Pruning & Controlling a Climbing Rose 

Thank you for that! I was worried I may end up having my children kidnapped by my rose and would have to wait for pruning season to release them. Now I can rest assured that keeping the rose cut back is OK whenever I need to!

"It now has been promoted. I dub thee Sir Main Cane..." XD

Thank you! My house with 3! old climbers are trying to devour me alive! Now Im ready for battle

I fell in love with roses several years ago when I found over 30 roses in the overgrown yard of a house I was renting at the time. Now I own a house on a small lot and am starting to collect old roses. So far I've got 8. I've been gradually learning with books and trial and error. I think your videos will save me a lot of error. And I no longer think I am nuts for trying! My roses are beautiful, and now I know better how to keep them that way. Thanks.

I have two New Dawn climbing roses that have gotten so out of control on the arbor that I was about to give up and dig them out. Thank you for this video! You spared their lives!

Thanks for this most helpful demonstration!

I love this presenter! Laughed and learned so much.

Great instructional video. Love the humor also

A Rose Guru! I've never been one before - thanks! I'm glad you found it helpful and your comment about understanding the basics is exactly what I'm hoping for. Now run with it!

Thank you for all your work! I'm watching you with admiration and great interest!

Glad you liked it and found it useful. We are all ready planning more for this season.

hi! that was beautiful..your videos are so easy and educative..i love the way you explain everything about roses..thankyou for the wonderful job.. thanking you

Thanks for this it was really helpful and thank you for repeating the salient points about main canes and laterals.

Brilliant - very helpful and very clear explanation.

Brilliant, to the point, clear, concise, nice to find a useful video on u tube. ps like your sense of humour

This is an excellent video with clear sightlines and informative details without being intimidating. Thank you.

Gee'awd, I love these videos. They are like a library in my home that I can visit anytime I need. And I do!

Thankyou so much for sharing your knowledge and experience.

Excellent video. Very clear instructions - this man knows how to communicate!

You're welcome. I find when I'm working with the climbing roses which ones to promote just makes sense.

"Bless thee and all whom bloom upon thee" Great video! I didn't know you could change a lateral into a main cane.

best 8 min introduction to controlling a climbing rose bush,good education with a chuckle along the way,good stuff Mr Zimmerman

Great information and sense of humor...your a natural for the video/tv world!!

Thanks for your response. I've watched your video on pegging & it was most informative. You are a great 'teacher'. I've learned so much from you & most importantly you've removed so much of the intimidation of venturing into growing roses by sharing your knowledge. I will probably be asking other related questions on your rose forum as my venture into roses progresses.

I wish I had seen this video last year! It will take some doing to get control of our climber - but at least this video explains how to do it and does so very understandably. Thank you for posting such an informative and well done video!

Thanks very much......I have a Gertrude Jekyll that Ive never pruned! So straight forward advice. 😀

thank you so very much you answered all of my questions

So helpful! I'm doing some Fall cleanup, and this is exactly what I needed to see! Thank you, Mr. Zimmerman!

Very helpful video, thanks!

Glad you enjoy them!

This was absolutely the best explanation on how to prune a climbing rose bush! I can't wait for the weekend so I can get out and get my 30+ year old climbing rose bush in shape for the blooming season! Thank You!!!

Thank you for the great review!

Wonderful! Thank you for explaining in a way I understand. Funny & Functional!

Exactly. And now that you know the difference between main canes and lateral and which ones you should and should not prune it will keep blooming every year. Glad it helped you!

It's official. You are my rose guru. I got into climbing roses about a year ago but I never paid much attention to pruning since it always seemed more difficult than college algebra. Now I understand the basics. This weekend I will try to pillar a rose. Please keep those videos coming.

Paul rocks! great sense of humor, super clear, excellent at explaining and demonstrating! I might get more daring in my gardening and plant more just to try out the suggestions he proffers.☺

Looking forward to seeing you over there!

This guy is a boss! Nice video

Best video ever! Thanks

Fantastic,I know now,Paul Zimmerman you have saved me from creating a mess.Thanks very much.I am getting climbers so needed this prep.

Awesome explanation, or as we now say in the UK.. awesome explanation! Thanks.

Fantastic. You are a gifted teacher and so knowledgeable. I would like to see the "after" of the pruning done here. Many thanks for explaining that there is not less of the rose, that's still all there, refreshed and ready to burst into bloom. Wonderful.

Love this guy!

I like these guys a lot!

