a spa in these gorgeous Bird baths.
Vouchers may be the gift to give when you are so spoiled for choice, as you are here at Wairere. They are now available as printed voucher or evoucher that you can email as a gift. Great option for overseas people with family here in NZ.
Pots in wire baskets are a versatile gift with ole world charm and a great place to grow the kitchen herbs.
secateurs
We have had our last delivery of pots for the year and we have again put these out for half price. These are not on the website and will be pick up only as we don't freight pots. There are some good bargains here and many are of a good giftable size.
Gordonton Christmas Garden Ramble Sat 9th Dec 10am - 4pm $20 per person Ph 07 8243850 or email rriddell@xtra.co.nz
Manawatu Art and Garden Trail 20-21 Jan 2018 Details on Manawatu Art and Garden Trail Facebook page Entry $25.00
The NZ Flower and Garden Show currently has tickets on sale via ticketek, this is said to be the pinnacle event for everything inspiration, design and horticulture. This is on 29 Nov to 3 Dec so hopefully you have the opportunity to go see it. It is being held at The Trusts Arena grounds in Waitakere, Auckland. This is the first major flower and garden show in Auckland since the Ellerslie Garden show so hopefully this event will be well supported.
If you have an event you think is worthy a spot in our events page then please send details to receiving@wairere.co.nz.
Online orders last dispatch dates for 2017
If you want your Wairere Order before Christmas then it is best to order now!Large orders or tree orders needing truck delivery have last dispatch on Wednesday 15th December so we need your orders in by 8th December so we have time to organise the trucks.
Courier orders last dispatch is Monday 20th December
First courier dispatch date in 2018 will be Wednesday 10th January but trucks will be later, possibly the 3rd week of Januray, we will advise when we know.
Hamilton Gardens are looking amazing right now so if you are looking for something to do over the weekend and you are local then check them out, well worth the look. I'm sure there are gardens all round the country looking fresh and colourful for any who are interested to view. Check the events page for some that we know of and what ever you do, be safe and ...
Have a great weekend.
Lloyd, Harry and the Wairere Team
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2017 Newsletters...
1st one for 2017 (26th January, 2017)
Grapefruit (2nd February, 2017)
Party time (10th February, 2017)
17 Feb (17th February, 2017)
Asteraceae (24th February, 2017)
Autumn Its Official 03032017 (3rd March, 2017)
The Camellia story (10th March, 2017)
Roses Half Price (16th March, 2017)
Clipped Camellias (23rd March, 2017)
Red and gold (31st March, 2017)
Wairere Newsletter 7th April (7th April, 2017)
A wet season indeed (13th April, 2017)
Form and texture (21st April, 2017)
To Bee or not... (28th April, 2017)
Mothers Day (10th May, 2017)
Its Rose time again (19th May, 2017)
Winter colour (24th May, 2017)
Roses blooms (1st June, 2017)
Healthy roses (8th June, 2017)
Birthday brekkie (14th June, 2017)
winter solstice (22nd June, 2017)
Rose Names (29th June, 2017)
Dry July (7th July, 2017)
Dry July nearly half way (13th July, 2017)
school holidays (20th July, 2017)
Tree time (27th July, 2017)
unoffical spring (3rd August, 2017)
Signs of spring (11th August, 2017)
Tui cherries are blooming (18th August, 2017)
Sunshine at last (24th August, 2017)
slugs and snails (1st September, 2017)
Never fail choc cake (7th September, 2017)
Never fail choc cake (8th September, 2017)
sandpaper vine (15th September, 2017)
In the beginning (21st September, 2017)
The Villa (29th September, 2017)
Montanas (6th October, 2017)
Crepe Myrtles (13th October, 2017)
Te Aroha Airport (18th October, 2017)
Kumara plants are in (20th October, 2017)
French Tarragon 2 (27th October, 2017)
Trees (3rd November, 2017)
what happening (15th November, 2017)
Xeronema (17th November, 2017)
Summer Watering (25th November, 2017)
..... Officially summer 2
Wairere Newsletter (8th December, 2017)
Xmas Summer Holidays (22nd December, 2017)
Wairere Nursery
826 Gordonton Road, R D 1, Hamilton 3281 Ph: (07) 824 3430 Email: