Transplanting a Yellow Rose

Question from Martha:
I have another question for you. I have a yellow Softtouch rose bush. I have recently put it in a bigger container with good Miracle Grow soil. I has started to flourish, with buds all over it. However, when it blooms, the blooms do not look fresh. They are kind of dried up looking, and usually dry up within 2 days. What is the problem? It may be that it is not getting enough nourishment in the pot and needs to be planted in the soil.

Answer from Pat:
I am not familiar with the qualities of Miracle Grow potting soil, but it is probably not a problem. Nor am I familiar with a rose variety called ‘Soft Touch’. (The patented “Softtouch” roses I know of are a particular kind of realistic-looking artificial flowers.) I don’t know of a living rose with that name which is not to say that none exists. I just don’t know of it. “Midas Touch’ is a yellow hybrid tea rose. Do you mean that one? Anyway, it doesn’t matter which rose you have. Basically you chose the wrong time of year to transplant the rose into a larger pot. If you live in a Mediterranean climate zone, the right time to transplant existing roses is in late winter when you prune roses. Disturbing rose roots in mid-summer can damage flowers and may kill the plant.

However, you can try to save it. Cut off the damaged flowers down further than usual. Keep the plant well watered and treat the soil with John and Bob’s Soil Optimizer or, better yet, humic acid, since this might help the roots to recover and regrow. August is the time for summer pruning anyway, but summer is the wrong time to disturb the roots of roses.

As an example, in August a few years ago I asked my gardener to pull out some invasive ferns that were growing too closely around a lovely little red rose I’d had for years. In order to do a really good job pulling out the ferns, he dug up the rose first. Then he took out all the ferns that had entangled themselves in the rose roots and replanted the rose. The rose was covered with buds. The buds opened and the flowers dried up as you described happening to your yellow rose. In my case my rose promptly died. I pulled it out and said nothing. From then on I remembered if some other plant gets entangled in a rose, I must wait until winter to disturb the roots and get the invasive plant out of there. Or I must hire someone else to do the job or get down on the ground and do the job myself by gently pulling out the ferns when the soil is thoroughly wet.