Thank you for the fast response and good advice. The roses and I are in Apopka, FL. We are just northwest of Orlando.

Hi & welcome Mrs. H! I am a teacher too, and trying to get a garden for school through a grant & am quite envious of your new responsibility. :) Kim's advice is always great so I am not going to offer more since I am clueless about your zone. However, I have been thinking that some of my students would do so well learning while having fun in the garden, though I teach science & it would go right with several lessons. I hope you will be able to incorporate it into your plans since it is now "all yours." Good luck & have fun!

Just a note that blackspot will be a persistent problem on your roses in your area, and liquid copper just may not be able to handle the problem. At some point, you may have to make a hard decision between using a good fungicide like Bayer Garden Disease Control for Roses, Flowers, and Shrubs (available online or at Lowe's) or having lots of blackspots on your roses (in which case, picking off leaves may be your only choice--but then your plants will be running short on chlorophyll due to lack of green leaves). Do you have any idea if they planted disease-resistant roses? If not, you may not have a fighting chance.

Kate

Hi Mrs. H! The rose garden sounds lovely and I hope you'll post pictures of it when it blooms.

Do you have any information on what roses they planted, where they got them and what root stock they were on? I know that's a lot of questions but the more information you can give us the better able we are to help. Knowing which roses they are we can determine how disease prone they might be. Where they got them may tell us what root stock they are on if you can't get that information. Knowing the root stock is important in Florida as some root stocks do not do well in Florida soil because of the nematodes in it.

For now, as Kim said, don't prune them. They're new plants and need all the leaves and cane they have to feed themselves. Keep them watered but you don't need to fertilize until after the first bloom. You can of course add any organics to them at any time though. Enriching the soil is the best way to fertilize anyway.

On the black spot, any yellowed leaves can be removed because they are no longer supplying food to the plant. It isn't necessary and will not stop the BS from spreading but it will make things look neater. Any leaves that are still green, even if they have spots on them, leave to continue feeding the plant until they yellow and die.

I have a mish mash of roses all from Dewar Growers. They are located in the same city as my school and I suspect they were donated.

I did some research and I believe the plants are grafted onto Dr Huey rootstock.

I have the following varities
Chysler Imperial- Red hybrid tea rose

Mr. Lincoln-Red hybrid tea whose tage says "AARS- improved resistence to soil borne parasites

Pascali-White hybrid tea rose

Pierre Oger Rose-Pink hybrid rose with improved resistence to soil borne parasites

John F Kennedy Rose-(not sure what it says on the back of its tag)

They are divided by color and not by variety. The county workers planted them and didn't pay attention.

Silly question: what constitutes a first bloom? They have all had a flower or two. There are far fewer blooms since we have had this cold snap. A few of the bushes look very bare.

I have 48 planted in one area and at least another 25 in another,

Thanks so much for all this great advice!

Your biggest problem will be black spot. When the spots show up, the fungus has done its' damage and the leaf is a goner. After a while if you let this go on in a humid place like Florida the rose will weaken and may even die. You can't cure BS but you can prevent it by using a fungicide that will stop BS in its' tracks. Back east I used BannerMaxx (propiconazole) with good results but you can also use Bayer Disease Control for Roses (tebuconazole). Both of these are systemic and work by attacking the fungal cells preventing their growth. Many here object to the use of nasty chemicals but without them you may find it very discouraging to grow roses. One more thing, although I used fungicide I didn't use pesticide for insects because it will kill the good ones as well as the bad ones. And also, whatever you spray, wear gloves and eye protection and do it on a calm day.

Dr. Huey rootstock isn't the best for your soil. Fortuniana is the suggested best rootstock for roses in Florida. I don't know enough about those nematodes to tell you how they'll affect the roses myself. Maybe you could post a separate question to ask the Florida rose growers about them. I'm sure they'd be happy to help out.

Those are older varieties for the most part. Unfortunately not all of them are gong to be healthy but they're lovely roses. JFK is a white hybrid tea, by the way. I've put a link at the bottom here where you can go to look up the roses you have and find out more about them.

Here is a link that might be useful: Help Me Find Roses

I grew roses in central Fl. (Winter Haven) for 20+ yrs. All of Dewars roses are on Dr. Huey rootstock. Root Knot nematodes will over the yrs weaken and kill the bush's. They are most present in sandy soils. Old orange groves and places like that. The process can be slowed down a little by using pine bark as mulch. The nematodes don't like the acid from the pine bark. It's starting to get a little late but tomorrow I can give you some hints and things to do that will teach students the difference between rootstock used on roses in Fl.

Nelson's Florida Roses are right around the corner from you (in Apopka). All of their roses are grafted onto fortuniana rootstock. Talk to one of the owners over there and tell them what is going on at the school. Ask them if you can purchase 4 roses so you can teach the children the difference between the different rootstocks and the difference in the growth habits of the roses. Get Mr. Lincoln, J.F. Kennedy, Pascali and a rose named Belinda's Dream (pink). Plant these roses close to their name sake from Dewar and Belinda's Dream with the pinks. Do a little home work on these two rootstocks. Now for disease's. Namely blackspot. It is a fungus disease that almost all hybrid tea's in Florida get. Hundreds of folks have tried different ways to keep roses clean. In Florida the best way is to spray the plants every two weeks with Bayer Disease Control for Roses and Shrubs. Do not use the All in 1 or anything like that. Remember water is the life of anything. This includes roses big time. Roses also like to be fed so they can perform at their best. Ask Nelson what they feed their roses. Always remember this, you can't sell roses to a childs mind if it is an ugly, disease covered bush with puny, ugly blooms. Remind the children that the rose is our National flower. Make them want to be proud to say that the rose is the Nations flower and they learned all about it from you're school. Now to answer some of you're other questions. Don't worry about the infected foliage. It will drop off in time. Don't feed anything until they have been in the ground for a least 2 months. Then just a small hand full of fert. per bush every month for 6 months. Then a big hand full every month after that. Don't prune anything this year. Next year do the major pruning. The rest of this school year water a lot and feed every month. They need to establish a good root system. Do yourself a favor and contact the Orlando Rose Society. They can help tremendously. Tell them I sent you over. Some of the older member know who I am. Enjoy and teach those children about our National flower. They're the ones who will be taking care of the roses after we're gone.