Last year I planted two rose climbers "improved blaze" They are doing very well some shoots are six feet, but no buds. Why?
This is the natural habit for roses. Long canes grow one year, form short sidebranches on these that bloom the next. You see this same mode with related plants like blackberries and raspberries. Bedding type roses (Hybrid Teas etc.) that almost bloom right off the bud head, without developing a proper shrub above it are abnormalities developed by artificial hybridization and selection.
if you place the canes so they are going sideways, i can almost guarantee tons of sideshoots with an abundance of flowers next year!
Hormones for flowering occur in the high point of the stem, if/when the stem bends over these are found in the entire highest section of the arch instead of just at the tip of the shoot. Therefore the bent cane produces more flowering sidebranches than the still-vertical one.
Thank you Ron B Thank you joclyn for the very informative help, greatly appreciated. I'll work on the sideways canes. Wardia
thanks for the detail as to why the bent or sideways canes produce so many blooms, ron! here's the result of laying the canes over the top of the picket fence. there is a little overlap in all the pics so you can see the whole thing. the whole thing consists of two ramblers planted about ten feet apart that i transplanted from the neighbors yard three years ago...they were literally just stumps a few inches tall. a broken foot a couple years ago, which precluded doing any pruning come fall and that's when i proped the canes over the top of the fence - they were about 5 feet at that point - and mild winters and purposely not pruning in subsequent years have given me multiple canes that are anywhere from 30-40 feet long with tons of side shoots (i've never thought to count how many) and now the side shoots have side shoots...
Looks like 'Dr W Van Fleet'. If these flower more than just in early summer, with additional flushes later than they are instead its sport 'New Dawn'.
these roses are OLD. at least 20 years and probably more like 40. would it still be that one, ron, if it's that old? the buds start off pinkish and fade off to pale pink/white as they age. and, yes, they do rebloom. just a little in this really bad heat/humidity...they'll get going again, very nicely, once some cooler weather hits and then will keep blooming until hard frost.