I have a potted dwarf rosebush that I trimmed heavily last October. It seems to have appreciated it, becuse it's growing back strongly, and turning a dark, lush green during the remarkably early and sunny spring we're having here. Its new leaves are so dense that I'm tempted to trim it again a little. My wife says this is a bad idea and plants shouldn't be pruned in spring. But it's already so dense that the leaves in the centre of the bush are receiving very little light, so are largely pointless, but still consume resources that could go into growing flowers. As you might guess from my name, my passion is in cacti, and I don't know much about roses. Could anyone advise me please?
roses can be pruned back in either fall or spring. i prefer to do mine in spring. mine are in the ground, not potted, though. potted roses may need to be treated differently, not sure. if it is too full in the center of the plant, then you may want to trim off some individual leaves - roses need good air circulation and if you have a black spot issue, then you definitely would want to keep the plant nice and airy. i'd wait another month or so, though as it's just coming out of winter dormancy at the moment.
You can take those inner leaves out, but do it cautiously and on a cold day and don't take all of them out. Normally roses love to be pruned in the late fall (October is perfect) and you can be quite severe then with excellent results. (as it sounds you already have.) As this is a mini, dense leaves are pretty normal and the plant itself is quite tough (not finicky like, say, some of the hybrid teas) so you're probably not going to hurt it any. And if you couldn't clip it while it was awake, what would you do about deadheading (which will produce more flowers)?
I like to put them in a bigger pot to let the roots spread. You can let a rose bush grow with out prunning to see what its natural shape would be and determine whats the best method of prunning. Just remove the dead wood or weaker canes when the plant is dormant.
I just take out the crossed/rubbing branches on my minatures (which doesn't happen as frequently as occurs with shrub roses I find). I also do it in the fall. As previously mentioned they do have alot of foliage and as that's their nature I wouldn't be concerned. Mine are also all in the ground. Les
