Time Flies. Pruning is full throttle now, but only as weather/temps allow. It hasn't been very warm over the past several weeks and I am behind where I'd like to be here on April 20th. The forsythia began to bloom a good 3 weeks ago bit I like to wait a week or 2 until I see my rose really budding out before I tackle serious pruning..

Life (and cold weather) got in the way of my rough prune this year - it didn't happen like last year. I did some of it today and yesterday. My wife had foot surgery four days ago and she can't put any weight on her foot for a week. This has allowed me to hone my nursing and homemaker skills during her convalescence. Those skills don't include the pruning of roses.

Some bushes are pushing growth in a big way, but most are not. Very few canes are vivid green this year, unlike last year, but mostly they all are pushing out buds regardless of color. For the most part I prune back to the bottom 2 visible growing bud eyes, but there are exceptions where I leave more than 2. Some bushes are not showing anything above the mulch line, and I will tend to those last. Leaving them as is with the mulch around them should help them get started (I hope).

Yesterday I awoke to 3 inches of snow on the ground. The forecast was for an inch or less. No harm though, it was all melted by the end of the day ????. There's a warning for a little more tonight. That's March weather around here all right.

Some irritating snow fell a few days ago - just a ground covering which melted by the end of the day. Same thing is forecasted for late tomorrow night. It must be March!

Haven't been out to do any rough pruning for a while. I'm not really looking forward to that until the weather cooperates!

I started the "rough" pruning yesterday, trimming down the 2 bushes of Sally Holmes on the south side of the house. This is merely cutting away the black canes that have died over winter. After viewing most of the roses, there's not very much green cane above the mulch line, which is the total opposite of last year at this time. I might even have a few casualties this year but at this time it's hard to tell. I'll continue the rough pruning whenever the temps cooperate, meaning 50 degrees or above and not too much wind.