Black Spot on Roses

[Sue]

Hi
My roses suffer terribly from Black Spot and this year was deciding to go against all principles and spray them, haven't done it yet, so probably too late now anyway.
Then I read on another thread that it would harm leaf-cutter bees so that's out and I breath a sigh of relief but my roses are doomed yet again.
Another allotment holder suggest sprinkling soot round the roots as anyone tried this? From what I can gather it's his experience as a boy that roses in dirty old London never got black spot due to the soot laden atmosphere.
If anyone has any other ideas not involving chemicals would be very grateful to hear from you.
best wishes
Sue

[Flummery]

Black spot on roses (and whiskers on kittens..humm humm tee tumm tumm)
The only thing I've heard is to pick off all the leaves - especially at the end of the season - and burn or council-bin them. If left on the ground the disease can over-winter. Not heard of anything more pro-active though, sorry.

(I'll never get that rotten song out of me head all day now!)

[rana]

At least you can breathe easy, as black spot is a sign of clean air. Polluted air in cities is enough to deter black spot.

[smallblueplanet]

I think (roses are the OHs province) that if you try and avoid splashing the leaves when watering them? But that's probably nonsense? When you prune try and keep an 'open' shape?

Anyway we've got this book for info and its good, but as I say not my area!

Growing-Beautiful-Roses-Organically

[Dottie]

Companion planting.

Plant chives among roses to prevent black spot, but it apparently takes a couple of years to work. I always grow chives for the flowers anyway, so this year I just divided the chives up and plant a some near every rose I have in the garden.

I'm not able to say if it works, as I didn't have black spot. But as I come from prevention rather than cure mentality and I'm a fan of the chive flower, it just seemed like the right thing to do.

[coreopsis]

Give it a damn good feed first.My Zepherine looked the same when I got it-black spots on pale small leaves.Healthy well fed rose will be more disease resistant.

[kentvegplot]

Roses never got black spot before the Clean Air Act - I think it was the amount of sulphur in the air!

Current RHS advice is that mancozeb and myclobutanil can be used early as a preventative.

If you don't spray, all you can do is remove infected material regularly and prune infected wood back in Spring. Remove all the debris so spores don't overwinter under the roses.

Some roses are more resistant than others, although this 'resistance' tends to fade over time. Make sure the roses are in a sunny place - that will also help.

[SarzWix]

I have the same problem Sue, some years it's worse than others, but I have no idea why?! I have a huge yellow-flowered one which doesn't seem to be bothered by it at all - the leaves do get some black-spot, but it still flowers heavily all season. I think it may be a 'Peace'. The other 2 in the same bed - 'Ruby Wedding' and another I can't remember the name of, both are struggling despite exactly the same care. So, I do think that the variety makes a difference too.