Oh my goodness @rosecanadian your potted roses are absolutely gorgeous! What a beautiful garden! Well done, they look amazing!

rosecanadian (Carol); YOU GROW THE BEST ROSES in pots ever !! What is that rose with yellow blooms, and the one with red blooms on its left? Thank you.

Carol, you work so much harder than .most of us to grow such incredible roses.

Kudos to your wonderful husband for trollying heavy pots in and out.

Seaside - thank you! :) :) This certainly wasn't from last year...the year from hell for my roses. LOL

Straw - you're going to kick yourself for not getting this rose when you had the chance...it's Valencia! The pink rose behind it is Grande Dame. Thank you for the wonderful words. :) :)

Kristine - thank you!!! Let's just say my husband works so much harder. LOL I passed on your "kudos" to him.

LClark - also in zone 3 (me) and 4 (you)...you'll find that you can grow so many more varieties if you grow your roses in pots. You can upsize your zone. :) :)

Awesome! Yeah, I remember you talking about all your potted roses and now I am contemplating if this is the best route for me. I have three in pots that I potted up in like late Aug because they were doing so poorly in hopes of 'reviving' them and they did perk up a bit. Anyway, I "footed" the pots in the ground and they made it through the winter very well. Better than any rose I've had outside exposed to the elements other than the hardiest of shrub roses.

I'm tired of losing roses, you know? It can get expensive especially when one MUST have roses. lol. I have a HT in ground that is doing great, but I have it under a styrofoam cone from November - March/April and that helps immensely, but my wife complains that it is so ugly, which I can't disagree with, so I can't have white styrofoam cone strewn across my yard most of the year ha ha.

Do you find that potted roses grow as large, bloom as well, generally perform as well as a happy in-ground rose?

How often do you re-pot the roses?

Thanks so much for answering all my questions!!

Carol, I didnt realize how large your pots and roses are!

Thats an entire garden!

You should post more pictures.

Youre giving me ideas: I bet I could try sun/heat loving plants in pots and move them to my shady back patio on occasion

L Clark - Thank you! :) :) So by "footed" do you mean you dug a hole and buried the pot? That's not something I could do with our glacial till. But, if it works for you and isn't too difficult.... I'm surprised that this way works better than growing hardy shrubs in the ground. Looks like you found a great way to grow roses in zone 4! I really like growing roses that are beyond zone 3...and I couldn't do that without pots. So for me...it's the only way to go.

Yes, I have wasted a LOT of money on roses lately. One year my daughter left the garage door open on the coldest day (of course LOL) of the year. I lost about 3/4 of my roses. The next year I tried to see how they would do without being covered in blankets (didn't go well...and you think I could have just tried that with a few. Okay...I was too lazy to cover them. LOL) Then year, most of my roses died in a huge pH problem. So...yeah...I'm tired of losing roses too. What people do here (on the other side of the city...there's no glacial till) is take huge slabs of really thick styrofoam and form a house around the garden. They stuff the house with bags of leaves. Then, if they want to pretty it up (neighbors complain) they put fabric (nailed in) over the styrofoam. I doubt your wife would like these ways. :)

As to whether a potted rose will grow as large, bloom as well, etc. as a happy in-ground rose. I don't think you can compare these in our zones. The only roses that will do really well for size and health will be hardy roses. Can you compare hardy roses with tender roses? There are a few that you can say will be as fragrant, as bushy, as beautiful of blooms...but not very many IMO. If you want to grow tender roses...they're going to be very small growing in the ground unless you go the styrofoam way. Whereas they can be quite large in a pot.

Here are some of my taller roses.

I repot my roses around every 10 years. I've grown roses here for about 13 years, I think.

You're MOST welcome. :) :) Ask me (or others here) any questions you'd like. :)

jc - oh thanks! :) :) Last year I didn't have many pictures worth posting, because of all of the problems I was having. Hopefully this year will be better, and I can post more pictures. Yes, I bet that would work!! Pots are very moveable :) :)

Carol, what you and your husband have accomplished in a tough situation is amazing. You must really love roses to do all that.

Superb. How many have you got?

I, like you, am interested in more than zone three and maybe zone four roses. While I love the shrubs (don't like rugosas) I want to have others. I've had more than a few expensive "annual" hybrid teas and floribundas. I'd love to have them multiple years ha ha ah .

What soil/media do you use in your pots?

Noseometer - thanks :) :) Yes, we are all rose nuts here. :):)

L Clark - well, I have 55 pots. But, like I said, the last few years have been brutal on my roses...whereas before that, I had many years of wonderful roses. So I've got around 20 roses coming this spring. And then, hopefully, I've learned all my lessons the hard way and can hold at that number. :) :)

I get a cubic yard of potting soil from The Big Yellow Bag. Don't know if you get that.

Plant Power Plant power is bursting with life! This premium grade potting soil made from a blend of compost, peat moss, pumice, fir fines, CocoCoir, zeolite, Earth Alive soil activator and worm castings and cocoons. This Soil-less blend is course in texture, rich in organic matter, and packed with nutrients and beneficial bacteria, with an optimal pH for amending. It makes and exceptional planting soil for all types of plant material and when used as a soil amendment will transform even the poorest soils

I like this potting soil a lot, because it has fast draining materials in it, yet there is also compost, etc. in it. When I deviated from this and cut out the richer stuff, my roses didn't like it as much.