Sounds good to me. The roses are dormant. I use the alfalfa meal too. I believe feed the soil is the right way to go I make my own compost. I also use the fish seaweed in a spray in the summer. I don't know if putting stuff on now the April showers spring rains could wash it through. Maybe it's better to put compost on in May and water it in.

Here is some pictures of my roses from the summer.

http://forums.gardenweb.com/discussions/3641915/zone-5-rose-shrubs?n=12

Hi John: Is your planting zone 6a or 6b? Alfalfa meal at NPK 2-1-2 has no salt, but poultry compost has salt. Both are best mixed with soil before spreading on top .. the microbes in soil help to break down organics faster.

If you have sandy or loamy (fluffy) soil, OK with high-nitrogen fish meal NPK 10-6-2 (one to four months release according to U. of Colorado Extension, at 5 lbs. per 100 sq. feet).

NPK of Kelp is very tiny, main use for micronutrients, 4 months release at 1 lb per 100 sq. feet. Kelp has salt, best used only if you have sandy/loamy soil and with rain.

http://www.ext.colostate.edu/mg/gardennotes/234.html

Sandy or loamy soil with high-rain need more frequent fertilizer. Heavy clay soil like mine need less fertilizer. I bought poultry compost before NPK was very low 1-1-1, but chicken manure has NPK 5-3-2. Anything high in nitrogen like that, or even higher like fish meal NPK 10-6-2 ... best used in spring or when there's plenty of rain.

I WOULD NOT USE such high NPK when the temp. is above 75 F. I burnt one rose badly with chicken manure NPK 5-3-2 during hot & dry summer.

I do have clay soil and I am trying to improve the soil that the roses are in. Years ago I used chemical fertilizer and since then I went to organic fertilizer and I have seen a big difference in how thing are growing.

Is there anything else that I should know about fertilizing my roses?

I did give them some Azomite this month to give them the minerals.

Another question if you start a rose cutting from a gifted bush will the rose be the same as the rose bush or will it be from the gift? The cutting would have come from the branch of the bush, not from the gift.

Hi John: If you start a cutting from the branch of the bush, it will have the same flowers as the rose-bush, but it will be wimpier, since it will be on its tiny-own-root, rather than GRAFTED as the mother-bush on Dr-Huey-rootstock .. the biggest & most aggressive root for clay.

Since you have clay soil, Azomite might not be necessary. I tested Azomite, but I won't do that again for wimpy own-roots that need fluffy soil. The best proof of Azomite I had seen is with potting soils (devoid of minerals).

Clay has plenty of minerals already, so any alkaline minerals with pH over 8 like Azomite, red-lava-rock, or pea-gravel (I tested them all) ... tend to make soil even harder & more clayish for alkaline clay like mine (very sticky, and hard like rock when dry, my soil pH is near 8). All the hydrangeas here are pink, indicative of alkaline clay.

There's also reddish acidic clay, which benefit from alkaline minerals like Azomite, red-lava-rock, and pea-gravel. If you have blue hydrangea, then it's acidic clay.

The best solution for clay soil is decay organics which release acid to break-down the hard-minerals in clay.

Decay organics like leaves release phosphorus and potassium, which are often tied up in hard-clay, plus make soil fluffier for best root-growth, plus water-retention to soften hard clay.

For years I piled up leaves (acidic at pH 4 to 6) on certain roses .. and those bloomed tons, plus I never water them. I stopped doing that for a few years, and used chicken-manure instead .. I notice a decline in bloom, plus they became weaker through a dry-winter, thanks to the salt in chicken-manure which kills the tender-roots sprouting in early dry spring.

This year I mixed dirt with leaves and topped roses with that .. thanks to Sam's example of the best-blooming in spring in his zone 5a garden. Will let you know how the leaves & dirt turn out. I won't use chicken-manure & sulfate of potash until we get tons of rain to dilute the salt.

In my one bed, last Fall I put wood mulch and top soil than work it into the garden to put organic matter into the soil and to loosen the soil. Yes, you are going to tell me that the wood mulch will take the nitrogen out of the soil which is right. But after 6 months it should be OK and start to break down and start to put nitrogen back into the soil.

Yes, it might not be the best this year but in another year, it will be improved and show big changes the fallowing year, which at that time I will add more wood mulch to it. The more you add the better your soil will get.

I will admit that leave would do wonders to the soil also, but you have to have them.

Somewhere you have to start right?

Yes I agree with you John. It's best if the wood chips have a couple years to break down before you plant the roses. Especially in Ohio.

The same microbes that break down the wood mulch will break down the rose canes too. Rose canes are wood.

