Easy to Grow RosesEasy to grow roses...what could be better? Not the ones that get black spot. Nor the ones that get a fungus. Not even the ones that need all those chemicals (not very "green, are they?) Let's discuss low maintenance, natural looking, often re-blooming rose bushes. Yes! They do exist and there are LOTS of them. Many are known as "shrub roses". Shrub roses are great for the following reasons.
Recommended Easy to Grow Roses
Here's a photo of a shrub rose at my own house. It's called Carefree Celebration. I was really looking for Carefree Delight or Carefree Wonder that I grew at my other house, but couldn't find them. Carefree Wonder was amazing. It just bloomed and bloomed with little care from me! From my experience all of the Carefree roses are also easy to grow roses.
These are fairly new on the rose scene. However, they too are hardy shrub roses which come in many different sizes and colors. Pink Knockout gets to be about 4 feet tall and will make you smile with blooms most of the season. As with other shrub roses, it is one of the easy to grow roses and is very hardy. I've had roses where if I fell behind on my spraying...well that was the end of them for the season. They looked awful. You won't have this problem with Knockout roses.
Rainbow Knockout (pictured above) was a 2007 AARS winner. The bud starts out as a deep pink and the flower turns to a beautiful pink with yellow centers. It's a little smaller than Pink Knockout...3 to 4 feet tall and wide. I grew this rose and loved the color. The flower colors are amazing. (See Notes/Updates below.) *AARS stands for All America Rose Selections. It is an organization with an extensive horticultural testing program and gives awards to roses that are easy to grow and low maintenance.
I live near New York and years ago went to visit the New York Botanical Garden in June. And they have a magnificent rose garden there. It is a sunken garden, so you don't see it from the distance. It rather surprises you! That was when I first saw the Bonica Rose and I loved it. It's not as easy to find as some of the others. This award winning rose blooms profusely, is low maintenance and is just lovely. 
Another shrub rose that is one of my favorite easy to grow roses is The Fairy. This rose bush will get to be about 3' wide by 3' tall. The flowers are delicate, small and sweet. Individually, the roses are not as showy as some of the other shrub roses, but when it is in full bloom it is dramatic. The flowers range in color from very light to a darker pink. It has spurts of blooms though the spring, summer and fall. In the spring it will get its first flush of flowers. These last quite a long time. Once they have finished the plant takes a break and then produces another flush, so that once again the Fairy rose bush is covered with blooms! This happens repeatedly so there are just short periods of time when there are no flowers on the shrub. If you are looking for easy to grow roses that are no trouble at all and very reliable, you can't go wrong with either one of the Carefree roses (see notes below), the Knockout roses, or The Fairy. They can be used alone in your landscape design or they can be used in groups. You can even plant a mass of them as a hedge.
Notes/Updates
Pink Double Knock Out rose in my garden - first year. I grew the Rainbow Knockout rose while living in Virginia. It's true, the colors were amazing, but the plant was not vigorous...well, as vigorous as I would have liked. I wanted to add some additional Carefree Roses to my backyard here in NJ, but this is really interesting. Almost all of the garden centers were full of Knockout roses for sale. This rose breeder has the market, that's for sure (why exactly, I am not sure in my experience). That's all I practically saw! I searched and searched and could not find any Carefree Roses. Well, not true exactly. I found the variety "Celebration" at the same garden center I purchased the ones in my front yard, but I wanted "Carefree Wonder" or Carefree Delight" and they did not have these. So, I almost had no choice if I wanted to plant this year, and I purchased Pink Double Knock Out roses. How are they doing? They are doing pretty well. I'll have to wait until next season to really form my opinion. While the Carefree Roses were beautiful the first season, these Knock Out roses are just OK. They are a little thin. The flowers are nice but not what I would call amazing. I will admit that the shrub is definitely one of the easy to grow roses, as it has had no blackspot or fungus...that's definitely a plus! It has also bloomed on and off all season. Next summer (2012) I'll post how I feel about them after two growing seasons. Most people absolutely love them.
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