My mom was wondering why her climbing rose wasn't blooming! She had it straight up! Thank you!

Very helpful, thank you!

Thank you! I moved into our house a year ago and the previous owners have a well established rose bush and then sort of next to it a random climbing rose (??). There's no trellis or anything for it to climb, so I'll either consider moving it or finding a free standing trellis. I have learned the ways of rosebushes but NOT climbing roses so this is incredibly helpful. I am no longer intimidated by this weird climbing rose :)

I'm so glad. New Dawn is a lovely rose. Keep in mind you can keep trimming the laterals all season long to keep it under control.

This is exactly what I was looking for thank you so much! Its alot easier than I thought. I hope if I "knight" any laterals, I can do it with as much pomp and circumstance as you did in the video! lolllllllllll :-) I'm trying to get these little guys over an arbor and I've seen those stragglers at the base too. Gotta go grab the pruners! thanks again!

Thanks and have fun Knighting!!

I know this video is quite dated, but man, your information and delivery was amazing!!! Thanks for breaking it down in a very easy to understand video!!!

Thank goodness for this video. Just bought a new house in Toronto with a climber and it was actually eating small children. Now I can take control!!!

Thanks and I'm glad you like it.

OMG I'm so glad I found this video!!!!!!!!!!! I love it!

Thankyou so much for sharing

Thank you even though the quality of the video is pretty hard to see BUT you explain everything so well I understood everything you said even though I don't know anything about roses. Thanks to yours video's I am learning alot! I've tried pruning a rose bush a few times in this house I moved into and every time I prune them they won't bloom but every time I just leave them they bloom like crazy. The problem is they don't grow new canes and the two canes that are on there don't grow any longer. It's like I frightened the roses and just decided to stay just as they are so I won't touch them lol I'm listening to them and I haven't touched them for the last two years.

Thank you and pass the word around.

Thank you so much. The huge bush of a climbing rose I need to tackle, now seems much less intimidating.

Thank you ! I am getting a 4th July Climbing rose this will be helpful! :)

Really good video. I understand a lot more now than I did before. What I need to know is how to prune roses when those little brown spots appear on the leaves ... after the first bloom

I learned so much!!!

I really want to thank you for the rose education you’ve given me. Following your advice, I’ve rejuvenated my grandma’s hybrid teas trained my new own root root climber and have enjoyed a positively sinful amount of blooms.

Enjoy and thanks.

Great and thank you!

10 out of 10. thanks. i learn alot

Thanks for the information. My climbing roses are in need of a strong prunning. I had a chuckle when you refered to the "arms that grow and grow and take over the lawn", my climbing rose looks like an octopus. I have it is a short support, like three feet tall, I want it to go higher like seven to ten feet tall due to the fact it is placed in front of porch at the entrance.

Hello! Mr Zimmerman.. I learnt so much from your videos on roses.i would really appreciate if you could do a video on how to increase the rose petal's count.

great! thank you from Paris

Thank you -- my Don Juan Rose is starting to get out of control. now i know what to do!

Thank you!

Thanks for all the kind comments and glad you like the videos.

I don't yet but stay tuned. I have a big one on our farm I plan to prune after it blooms this spring. Ramblers are best pruned right after flowering.

It applies to all roses. In fact, what you are talking about is called pegging and there is a video on it. Glad you enjoy the videos!

You are very funny, but that explains why this is the 1st time my climbing queen elizabeth is going to bloom, this is it's 3rd year. Very informative.

Yes, the same applies to a lady banks rose. But since it is a spring flowering rose do the major prune after it flowers

paul i lost your email but just wanted to update you on that gorgantueous rose...Haha--totally misspelled that...well i chopped it down to about 2feet...remember it tipped the trellis over...it was just to big for me to cut properly so i just went crazy...but in CA we are getting some cool nights and i walked by and that thing is growing....i thought i had killed it...but it is coming back...so i will be putting a trellis again just a very secure one and not out of wood unless it is supported with steel...it was a gorgeous trellis so maybe in five years it will be back to where i cut it down...thank you for all your input! i have a better sense of what to expect and how to control it better now! thank you thank you thank you! i would love to someday see your garden--i'm sure it smells beautiful if you have as many roses planted as i think you probably do! roses are my favorite!

Thanks!

Thanks Paul! My Graham Thomas was out of control! 12' high and 6 ' wide, it was very nearly ready to envelope the BBQ and, yes, any small animals or children. Watched your video and attacked my rose that same afternoon. I won.

