Waaahhhhh, my rose has powdery mildew. I couldn't find the gardening forum yesterday so I asked on the sewing board (LOL, I live on that board).

DH bought me a beautiful rose for our anniversary, it's still in a big pot (long story but I can't plant it yet). So I've had it in the house for a couple wks and it's suffering. I sprayed it w/ a mixture of water, soda ash & dish soap yesterday--when I googled that popped up as a preventative to it spreading. Then I trimmed, and trimmed...the new green growth has it I guess because they were just falling off, stems & leaves & the poor thing's half gone now!!!

Anything else I can do? I moved it out onto the deck, southern exposure. I've got to keep it alive, my one from my birthday last year that dh bought me didn't survive the winter :( I used to have beautiful roses, huge ones that climbed right up the side of the house...I miss my babies, lol...

Oh, it came from a reputable nursery, the owner brings a truckload of plants to dh's work every week and dh knows not to bring me cut flowers (dead flowers, lol) so I get a pot of plants every once in a while and nothing else has had problems like this.

Here are some links for you. Hope you figure it out. I love roses.

http://www.growinglifestyle.com/article/s0/a47114.html

http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/roses/1998063150004002.html

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art11754.asp

http://www.growinglifestyle.com/article/s0/a47114.html

Thanks so much! I guess I'm doing the right thing. Crossing fingers :)

My rosebush got aphids and was completely eaten within a matter of days! I was so mad, I had brought it back to life, and it was huge and full and bushy and had tons of rosebuds on it, then the aphids got it and reduced it to nothing. I cut it back to practically nothing and now it's growing again! I'm surprised!! I've got four roses on it right now!!! :) I bit the bullet and just bought some rose bug killer spray b/c it's in a big pot away from where we play, so I knew Connor wouldn't be getting into it. So far so good. I tried the dish soap and water thing to get rid of the bugs and it didn't work at all for us. :(

GardenWeb is an AWESOME website btw. I see that link was already posted but wanted to sing it's praises. I have learned so much about the flowers I inherited when we moved into this base house. My rose bushes looked gorgeous when they first bloomed in spring. Then they got thrips. Sigh. I would rather just have the black spot. Thrips are terrible. I had to chop off about 50 growing buds cause they weren't ever going to open. It about killed me.

But anyway, those forums there rock and you can become addicted to them fast LOL

btw, I owe you a pm!