Wednesday, August 08, 2007

Roses and Compost Tea

My roses usually look a little sad at this time of year. I’ve used fungicides; kept the bushes picked, plucked and pruned; cleaned up all the leaves that fell on the ground; deadheaded; watered; fertilized; and generally fussed over the roses. By the middle of summer the roses still resembled green sticks.

This year I used a fungicide once in spring and watered during the dry summer. I used a systemic fertilizer my usual 3 times this year and generally ignored them. Except -- I used compost tea every two weeks. (see July 7 post) There is no way to prove that the compost tea made a difference but the bushes look healthier than ever. There is very little blackspot and some nice little blooms.

Now if I could only conquer the Japanese beetles.

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