vettin - Sounds like you are talking about suckers which come from the roots or the trunk of an own root rose. In that case, I agree with you - if you don't mind the rose spreading all over the place, there is nothing "wrong" with own root suckers. However, some roses (most hybrid teas, for example) are grafted onto the roots of an entirely different rose. This is/was done both because some roses grow more & faster this way, and also it is cheaper for mass production of a rose.

Anyway, if you have a rose like that, "suckers" mean that the roots are sending up there own rose canes. Because the roots are an entirely different rose, the new sucker canes will be that same rose (not the one you thought you had). Also, because those sucker canes are from the roots, they frequently can be stronger than the top rose, and the top rose will eventually die out, and you will be left with only the root rose, whatever that was.

Sometimes that can be delightful - I got a gorgeous plant of "de la Grifferaie" that way, when the top rose (a boring yellow hybrid tea I don't know the name of) died. However, dlG is a once bloomer, and not everyone would have been delighted to see it appear instead of the yellow rose. So, folks who have grafted roses must take off the root suckers (at the place they are emverging from the main trunk) in order to keep them from killling the top rose. Sorry to be so long winded, but it can be a confusing subject, so trying to be clear.

Jackie

It doesn't weaken the mother plant, but if you let a thicket of (say) gallicas develop, you can't tend it properly.

I agree with what others have said so far, keeping in mind that Michael is talking about ownroot (not grafted or budded) roses. You're right that you can often get new plants from suckers of a rose on its own roots. Some roses and rose classes are inclined to sucker, such as the Gallicas Michael mentions; others aren't--I've never known my Teas to sucker.

Melissa

Gallicas and rugosas on their own roots tend to sucker heavily. Damasks and albas somewhat. Other classes and roses vary. I suspect it is related to the species in the particular rose's background whether it will or not. On the whole I've discouraged suckering but I'm beginning to revisit this issue in the name of drought resistance.

As for suckering of grafted roses, dig down to the point of origin, and rip (not cut) the sucker off. Otherwise it is likely to regrow again. Eventually you will have a garden of multiflora or Dr Huey, not the roses you selected.

Rosefolly

It also varies according to conditions. I've been given several gallica cuttings with the advice that 'It's safe. This one never suckers," only to find out that in my version of gallica heaven, it runs like Jesse Owens.

How long does it take suckers to flower? I had a little tiny thing come up three feet from my McCartney rose and I was waiting for it to bloom before doing anything with it, but it didn't do anything last year. Jacqueline said suckers can be stronger than the mother plant, but this little thing is extremely delicate, even going into its second year.

This sucker on your McCartney plant might be a Dr. Huey which is from the graft rather than McCartney Rose. If so, you might like it and you might not but based on the fact that you said it did nothing last year, I am surmising that it is the once-blooming Dr. Huey, if that is indeed the roostock used for grafting said rose.

I had a red sucker grow out of Blanc de Coubert. It looked pretty when the red and white bloomed together (I did cut it off), but I believe it has now killed B de C. Should have "ripped" it off.

I'm getting worried about my own root Charles de Mills. This is his second year, and he hasn't suckered yet but now that I hear he can take over a garden I think I might need to dig him up and replant him in a big pot. I so much want this rose to thrive so hate to try that, but don't want suckers all over the place.
My Cardinal de Richelieu is not a bad suckerer at all.

I noticed yesterday that my laceleaf Japanese maple has suckered...I think it is a rootstock maple but it is also burgundy. Will pot that up to see what it does.

I had an area with several of the early blooming yellow roses. Easter's freeze two years ago damaged some of them; three years of drought led to last spring's bloom on them coming very late and three of them are now dead...in their original location.
One has suckered and filled in its corner of the garden rather well.
But I have two additional roses coming up and I don't have any clue as to which roses they are. I'd like to move them while young because these are of very different growth habits, but I can't tell who they are or how they will transplant.
This isn't something 'wrong' with suckers, but it does make appreciating them more challenging.

There are 2 main reasons that I don't want my roses to sucker.

1. I have limited space and don't need an entire area devoted to 1 rose that suckers to form a thicket. I need to try to conserve space and use the garden space that I have. Suckers are tough in a small-ish garden.

and

2. I try to use roses in the garden landscape instead of on their own. They are part of the garden and structure, so they are surrounded with other plants. When they start to sucker into other (already planned) areas of the garden, they crowd out and kill other plants that I love as well.

I don't think there is anything "wrong" with suckers, but I have find them fairly inconvenient :) A little spreading is one thing, but there are some roses (especially gallicas) that will take a mile if given an inch . . . and I don't really have that mile to give them so they can run wild and free.