Budded Roses Why Buy Them

Why I Buy Budded Roses

For the same reason you do, it is the only kind offered for sale by the nurseries. That is not to say l do it because I want to… to the contrary I would much prefer to buy a healthy plant grown on its own roots. But since they are not available and it is not feasible to grow my own I have to be content with the budded stock.

For a number of years the idea that budded roses are superior has been kept before the public and most of us have come to believe it. Books on rose culture have stressed the point and, of course, the beautiful catalogs coming your way each year tell of the wonderful budded stock for sale and we, the trusting rose growers, believed this and have purchased them by the millions.

Somewhere along the way I became suspicious that some of this talk was more for the producer of rose plants than for the rose grower. A little investigation convinced me this was true. It is easier and faster to grow a budded plant and it does better the first year in the grower’s garden.

It is possible to multiply the number of plants much faster by budding than by cuttings, you see a cutting with five eyes will produce five budded plants but only one self-rooted plant. Also the understock chosen has a pattern of root development suited to easy digging. All this is fine for the producer but has little relation to the garden.

Let’s take a look at some of the reasons given for using budded roses.

Budded roses are more vigorous

Given plants of the same size and grown under the same conditions the budded rose will likely out produce the self-rooted rose the first year, in later years the self rooted rose will usually keep up and often be superior.

There are without a doubt some varieties which will produce better roses on budded plants, on the other hand some plants are definitely superior on their own roots so it is evenly balanced. Roses tending to have split centers seem to have fewer such malformations on their own roots.

Today with the rooting hormones available and the other propagation aids it is possible to get very vigorous own root plants.

A budded rose is hardier

This would be one for a laugh if it were not so widely believed. The root-stock may be hardier than the rose you want to grow but if the rose you want dies what good is the hardy rootstock? When a budded rose was not hilled up and freezes to the ground it may be killed yet the under- stock will likely survive and will perhaps send up a nice shoot in the spring. But if it had been an own root plant you would still have a plant of the desired variety, not a worthless understock.

A budded rose is more disease resistant

This is another one for the comedians. It is the same rose in either case, if grown under the same conditions the disease resistance is the same and no more. It is true a weak plant is more subject to disease but if a plant is well rooted and well cared for the disease resistance is the same.

For a number of years I have grown both types of roses, side by side, and after the first year or so I can see absolutely no difference except that the budded roses seem to get tired after a few years and slow down somewhat on their growth.

Many rosarians do not have the time, experience or know how to grow their own plants, to say nothing of the problem of patent restrictions. My plea is that some producer of rose plants realize there are some folks like myself who would much rather buy a rose on its own roots than a budded plant even if the cost is a few cents more.

Roses were grown on their own roots for thousands of years before budding came into fashion. Some of the fine old rose gardens of the world have plants older than you or I. Let’s not be in such a hurry to get our roses blooming that we cut short their life span. No doubt I shall be compelled to buy budded roses in the future in order to secure the varieties I want, but I hope the day will come when it will be possible to get any rose on its own roots.

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