Temecula Valley Rose Society

President's Message

The past year has had many successes: a profitable first bloom event that celebrated our own Rose Haven Garden, a Members' garden tour, great program speakers, new members, improved meeting room/agenda, bigger better planned youth gardening program, challenging gardening problems overcome in Tree of Life with some successes growing vegetables, and expanded collaborations with other groups and organizations in the valley. My first year as president has been rewarding and successful. All of the is was made possible with the help and assistance of the very capable current Board Members and committee chairs to whom I give accolades. Please express your appreciation to these persons.

Our talented and devoted members and volunteers help make events and programs possible. One thing that I would like to stress to all of our members both old and new: Without members we wouldn't exist. Without volunteers nothing would happen. Without YOU we will disappear. I urge each and everyone to think about what you would enjoy doing for your society and sign up to join our various committees as you renew your membership. Committees chairs and members help create and direct programs and events, and coordinate with the Board ideas and possibilities of an interesting thriving organization. Please step up and join a committee. Check our website and the back of meeting agenda for a list of committees—they really need you!

Development of projects at Rose Haven are ongoing and many have been accomplished this year. In the coming year we would like to concentrate on completing a number of projects. While there is still work to be done at Rose Haven, the garden provides us with a beautiful place to enjoy the fragrance in the air, the multi-color display, serenity and gentle breezes and soon-to-be seating in shady spots throughout the garden. One can only fully appreciate and enjoy this magical place by taking a stroll, or stopping to view the scenery—and what better place to have a picnic in spring and summer? We look forward to all the additions that are being planned for this community garden—the best Temecula has to offer.

Thanks to those members who have adopted small sections of Rose Haven. Many are being maintained on a regular basis and are looking great. Their efforts lessen the need to hire professionals to correct all but the major problems in those areas. Still, there are areas in need of being adopted. This "share the care" program helps keep the complete garden looking better and frees other adopters to better manage their adopted areas. Your help in caring for a small area would be greatly appreciated. Contact Phyllis Bettleheim to learn where help is needed.

In an effort to keep our society members and the general rose growing community informed about good cultural practices and newer products, our society's Consulting Rosarians – Rebecca Weersing and I – attended a seminar directed by Dr. Tommy Cairns in Whittier, CA on October 20. A new website address for the PSWD (Pacific South West District) is pswdroses.org. The new site is more user friendly and has an event calendar of what is happening in our district.

I encourage all members to join the ARS (American Rose Society) under whose umbrella most rose societies operate. The ARS website has many interesting items and a wealth of information. Take some time to visit the ars.org website and our own TemeculaValleyRosesociety.org/index.shtml website for more information and how you can help. I'd like to take this opportunity to wish each and every one of you, along with your families, a happy and healthy Holiday Season.

Grocery Cards Benefit TVRS

Rose Haven Update

Well, here we are another year in the garden almost finished. There were many improvements and accomplishments during the year. Notably: a new ornamental iron gazebo and revitalization of roses in the Hall of Fame area, addition of a new storage shed specifically for rose shows and other events, a beautiful new entry sign on the corner entry, many rose additions and general improvement in the Romantic Rose and gazebo area, planting new vegetables and clean-up in the Tree of Life garden, benches in the pond area and the addition of crape myrtle trees on the hillside. Whew. And a whole lot of clean-up and maintenance by our wonderful gardening angel crew. Thank you everyone for your efforts in making the garden a beautiful place for our community to enjoy.

At the November garden committee meeting we reviewed the proposed improvements for 2013. We will skip meeting in December, so our next meeting will be Wednesday, January 23rd at 9:15 a.m. The address of the garden is 30592 Jedediah Smith Rd., Temecula
. Please see our website for additional info and photos at http://temeculavalleyrosesociety.org/index.shtml.

Member Meeting Program

A light buffet luncheon will be served around noon. Guests are welcome.

January Program is "Weeks Roses for 2013". The speaker is Christian Bedard of Weeks Roses.

December Birthdays & New Members

Little Rose Show

Lenore and I wish to thank everyone who participated in the Little Rose Show competition which serves as a great learning experience for exhibiting your specimens. Always make sure that you take the time to properly fill out your tags with the correct name and spelling of your bloom otherwise it could be disqualified. Results for the 2012 1st, 2nd and 3rd winners will be announced at our Holiday Luncheon Meeting on December 20th. With your participation we can make the following year a bigger and better one. Happy Holidays.