It's best to put wood mulch on the compost pile then use it when finished.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.oardc.ohio-state.edu/hermslab/images/Mulching_the_Landscape_Effects_on_Soil_Ecology_and_Plant_Health.pdf&ved=0ahUKEwjD1P3OtOrKAhVHox4KHf_9Bc4QFggnMAM&usg=AFQjCNGC0ziMABA6rHzT7aikqo350vCjdg&sig2=oYyKHV5N8wt3LJJMu6Xf7Q

There is an Ohio state mulch study about the use of wood mulch on woody shrubs. They said that yard waste composted mulch has less diseases and more plant growth than wood mulch.

Its best to wait a year or two to plant the roses in the wood mulch. Less chance of root rot diseases according to the Ohio State mulch study.

My roses got better in the few years I stopped putting wood mulch around them.http://forums.gardenweb.com/discussions/3641915/zone-5-rose-shrubs?n=12

Wood mulch isn't good for the tomatoes the lilacs and the roses. I used to love cedar bark mulch and put it all over the garden but it caused mildew in the lilacs and curl leaves on the tomatoes and bad diseases in the roses.

John: I used to MIX wood-chips into clay to fluff that up. But after testing leaves, alfalfa hay, and even coarse sand ... I find wood-chips are the worst choice to mix with clay, despite Heirloom Roses nursery advice of mixing 50% wood-chips INTO 50% soil to make it fluffy for own-roots roses.

Problems with mixing woodchips into soil: fluff up clay for a short time (1 year max), then it glues up with clay once it breaks down. Woodchips are drier & less nutrients than leaves, and won't benefit sandy or loamy soil.

The type of woodchip matters .. there's soft wood that break down faster vs. hard wood, there's acidic pine-bark (pH 4) which brings the pH down way low if soaked in acidic rain water.

Some excerpts from Colorado State Extension: "

When placed on the soil surface as mulch, wood/bark chips do not tie-up soil nitrogen. However, incorporating wood/bark chips into a soil can create a nitrogen deficiency due to a carbon-to-nitrogen imbalance, and can interfere with seedbed preparation. It takes ten or more years for chips to decompose in a typical soil. The use of fine chips or sawdust as mulch can tie-up soil nitrogen and can decrease soil oxygen levels.

Wood/bark chips are not recommended in vegetable or annual flowerbeds where the soil is routinely cultivated to prepare a seedbed.

Do not cultivate wood/bark chips into the soil. The high carbon content of the wood product ties up soil nitrogen. Chips create soil texture interfaces that interfere with air and water movement and root spread. Chips decompose only slowly, taking approximately ten years. Wood/bark chips on the surface do not tie-up soil nitrogen. However, do not use sawdust for mulch as it may tie up soil nitrogen. Wood products need to be composted before use as a soil amendment."

http://www.ext.colostate.edu/mg/gardennotes/245.html

*** From Straw: agree with the above, I mixed horse manure (on sawdust) into clay and it was a disaster .. glued up with my clay into concrete & choked plants due to less oxygen, plus dried out the soil.

Sam: You have loamy/sandy soil, if I remember correctly? I checked on cedar bark mulch .. found these info. "On the other hand, cedar mulch has been shown to repel insects, including beneficial insects, from gardens. Cedar mulch has also been shown to help reduce termite problems ... Cedar mulch also prevents water absorption to some extent by repelling water."

http://www.ehow.com/info_12000701_cypress-vs-cedar-mulch-better-garden.html

That explains what Sam wrote: " I used to love cedar bark mulch and put it all over the garden but it caused mildew in the lilacs and curl leaves on the tomatoes and bad diseases in the roses."

Leaves, including alfalfa hay are the best choices. Yes, I mixed half-rotted alfalfa hay NPK 2.5-1-2 into the planting hole to fluff up my alkaline clay, awesome result on Tchaikovsky which I posted pic. of its healthy & lots of blooms. Melissa in Italy (clay soil) with 400+ roses put half-rotted straw in the planting holes when she planted bare-root roses.

I mixed wood-chips into my alkaline clay, dug that up few months later, and it was bone-dry. I mixed leaves into my clay, dug that up few months later, and it was moist & fluffy like chocolate cake. NPK of White Ash leaves here is 0.63 /0.15 / 0.54, with pH 6.8 compare to zero-nutrients wood-chips.

My village chopped down 2 dead white ash trees across my street. Those 2 neighbors piled up wood-chips into a volcano-cone around those trees, and they use weed-killer in their lawn-fertilizer. My white ash tree is big & healthy since I don't mulch it and no weed-killer in lawn either.

Bluegirl: I love how you improve your soil with organic matter. I find that white pine trees, which prefer airy & fluffy sandy soil ... these pine trees HATED it when I dumped leaves on top .. they turn yellowish due to lack of oxygen. So I had to scrape off the leaves around those white pines.

Roots need to breath, so leaves are best left for 1-year in my cold zone to decompose 1st, before mulching roses. I wish I have a wood-chipper to grind up leaves into bits .

Leaves tend to mat together into a sheath in my cold zone. I solved that problem by mixing leaves with dirt, which helped them to break down faster.