Ground Cover Roses

The rose is known as the queen of all garden flowers and in my humble opinion deserves to hold and retain the title.

Numerous gardeners’ plant, care for, and enjoy ground cover roses every year. There seems to be no slow down in popularity and demand for these beauties and I feel certain this will be true for many years to come.

In Nebraska and Iowa I had great results with various members of the rose family and I might add with out a great deal of maintenance.

Oh yes I always took care of the basics of proper pruning, fertilization, insect and disease prevention and of course winter protection.

When we moved to the upper Sunbelt region of the country it was my intentions to carry on my relationship with these beauties but the total extent of care required here is extensive.

Yes I still got the same outstanding floral display but the insect infestations were much greater here and with the high humidity the problems with black spot had become a perennial nuisance.

I’m in my mid sixties now and have far less energy and time to devote to all of the special care that is required in order to properly maintain ground cover roses in a manner that they deserve.

So I started searching for rose cultivars that would thrive in our environment with less energy spent on my part.

One variety prospered quite well, however, it reseeded all over our property.

Another variety was so loaded with thorns that it was almost impossible to touch it without running for a supply of band aids.

I certainly did not want to give up on roses so my search continued.

Eureka! Finally my efforts were rewarded when a wonderful new variety was developed about ten years ago which offered everything that I had been looking for.

Pruning is still required in order to force the plant into developing more blooms but such a return as we are able to enjoy almost constant flowering all summer and well in to the fall.

Disease and insect problems are vastly reduced so I spend little time in prevention or curative procedures.

So what’s the name of this new ground cover rose superstar?

In my opinion a better name could not have been chosen than KNOCK OUT.

Yes it really is a knock out!

You can plant one as a single specimen or even better as a truly superb ground cover in mass plantings.

At first just one variety appeared on the market which was red but now several new choices are available such as:

• Pink
• Rainbow (Pink with Yellow center)
• Blushing Knock Out (Rosy-Pink with the pink and a newly developed red sporting double flowers.

Plant Knock Out in full sun or light shade and please make that the soil is well drained and fertile.

Another big time saver is that they do not require special winter protection as they are hardy.