Roses and permaculture?

you don't have to grind the rose hips to powder to use them in tea. put them in whole and steep longer.

My skin was feeling irritated from our first bout with the summer sun and hot days. So, I decided to try making rose water. Hands on time was about two minutes, waiting time about 25 minutes. It made a lovely, free facial wash and immediately calmed my skin down. I'll be repeating that all summer long.

great idea. I've got so many roses right now, that I have been giving some to the goats (they love them)... just the ones that the petals are about to drop anyway. It should take no time at all to gather plenty, and my skin can always use help. thanks for posting

An addendum to the rose water, you may apply a little as a final rinse for lasting fragrance to your hair.
Rose water lemonade. Seriously. Try it.

Make rose extract same as you would vanilla extract with bourbon or vodka. Rose shortbread cookies are so divine!

You can put rose petals in honey and the honey takes on the flavor of roses, but moisture also goes into the honey. Therefore it may no longer prevent things from growing in it. Once you have the rose infused but more watery honey, reduce the moisture, refrigerate it or freeze it or something. It is wonderful, and worth the bother, but I just don't count on it being nonperishable as proper honey is.

You can also layer rose petals in what ever kind of sugar you use, and it will flavor the sugar.

Susan Lenore Stanley wrote:Roses "clone" or grow their own roots too, very well...  Free and beneficial :--)

Oh so true.  I have species rose (rugosa) growing all over my homestead, almost all the result of root suckers taken from only a couple of original purchased transplants.  Why?  Because why not?!  They're free and seem to thrive here (although after five years some of my original, once vigorous bushes are severely dying back - don't know what to think about that).

Matthew Nistico wrote:Previous posts have already highlighted the many benefits and uses of roses: nutritious hips and edible petals, potential use in growing a thorny hedge/fence, trap crop for aphids, bee fodder, ornamental value (which I agree with previous posters: permies should never undervalue beauty in our systems!).  I have also found my wild species roses are a great trap crop for Japanese beetles, if you have those in your area.

Like many here, I grow rugosa rose and have found it to be tough as nails.  It's propensity to root sucker is both annoying and useful: requiring frequent attention if I don't wish my bushes to turn themselves into thickets, but also providing an endless supply of easily transplantable new roses.  But, I don't know how much the hybrid tea roses the OP inherited with her land will follow this same pattern.  I will also note that I was skeptical at first how well they might do in my heavy clay soil, since rugosa famously enjoys sandy places (I've read it is known to colonize beach dunes).  They go crazy here!  I think the take home lesson is that if you want a surefire, rapidly growing, rapidly spreading, and early producing species to jump start a bare patch on your property, wild roses are a good bet.

So, the question remains: should you maintain your hybrid roses or replace them with other species, including possibly wilder rose species?  I would say give it time and let the roses tell you what to do with them.  Give them no chemical care or overmuch attention and see how they respond after a year or two.  If they continue to thrive, then you have learnt something about them, and you have enjoyed some free visual appeal to your otherwise empty lot while it is in its early establishment phase.  As the rest of your systems mature, you will see how these roses fit into your growing landscape: whether their size and position are convenient for you or not.  You might then chose later to replace them with some even more hardy and productive wild rose species if you found they were in a good spot.  If they don't survive the neglect, then your decision has been made for you.

UPDATE: Not long after I wrote this post, my own various rugosa rose thickets began to die back.  And this, as I'd originally pointed out, after 4-5 initial years of rampant, seemingly unstoppable growth.  The first year of trouble was a drought summer, so that might have had something to do with it.  But then in subsequent years they continued to decline.  And in all areas of my property at once.  Now I have only a few straggling suckers left.

So far I have not attempted to replant them.  Given that people say rugosa are incompatible with my soil type, I took their eventual die off as a sign that they shouldn't exist on my property.  I might relent and give them another try one day, but only if I don't come up with something else to attempt in those spaces first.  One of the two bigger spaces I've already used to start a pineapple guava.

Fragrant, edible, medicinal, climbing roses on trellises make shaded spaces for outdoor living, an over story for microclimate below and wind breaks.

providing habitat for other species, (food shade and shelter ).  In some instances living fences.

Photosynthsizing, like all green plants, sequestering carbon, and feeding soil microorganisms.

I bet you could use the long canes of climbing roses eg lady banksia for any number of projects 😊

I planted a small wild rose bush (Dog rose, started as a seedling in my back yard) next to the garden shed at the allotment garden. It's still small, but hopefully it will start growing and having flowers this year. I love those small whiteish roses. Those bushes grow somewhat like a climber, it might become a 'cover' for the side of the shed. In my imagination it makes a romantic picture ...
When there's something to show I'll put a photo here. Or it will appear in one of my garden videos ...

Wild roses next to the hose where I wash buckets after putting food scraps into the compost. I save the rose hips for tea. Two almond trees are nearby. This is in the oak woods of the San Diego, CA back country.

Garden roses, especially the older varieties, are descended primarily from Persian garden and wild varieties. When I realized this, it explained a lot about their needs, strengths, and the problems that I kept reading about,  but never experienced.

Persia, modern-day Iran, has a summer-dry climate like the US west coast, the Mediterranean, and South Africa. Roses are easy in this type of climate. They are extremely deep-rooted, are resistant to winter flooding and to summer drought. Like native oaks, their main problems with disease come when subjected to moist air and over-wet soil during warm weather. Their natural pattern is to bloom is spring when there is still moisture in the soil, and perhaps in fall with the rains. In the wild, most roses are understory plants that throw up canes to climb up trees and other plants for support.

Modern types will bloom all summer given irrigation--this trait derives from Chinese roses that reached Europe in the 18th century and were crossed with existing garden types. Before that, ever-blooming roses were unknown. Like most temperate-climate perennials, they produced one huge flowering and then went on to other phases of growth, like fruiting or dormancy. Modern hybrid-tea and floribunda roses, the most widely marketed types, are products of this extremely varied genetic mix. This means that their disease-resistance and behavior can vary a lot. They are typically grafted onto another, less showy but stronger, variety (rootstock) which is vigorous and disease-resistant. I have found that the rootstock is usually more like older wild roses, in that it is very deep-rooted, hardy, durable, and once-blooming.

All of the above adds up to some takeaways you won't find in books:
-Even ever-blooming modern varieties often have roots that are quite close to the wild types, selected for vigor and disease-resistance.  
-You don't need to manage roses for maximum flower production--They can often be happy, trouble-free shrubs with few inputs.
-You will read they need an inch of water a week. They do, for continuous bloom. But even in my hot climate, mine survive on one deep watering a month.
-In places with hot dry summers, they do best with afternoon shade. I grow them most successfully on the east wall of the house where they get morning sun. Climbing types with long canes can climb trees to gorgeous effect and provide a wonderful habitat for birds and pollinators, and overwintering beneficials in the process.
-Planted against a house, shed, or even by a patio, those deep vigorous roots will search out the nutrients and water under structures. They love a cool covered area to root into.
-You don't have to do the hard pruning some books recommend--it makes them look awful in the garden and produce too much sappy growth that draws aphids.
-The top, grafted-on variety could come from any part of an extremely varied and wide genetic pool. Some thrive with neglect, others are high-maintenance weaklings selected for their flowers alone. Wait and see what they do in your situation, with your cultural regime.
-Roses can be a long-lived anchor plant for a guild that includes smaller shrubs and herbaceous perennials, and may in hot climates also include deciduous trees. A redbud would be a possibility for a nitrogen-fixing small tree. Fruit and nut trees may be suitable if there's access for harvest. A mountain ash for bird habitat would be handsome and not require harvest, as the birds would be harvesting.

In older and neglected gardens, what you often find is are a mixed bag of modern but older varieties. I once moved into a 1960's mobile home in a trailer park. There were some roses, mostly typical 1950's and 60's products--Double Delight, Chrysler Imperial, etc. But amongst them was a classic Gallica rose from 1829 called Belle de Crecy. It was kind of like finding truffles at the local 7-11.  I have no idea how it got there.

Many edible flowers and medicinal herbs do best if they are in a sheltered situation with perhaps some shade. So do many perennial vegetables. Roses' deep roots mean that they
can go deep to find nutrients and water, and don't mind a carpet of other shallower-rooted plants at their feet, Wormwood, poisonous to many other plants, doesn't bother roses. But it does bother gophers. A rose-and-wormwood border can be a great barrier. Roses are even able to stand up to an understory of mint.
Other highly-useful plants that I would suggest under roses include most perennial vegetables from temperate climates like sorrel, lovage, miner's lettuce, alexanders, perpetual spinach, chives, etc.  https://www.quailseeds.com/store/c11/Perennial_Vegetable_Seeds.html


Unlike our culinary herbs that like an open, dry, limey condition, many if not most medicinals prefer a richer, moister situation with light shade. Roses can shelter many of these supremely well, and many are decorative too.
wood betony, skullcap, bleeding heart (the creeping native aka turkey corn, not the large garden type) angelica, self-heal, plantain, anise hyssop, bergamot, lemon balm, meadowsweet, spilanthes, yarrow, and arnica all would enjoy the semi-shade and good soil that roses both enjoy and create. I have seen both sage and thyme do well there as well, if there is enough sun coming in.

Edible flowers that do well under roses include nasturtiums, calendulas, daylilies (NOT true lilies), violets, pansies, alyssum, campanula, pinks, sweet william, love-in-a-mist, as well as wood betony, skullcap, yarrow, arnica, self-heal, bleeding heart, and anise hyssop which are also medicinal. The little white bells of garlic chives are exquisite, as well as being a wonderful perennial vegetable which thrives under the part shade of a rosebush.  I would not remove a rose, or any mature woody plant until it has proved to be a liability, or you have found a replacement you are sure is better.

Hey Tara, many years late to reply, not sure if you still have the roses, but they could also act as a natural fence to keep critters and people out of your garden. I started putting my thorn-ier plants on the edges so less in the way and I like to think it helps keep a natural fence line. Best of luck! And congrats. