How to thin out the suckers on roses?
You may not be familiar with the introduction of green plants and flowers on how to thin out the suckers caused by roses, and if there are any mistakes, please correct them!
Previously, I shared the key points of rose management in early spring, mentioning thinning out suckers. Many flower friends said they didn't know how to do it and which suckers need to be removed?
Key points of thinning out rose suckers
Before thinning out the suckers on roses, we need to understand first, why do we thin out rose suckers?
After the winter dormancy pruning, roses will grow a large number of new suckers in early spring, especially at the branching points, where often four or five new suckers can grow from one branching point. If all these suckers are left to grow, some may grow vigorously due to nutrient issues, while others may grow weakly, eventually becoming blind suckers, affecting the ventilation of the entire plant and consuming the nutrients of the plant.
Therefore, for these suckers, we need to handle them at the initial stage of germination to ensure that the nutrients are concentrated for the growth and flowering of strong suckers. This is similar to how, in nature, some birds discard the weaker newborn birds and raise only the strong ones, because resources are limited and need to be allocated more rationally.
Which suckers need to be removed?
Thinning out suckers should be done when a large number of rose suckers are germinating in early spring. At this time, it is necessary to carefully observe the development of each sucker point on the roses, especially for potted roses. For ground-planted roses, since they have sufficient nutrients, usually no special attention is needed, although thinning out the suckers would be better.
1. Clustered suckers at the branching nodes
How to thin out the suckers on roses?
Rose sucker thinning is generally an operation performed on potted roses. In early spring, we often find roses in the state shown in the picture above, where many suckers burst out simultaneously at the branching nodes. Among these suckers, some are stronger, while others are relatively weaker.
For these suckers, we should also screen them and remove some of the weaker ones and those that germinate slowly.
The picture shows that the suckers pointed to by the red arrows are relatively smaller, while the ones pointed to by the green arrows are relatively plumper and stronger. Therefore, we need to remove the suckers pointed to by the red arrows.
Looking at the position pointed to by the red arrow in the picture above, the sucker is very small. If such a sucker is retained, it will also become a very small blind sucker in the future, so it needs to be dealt with as soon as possible.
2. Underdeveloped suckers Besides the clustered suckers mentioned above, there is another type of sucker that needs to be dealt with, which is underdeveloped suckers, such as the ones shown in the picture below.