Temecula Valley Rose Society

An Affiliate of the American Rose Society

President's Message

We are going into a "full speed ahead" mode! We will reach our goal of a public garden that is sustainable long into the future. If you can help or add your ideas, please let me know. Everyone's effort will be needed.

MYGARDEN75

Planning continues for National Public Gardens Week. Help with the planning would be greatly appreciated. We will be meeting on the following dates, all Wednesdays, at 9:30 a.m. for about an hour: April 3, April 10, April 17 and April 24. The tasks before us are (1) planning events for May 13 to May 19, (2) creating and implementing our publicity and (3) setting up our MYGARDEN75 fundraising page. Send me an email temroses@gmail.com for the meeting address. Join us in sharing Rose Haven with our community and others who enjoy visiting gardens.

Consulting Rosarian School

An ideal Consulting Rosarian is a person who (1) shares love and appreciation of roses, (2) is willing to work, (3) has knowledge of all types of roses, (4) understands being a CR is a call to service - not a reward, (5) knows it is important to be nice, and (6) is available to help.

To become a Consulting Rosarian one must be an active member of the American Rose Society for three years, be an active member of a local Rose Society, and have successfully completed a CR school which includes an open book test. Every four years one needs to attend a CR school to refresh one's knowledge and learn what is new.

The subjects covered in the CR school Soil & Water, Insects & Diseases, Chemical Safety, and Fertilizers.As always, there is something new to learn. Linda Freeman and I audited the school. Although neither of us is currently a CR, both of us found our knowledge of roses enhanced.

Share! Teach! Learn! - this is a CR in action. Consider becoming a CR for our Society.

Rose Haven Committee Meetings

Our committee meets on the fourth Wednesday of each month, excepting July, November and December. Our next meeting is Wednesday, April 24. We have both an indoor meeting of about one hour and an outdoor meeting at Rose Haven of about one hour. We welcome members to attend both meetings or just one, depending on your interest and your availability. Email me [temroses@gmail.com] for more information about our meetings.

Ownership of Rose Haven Heritage Garden

There is an absolutely gorgeous rose garden at the corner of Jedediah Smith Rd. and Cabrillo. It's not a City park. Do you know who owns it? YOU DO! Each member of the Temecula Valley Rose Society owns a share in this special place. Enjoyment can be found in the peaceful setting, as well as the satisfaction of helping to create it. Volunteers are always needed to help with maintenance and fund-raising. Can we count on you?

Visit us on Facebook!

We have three Facebook pages! Ann Schryer and Linda Freeman did some research and found that we were able to utilize our original Facebook page. A new page also was created so we have expanded our Facebook outreach with two Temecula Valley Rose Society pages. The society also has the Families in the Garden page which Alicia Cline is editing. You must be a Facebook member to access these pages. The links work best if you are logged into Facebook. Visit us at :

University of California Botanic Gardens
Spring Plant Sale April 6, 2019

Spring Celebration & Botanic Garden Member Appreciation Plant Sale. This unique event will be open only to our members and will be held on site in our upper nursery where our beautiful plants are propagated and grown.

Botanic Garden Members will have a chance to shop, see where the action takes place in the Gardens, visit special places such as the Greenhouse, Butterfly Garden, Rose Gardens, and Dome in their springtime splendor, and enjoy complimentary refreshments.

The Botanic Gardens were able to get cuttings from an extensive local estate and have been propagating those cuttings.

Rosy Ramblings

Many of our members have been travelling near and far picking up roses for their gardens. Don Nordike's recent ramblings took him to Roseland Nursery (Rainbow - it was reported as being closed but is open), Ganter Nursery (Vista), Louies Nursery (Riverside), and Guerreo Nursery (Ontario). Don reported that Guerrero has acres of roses and is well worth the trip. Linda Freeman visited Cagliero Nursery (Hemet) and was impressed by their over 50 varieties for sale.

The Temecula Valley Garden Club

This Month's Program:

Thank you to our members who will be sharing their gardens with us. We will meet at Rose Haven at 9:30 am. Plan on a walkabout to see all of the changes and enjoy the many blooms at Rose Haven.

Maps will be distributed at Rose Haven and we will form car pools. At approximately 10:00 a.m. we will head north to our first garden. For those carpooling we should return to Rose Haven between 1:00 and 1:30 p.m. We will visit the gardens of Don Nordike, Jim and Laurie Moss, May Olson, and our final stop will be the Weersing home where we will have lunch. If you have any questions please contact Linda Freeman 951-204-6141.

We will resume our monthly Library meetings May 16 with Celeste Cantu speaking about "Growing Roses and making every drop count" - more details in the May Newsletter.

April Birthdays & New Members

Rose Haven Garden

A new activity at the garden is a Yoga program every Saturday morning in our Pavilion coordinated by Rancho Family Medical Group. Several of our members attend the class and then have participated in our fourth Saturday Rose Haven volunteer day. Just last week a group helped spread fertilizer throughout the garden. Thank you to Suzy Parsons, Kathy Trudeau, Ann and Richard Schryer, Nardo Felipe, and Ray Jacques, we really appreciate your time and effort in accomplishing this task. Our next volunteer day is Saturday, April 27th. Perhaps raking and weeding will be on the agenda.

The next garden committee meeting is Wednesday, April 24th at 10:00. Meeting will be at Rebecca's office, 31285 Temecula Parkway, Suite 255. We will discuss garden improvements, projects, etc., then go to the garden to complete the program. All interested members are welcome to attend.

Rose Haven garden is located at 30592 Jedediah Smith Rd., Temecula, at the corner of Cabrillo Avenue and Jedediah Smith Rd.

Hospitality Committee Update

The Temecula Valley Rose Society Hospitality Team in the past was always headed by one or two of our members. And those faithful members who took the kitchen job usually stayed for a few years. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all the kitchen hosts for your years of being on the Hospitality Committee. Our last team was Frances and Tony Merritt and they did an amazing job!

In the beginning of 2019, the TVRS board met and decided that we should try and start a new opportunity/challenge in the kitchen for our membership. The decision was made to line up a different host for every meeting throughout the year except for the Members Garden Tour in April and the summer months when we are dark.

Host Responsibilities: Being the Host includes making sure everything runs smoothly in the kitchen, which consists of making the coffee, accepting the food from our members and storing it in the refrigerator before the meeting, setting the food out after the speaker presentation and cleaning up after the meeting. The good news is: that all the utensils, coffee, cream and paper goods will be in the kitchen before the meeting.

This year began with the TVRS Board taking care of food for our January meeting. February meeting hosts were myself along with Laurie and Jim Moss and Fay Devor. In March Laurie and Jim Moss and Fay Devor were the hosts. At this point we need a host for May. Carol and Peter Gagliardi, new members, have stepped up and will be hosts for our June Meeting!

It is a fun job and Fay and I will be standing by to lend a hand if you need it. Please see me at the members garden tour to sign up as a Hospitality Host for our May potluck. We appreciate the luncheon items you bring every month. Thank you for your ongoing support!

Some TVRS History Tidbits

In 1990 all we saw was a huge weed patch, but Karen Ortega had a dream that is being fulfilled and sustained at Rose Haven Heritage Garden. She did have the chance to see how it looks today and she was aware of the extent of our community activity, including for the children. The hundreds of members who have passed through our society in the last 30 years have made this possible. Only Rebecca Weersing and I are the remaining Charter Members.

Zelda Lloyd, a rosarian from Riverside, was our mentor in the early days. She was determined that we would be successful in developing a rose garden. Her own home was painted a dark gray color with white trim, an idea she had to create a background for all her colorful roses.

Bill Scheufler was eventually able to arrange for the purchase of the property from the County of Riverside when it was on the delinquent tax roles.

Roy and I found a kitten at the garden. Actually, she found us one day as we worked there. She and her sibling had been abandoned. We enjoyed her for 18 years, with the appropriate name of Rosie.

Projects have included: medians on Rancho California Rd., Senior Center entry fence, Sam Hicks Park chapel garden, Boys & Girls Club front entry and City of Temecula patriotic garden. You might be noticing all the white roses planted all over town. Karen's influence with developers and the City brought this about. She recommended "Iceberg" as the perfect variety, giving lots of bloom and low maintenance.

More to come, as I recall it.

Grocery Cards Benefit TVRS

Rose Care FUNdamentals

If you want the fullest blooms possible, supply plenty of water to your plants, but don't flood them. For larger blooms apply greater amount of water when buds begin to swell and show color. But pay attention to the drainage of your soil-roses like plenty of water but they don't respond well to soggy soil. The optimum time to irrigate is early in the day.

Roses love food. Preferably good quality food on a regular basis. Not all fertilizers include all the micro/macro nutrients needed, so read the label on the packaging. Alternating the major fertilizer with fish emulsion every 2 weeks will help provide some of the micro nutrients. Continue fertilizing. As I always say, organics are much better for your soil and ultimately for your garden and the environment. Adding 1 cup of Epsom Salt (Magnesium of Sulfate) to large size plants, one-half cup for smaller plants, once in Spring and once in Fall can assist in getting new basal breaks (new canes from the bud union).