Youth Gardening in November

November has been a quiet month at Rose Haven for Youth Gardening. The third Saturday in November has typically been rainy and this year was no exception. We anticipated this and made the decision to cancel our Families in the Garden program this month. We always take a holiday break in December, so our next scheduled program will be in January. November is also a good month for taking time to plan for the new year. Some of the changes we made are:

Due to many of us being busy this month, there has not been very much activity in the Tree of Life vegetable garden. The student volunteers have been cleaning out the beds that are no longer producing. The seeds and garlic we planted in October are starting to come up (see pictures) so we are keeping an eye on them to try and protect them from being eaten by our many garden critters. If you have any foolproof methods, please let us know.

 

A Brief Overview of Basic Rose Arranging - Part 2, Line Mass

As the name implies, line-mass arrangements are a combination of line (borrowed from the Orient) and mass (borrowed from European Period Arrangements). This design should remain light and airy and retain the identity of an interesting line. You have probably noticed that all arrangements have a focal area. In a Line Arrangement, that is usually the largest rose. In the Line Mass, the focal area is fortified with plant material, but the silhouette is still fairly open. The focal area should not be so large that the arrangement can be considered a Mass arrangement. (More about that style next month.)

As these characteristics show, the Line Mass style allows the designer to incorporate other colors, textures and plant materials; for example, spiky plant materials can fit into this style very well. As with any arrangement, use plant material of the highest quality.

The illustrations that accompany this article show three variations on the Line Mass style. Notice that these retain a dominant line but build up the focal area as described above. Both styles can be horizontal, diagonal, curved, crescent, spiral, or "Hogarth" ("S" shaped variation). But consider the main difference: In a Line arrangement you have height and width, but very little depth; in a Line Mass you have height, width, and depth. Consequently, the placement of materials is critical: Exercise restraint or you will end up turning it into a Mass arrangement! I encourage you to re-read last month's article, and see if you can identify examples of these two styles when you are out and about. Feel free to experiment with this style and to bring a Line Mass arrangement to the November meeting for additional input. And remember, if you don't have fresh plant material, feel free to use silk flowers-you could end up with a very nice center piece for the Thanksgiving table!

Rose Care FUNdamentals

Daytime temps are very agreeable for growing roses. It is important that one monitors the irrigation program for your roses. It may be necessary to modify the program if you haven't changed since the hot dry summer. With lower temperatures less water will be needed but will still need water to produce blooms. Because roses like moist but not wet soil, reduce the amount of water you apply if we receive above one inch of rain. I cannot stress enough the importance of "deep watering." The length of time needed for this depends on several factors: the amount of pressure in your watering system, amount of delivery by emitter, run time, and type of soil.

Do not fertilize after mid-November for our region. Also, while the weather is relatively comfortable, clean up of garden debris (such as dead leaves and petals). This will reduce the population of overwintering pests and give you a jump on spring, as well as a healthier garden next year.

December is still a good time in our area to prepare for new plants that you plan to purchase or that will be delivered in January. Refer to last month's article at temeculavalleyrosesociety.org on the process for doing this. The weather is still relatively nice for gardening and not much else is happening in the garden so you will have more time now than later for this preparation. This will actually save you time and get your new roses planted sooner. If done now you will have the hard part of planting accomplished and not be worried, hurried about January.

As winter progresses the rose will slow down it's metabolism, taking a rest. Let the hips set on the bush, remove only the blossom petals to help keep your garden clean and free from any viruses that may come along with the cooler, wetter winter weather. Do not prune this month. Let the plant enter into a short dormant period. It is the natural cycle of active growing healthy plants reaching its ultimate purpose of producing offspring: seeds in hips. They need a rest from all the work they did for you all year long. Warning: Pruning is a way of forcing a plant to produce new foliage and become active, much winter is still to come with frost in the region up to February/March. The new tender foliage can be frozen and lessening the plants ability to recover for great performance next year.

Now, sit back, relax, and enjoy anticipating all the pleasure your roses will give you next spring! OR enjoy the holidays without added pressure of tending your roses. But if you just can't sit still, go get some inspiration by visiting TVRS' Rose Haven garden at 30592 Jedediah Smith Rd., Temecula. There are always a few weeds to eradicate or beds to freshen or debris to pick up or to just enjoy the views on a warm day.

Don't forget to check out the Pacific South West District website at pswdroses.org. There you will find planned activities for other rose societies in the SWUSA.

For more ideas, visit TVRS' Rose Haven garden at 30592 Jedediah Smith Rd., Temecula
, Temecula, as well as our web site at TemeculaValleyRosesociety.org/index.shtml.