Hi Cynthia.

I've always found a good hardwood mulch works great. Nothing special needed in applying outside of don't mound it up over the base of the roses too much.

Four inches of the locally available garden mulch is best. Your entire garden would benefit from mulch. It preserves water and suppresses weeds. I use fir bark.

Use what is available from a LOCAL source, a lot of times you can find stuff free for the hauling. In my area the City & County have a combined site were free wood chips are dumped for people to pick up, that's what I use. Places to check are your city or county Forestry (usually a division of the Parks Dept.) Dept., the county extension office, or a local garden club such as Master Gardeners or Rose Society---if there is anything around, they'll know about it & lots of times, garden clubs will know of someone that may even deliver the stuff for a reasonable price if you don't have the means to haul it. Also check for horse riding stables, usually they don't have enough spare land to spread the horse manure on & they're always looking for a place to get rid it.

Thanks, all. wood chips shouldn't be hard tofind. I'm glad to hear that roses don't need something exotic. :)

Shredded oak leaves, pine straw, I even used wood shavings from a pallet manufacturer, sawdust mixed with manure.
To avoid weeds growing up through it, lay down sheets of cardboard or layers of news paper before putting down the mulch. It's just wood pulp and will decompose like any wood. don't know how close you are to lumber mills but they should have mountains of sawdust.

I use cedar mulch. Karls sources would be less expensive though. Some areas that get alot of weeds I use layers of newspaper, then apply mulch over-top. The newspaper lasts for about 1 full growing season.
This past fall/early winter I used shredded oak leaves.
I used shredded oak leaves and other leaves years ago on our other shrubs we had, did wonders for improving the soil also.