The soil needs a supply of organic material such as humus incorporated into the depths. That isn't easily accomplished in established gardens, however adding a 3–4 inches of a good composted mulch over the entire garden, leaving a 12" diameter circle open around base of each bush will go a long way to enriching your soil overall because earthworms help transport that mulch down into the soil where the microbiology is complex and multi-tiered. A healthy garden soil system is teeming with beneficial microbes that inhibit, compete with, and consume disease-causing organisms. This creates a sustainable soil "immune system." In fact, plants grown with organic fertilizers are themselves more resistant to pests and diseases. In addition, when you feed those beneficial organisms, they feed your roses. That's because they are busy breaking down organic matter and releasing mineral nutrients slowly and reliably. I've recently learned that extra phosphate in the fertilizer that you use is most important in assisting in creating a soil environment that aids immensely in helping plants to be resistant to pest and diseases. Also helping plants to develop hardier root systems and larger blooms.

Many gardeners become discouraged when they first experiment with organic treatments while still using chemical fertilizers. It is difficult-in fact, almost impossible, to have it both ways. Chemical fertilizers negatively impact the soil food web by poisoning entire portions of it. The fact is, chemical fertilizers are salts! What gardener hasn't seen what table salt does to a slug or snail? Salts absorb water and dehydrates the soil microbes which are the foundation of the soil nutrient system. Once you've used chemical fertilizers regularly you must keep adding more because the soil microbiology is weakened and unable to do its job of releasing naturally available nutrients to your plants. Rains help to leach accumulated soil salts from the soil, provided there is sufficient good drainage. Organic fertilizers and amendments (such as manure, compost, or mulch) break down slowly, generally staying where you put them, and don't contribute to ground water pollution (as long as you prevent run off into drains). In addition, they improve the soil food web, so in the long run you end up using less product.

Chemical fertilizers are artificial growth stimulants and, in the long run, harm your soil and pollute local waterways because as dissolved salts they quickly leach through the soil (becoming unavailable to your plants) and enter the ground water. How about swearing off chemical fertilizers for the rest of the year and starting to use organics? Give it a year. See if your roses don't reward you! Fish emulsion is also a good amendment to apply either foliarly or onto the soil around each bush.

It may be that you have had some blooms already. Keep spent blooms cut away. Cut the cane back to a outward facing bud at a 3-5 leaflet leaf for new growth. Air circulation is important to help prevent fungi diseases. The small spurs growing inside the bush can easily be finger prune to keep the center of the bush free of extraneous growth. Giving the bush an early morning shower to rinse off the leaves may help to avoid powdery mildew. Do this early enough that the leaves will dry prior to hot sun. It is possible that with night time dew a disease called botrytis can appear on the blooms, especially on blooms with 40 petals. Remove these as soon as disease is noticed. Even with great observations and preventive methods, fungi may become a problem and chemical treatment may be needed to keep disease at bay. Make sure to deep water. An extended slow watering is more beneficial than a frequently short application.

There are many opportunities in the next month or two to attend local rose shows and see, learn, smell different varieties. On April 26-27 Pacific Southwest District Rose Show and Convention held in L.A, Arboretum: May 4, San Diego Rose Society will hold their 92nd annual Rose Show, Ronald Reagan Community Center, El Cajon, CA.

For more ideas, visit TVRS' Rose Haven garden located at 30592 Jedediah Smith Rd. at the corner of Cabrillo Avenue and Jedediah Smith Rd., Temecula, as well as our web site at TemeculaValleyRoseSociety.org. Spread the joy of roses!

Thank You to Our Friends

This newsletter is web-published monthly for members. TVRS is a 501(c)(3) non-profit corpor­ation dedicated to the purpose of encouraging the appreci­ation, study, and culture of roses. Members are encouraged to join our affil­iate, the American Rose Society, at www.rose.org.

Our monthly Member meeting is held the 3rd Thursday of the month (excluding July and August) at 10:00 a.m. at the Ronald H. Roberts Public Library, Community Room B, 30600 Pauba Rd., Temecula.

Do not send any mail to Rose Haven Garden on Cabrillo Ave. There is no mail box there.

For more information about our sponsors go here.

For additional information please visit our web site at temeculavalleyrosesociety.org/