Great advice and funny

Hi its spring over here but very hot (like summer), should i prune it after all the roses die? I normally always cut alot of them off to give to my mum then trim were i took the rose from if that lateral doesnt have any roses left on it.Am i doing right? And my Climber this year got a cain growing from its roots. Should i cut it off? Heard it could kill roses bushes or should i leave it grow? Thanks so much :) your videos and web really helped me!

Great video. You remind me of J.K. Simmons. I'm off outside to prune my massive, messy climber.

I lover your presentation style and funny expressions 😆 you mix in your videos. I watched all your videos in whichever channel you are. But I couldn't find anything about overwintering climbing rose and shrub roses. Can you please make a video on how to overwinter climbing rose plants and container roses, how much watering will it need during winter and etc.? I really appreciate your advice on roses! 🌹 💐 Thanks 😊

That was very educational, thank you. What I'm missing is an understanding of from where the flowers actually grow. If I am continually cutting laterals, am I not also trimming off the very stems that will bear the flowers, thus preventing flowering? I ask because I have a Smooth Touch rose that's about 5 years old that has literally never borne a single flower, despite horizontal training. So I have no experience with how, where or even when rose flowers emerge, despite 5 years rose-growing experience! :(

Seriously you should have way more subs than you do. Excellent video new subscriber here

@AshdownRoses - Hello.. I want to thank you for your very instructional video,I learned a lot and I'm thankful. I recently purchased a "Don Juan Climbing Rose" ( which I'm totally in love with) I would like to know if this specific climbing rose is pruned or taken care of differently then the rest, and what kind of trellis do you recommend me to purchase for my climbing rose?

Just stumbled onto this video and I love it. Very helpful! I'm going to watch all yoour other rose pruning videos in just a moment. Question: I have a climbing Zepherine Drouhin. It seems to bloom nicely in spring, but right after it is done blooming, it drops all its leaves. The leaves don't seem to make a comeback until the roses start putting on new grown in late summer. Is this hard on the roses? I don't fertilize throughout the season. Is that the problem?

Any heavy pruning you want to do in late winter. At this point just trim the rose to shape it, cut out dead wood etc. With the cane growing from the roots. Is your rose own root or budded? If budded is the cane coming from above or below the bud union, which is the "knot" at the base of the plant above the roots.

You can take care of Don Juan just any other climbing rose. It's very easy to work with. As to what kind of trellis a lot of that is up to you in terms of what you think will like good in your garden. If you want wood something like a 4x8 foot lattice sheet would work. Where are you going to put the trellis?

Does the horizontal cane theory apply to shrub roses that throw out longer, flexible canes that tend to grow vertical with roses or clusters developing only on cane tips? If I was to position those canes in a more horizontal position would they produce laterals & more roses? I'm working my way through your videos, commenting as I go. So helpful your videos. Thank you.

You might try cutting one or two of the canes short to about 2' or so. That would encourage blooms towards the base. I wouldn't do more than one or two though.

Are the canes trained straight up the arch?

Great, thanks! What gloves are you using, doesn't seem like you get any thorns into the gloves you are using?

Hi Paul. Thank you for this video and your time :) I bought two climbing roses because I loved the color but how can I train it to be a bush ?

In winter zone 6 with a climber, with strong cold winds, how do you ever get them to climb if you have to keep cutting them back? I saw that someone had them wrapped around their tree climbing a tree - and they wrapped a piece of burlap around the tree, I think it was Chicago and they protected the canes with burlap in winter. What is your advice on this? We want to grow a white rambler up a very tall tree for a moon garden but it's a Northern location - it's protected to 6 ft then it will be exposed to the pasture winds.

You can tie them in like main canes or cut them like laterals.

Excellent video. I have a crisscross style arbor. My hope is to train the climber only on those 45 degree Do you think that is doable? I may need to have each cane do short switch backs as it grows to the top. Although, I would prefer to run each can at a 45 degree from one end to the other 🤷🏼‍♀

You would treat the Lady Banks the same way.

Thank you great information, I see that We should not cut the main cane, but how if the main cane bear flowers? Should I deadhead those flowers or not?

Hava you got a video on pruning ramblers? Thanks!

I'm just starting climbing rose bushes and I bought two I have an arbor in my back yard that I want to use for them. My question is how far apart do I plant them and do I plant them on the outside or inside of arbor. I have a bird bath in the middle of the arbor. Love your video It was very helpful. Can't wait to get started.. Thank you for your video