I have three Awakenings and you can just whack away at them and they will forgive you and do just fine. Awakening is not like New Dawn as New Dawn acts like a climber but Awakening acts like a Wichurana rambler so you can abuse it. Unless you have your clippers in your hand all during the summer and want to keep snipping at Awakening, then Just cut back the straggly laterals that are sticking out in the way. It does have to be tied back with rope right across the whole rose. I have one of mine climbing up a tree on wire mesh. There is no way I can prune "professionally" so I get man to use his extended hedge clippers and shear away. In the summer it is a thing of beauty.

How old?

Budded or own-root?

One budded and two own root. Awakening really does best grown as a rambler such as along a fence because of the Wich blood in it. Growing it as a climber upwards, presents a large pruning job every year. Do keep this in mind. If you goof or forget to prune Awakening, just cut it back hard in the spring and it will leap back again. By hard I mean to 2 or 3 feet.

Sub, your rose looks beautiful. I can actually see how many canes..not that many but the second pic surprised me..what a beauty. :)

Jin

Wonderful pics, subk3. The first is so instructional, I had not seen stems trained in an ‘S’ pattern. The second is gorgeous, is the clematis Jackmanii?

subk3

Very helpful pics . After the climbing rose starts blooming in the spring and the flowers are old , how do I control it and encourage new blooms ? should I cut the laterals back to the main canes ?

If they are short with just a spent bloom on the tip, yes.

The laterals on Nahema grow 2 ft tall before they bloom in a cluster .should l cut the lateral back to the main cane ? I just deadheaded last season and the bush got messy .

It's up to you. It depends on how you want the plant to grow. You will get more blooms when you treat some long strong laterals as main canes and bend them after you cut the tip off. . Then you will get laterals growing from the previous laterals..

Nikthegreek

Thanks for your help .But then l will get too many canes/laterals almost touching each other. Is that fine for a climber? Wouldn't it encourage disease ?

Thanks for the nice comments. I suspect that the more vigorous the rose the more important is is to cut the laterals way back. I prune my Rev d'Or and climbing Clotilde Soupert the same way in early spring. In the middle of the season as I just try to pin some of the more exuberant growth back to the trellis. With New Dawn that could be a challenge since she was so vigorous. (which is one reason why she doesn't live here any more!) Mostly once the season gets going I just dead head. I've read somewhere that some plants like more and some less of the lateral to come off with the spent bloom to encourage re-blooming and that you should experiment to figure out what your climber response best to. I never got much re-bloom with the ND I suspect more because of its defoliating problem than how I deadheaded.

Paul Zimmerman has some great youtube videos on pruning climbers which I highly recommend! That's what I used to figure out what to do with mine. https://www.youtube.com/user/AshdownRoses

@BenT yes the clematis is Jackmanii--not terribly original, but it has done very well for me.

Just to complete the photo essay from above, I found a picture of the same climber before I pruned it. You can see I really got into it! You can also see I didn't do a very good job the summer before keeping the new growth in the program!

Thanks everyone for sharing your experience. My Awakening is 3 years old and own root. I will be so lucky if mine even approach is the way Subk's looks.

I have watched Paul Z say that one should cut off the canes that are thinner than a pencil. I need to get over my resistance. I will go ahead and cut short the laterals. They are just so darn long that I am reluctant, but it seems it will not hurt it. I like Nik's idea of leaving some laterals long as I have lots of space to fill.

Subk3, The end result of the evenly spaced branches is like a piece of art, must have been quite a bit of detail work.

The other thing that surprises me is New Dawn and Jackmanii sharing a trellis would seem like King Kong and Godzilla sharing a skyscraper. One would overwhelm the other, and the supporting structure would come tumbling down, a casualty of the battle. Yet they coexisting so peacefully on yours, well done.

Honestly, I would not say detail work so much as just getting in there while it was cold enough to wear some thick layers and getting after it. Once you identify the main canes as you start cutting off the laterals it simplifies what you see and it becomes pretty obvious what you are doing and what you should do next. Go forth boldly!

Now if I could just figure out my floribundas...

You are exactly right as to the two monsters duking it out! The trellis however is 3/8" steel and is well up to the task. It's repurposed waste from a steel yard that a local metal craftsman welded the legs on to make it a trellis. I suppose it will eventually rust, but it's not going to be defeated anytime soon.

subk3, thanks so much for those great pictures and to tortoro for starting this timely thread.

I have read multiple sources saying that New Dawn blooms on old wood so prune sparingly. I've been dying to prune the dead canes (even though it's a viscous horrible job) but have been treating her differently. But no more!

I have an embarrassing amount of ND because I wanted fast growth. Which I received but she only bloomed once last year so now I'm re-evaluating.

Laughing and grimacing at the same time at BenT's King Kong and Godzilla comments!

LL, that's what I used to think, but it's not true. In fact, I get many new blooms from new wood! AND, I whacked off a long newly rooted cane last year and it rewarded me with a candlelabra-type bloom, so it seems pruning will only help with bloom on these laterals. I still have to wrangle all of mine including the "small cutting" I referenced in this post, /new-dawn-blooms-on-new-wood?, which I recently transplanted to the fence near my drive. She's getting humongous.

VV, I don't know if you remember, but I moved a bunch to the fence too. And then this winter, bought a bunch more after I swore that I couldn't take it anymore! I had another tall but neglected wall to cover and I couldn't think of anything tougher than ND for the job.

Thanks for the link!

Sub, thanks for putting up your second pic . Yes, I can see the difference but I hope I can do what you guys did. I only have one climber and it is still a baby. Thank goodness...I been watching a lot of Paul Zimmerman videos and I hope I can do it.

Jin

Hah! I do remember that LL! Don't forget if you want more I have a very good one I'm happy to share. I couldn't imagine growing next to a walkway. The one I just transplanted looks like subk3's "before" picture. I really need to go out and tie them up, but I'm telling myself I'm waiting till I'm ready to prune. I did manage to spray dormant oil so I don't feel like such a slacker.

Umm, I don't think that I mentioned that I have SIXTEEN now. I must truly be certifiable!

I actually needed more but switched over to Aloha when somebody (maybe you?) said how lovely the fragrance was.

OK! You did NOT mention THAT number!!! It may have been me who mentioned Aloha as I seem to be collecting ND's progeny. ; ) Blossomtime is another beauty. They all seem to look so pretty together, but have inherited her extreme thorniness.

The ones on the fence have been the most manageable because the neighbor's donkey keeps eating them, go figure. I keep waiting to hear how said donkey was carted off to the hospital but he still looks quite healthy.

I think it blooms on the new wood that sprouts from the laterals (old wood) that were cut short. I think cutting the old wood shorter may concentrate the energy so that the new wood blooms. (Actually this principle and way of pruning applies to getting wisteria to flower).

Last year I did not prune aggressively either (though I did dead head) and I did not get as many blooms or repeat though that could have been midges.

So I did orune off the spindly twigs. Here is the new lateral growth (some are 2 ft long) with buds off the main canes

LL, can I borrow that donkey (or maybe I should just get a few goats)? I don't even prune Colette half the time. Neglect is good. Diane

That's so funny that you said that today Diane! I was just looking at the twenty feet high on the wall NDs and thinking that donkey might have done me a big favor on the fence ones.

I can just visualize all of the horrible things that might happen to me if I get on a ladder at my age and have decided to ignore the deadheading that is too high in the air.

And every time I pass them, I will recite to myself, "nanadoll says neglect is good, nanadoll's Colette looks wonderful, nanadoll says neglect is good, "!

Oh, LL, you are the funniest, and I love it! I will not be responsible for the results of your neglect. I used to grow several New Dawn roses, and never pruned them properly. When the canes started endangering people, out came the pruning shears, and on came the goatskin gauntlets. I hated every bit of it. And I agree with you, that I am (not you) far too old to be climbing on even low footstools. Diane

Yikes! You have a 20 foot wall! Can you explain this? Perhaps you could loan it to a certain government official. I think he wants a wall. Diane

Nanadoll, you're a genius! Perhaps if it were presented as a giant trellis it might have more support! OMG! Can you imagine a 2K foot wall of roses! If they planted New Dawn NOONE could get across! LOL!! ; ))

Yes, vapor, the ultimate weapon, the nuclear rose, New Dawn. It would be worse than those barb wire rolls on top of prison fences. Heehee. Diane

ND really would be worse than a roll of barbed wire! Hiding behind those pretty flowers where nobody would suspect what they were getting into.

Diane, my wall is actually the side of a shop. It's way too tall and needed a disguise so I went the big guns, aka ND. However, nothing good can come out of the meeting of myself and a tall ladder.

VV, you convinced me of her beauty a couple of years ago but I think that yours blooms all the time, right? Last year was one big flush and then nothing. But she's covered in blooms two months late this year because of our unusually cold winter so we'll see how it plays out.

LL, she does need dead-heading, but you can wait after the first flush and use those trimmers on a long pole. I do all mine as a type of meditation so I get them everyday. Mine have always repeated even those I've rooted or have tip-rooted themselves. Perhaps they need a bit of time to build up strenght to rebloom.I'm not saying they have as huge a flush as the first one, but there are always blooms even when nothing else is blooming. They also have a nice turnout in late summer early fall-ish. I hope you don't have Dr. Van Fleet, her parent from which she sported, as that's a once-bloomer.

LL, my NDs, which came from David Austin years ago, were all Dr. Van Fleet, and I never saw a repeat from any of them. This didn't endear me to the roses or David Austin.

Vaporvac, thanks for reminding me to use our pole trimmers (or actually my son in law; I'm not sure I can handle them). We haven't used them enough. Diane

Oh dear, sounds like I need to look into pole trimmers. Those sound like an accident waiting to happen with me at the controls though!

LL, haha. Basically, pole trimmers look like some medieval Scottish weapon of war. But of course, it will be a War of the Roses. Be sure to have a pot of boiling oil standing by. Diane

Hmmm....DH adores medieval Scottish weapons of war. I believe that I'm going to mention your description and see if that entices him to take a stab at it. He already fancies himself as a ND whisperer. I told them that I was going to get rid of them a while back because I couldn't get them tied up without getting slashed but he insisted that he get to try.

Awakening in bloom. I always get some repeat from her. I think that is supposedly one of Awakenings advantages over ND. Also more petals,but smallwe blooms I think.

Beautiful and inviting, totoro. Awakening blooms have more lushness and substance to them than ND's blooms, which didn't last at all in our summer sun. I should call the roses I grew Dr van Fleet, as I explained. Anyway, your Awakening looks like a part of an inviting retreat. Is there a nook in there for humans? Diane

LL, I'm missing your comments and humor. How did the pole trimmers work out, or is your absence here a bad sign? Hope to hear from you soon. Diane

Hi Nanadoll! Thanks for the kind words! Life has gotten in the way of my rose forum fun and I need to catch up!

My lawn helper decided to deadhead the ND's but I think only up to regular human height. It will be interesting to see what they will look like on the next flush, assuming that there is one.

To be fair to ND, the first flush was absolutely packed with blooms and I couldn't ask for anything more. I added some Aloha in there and they took off so we'll see if they have any reblooming issues.

Diane, I think of you and your quail whenever I see my roadrunners and mockingbirds fighting! One zoomed by with a little snake in its beak so I surely had a disappointed cat.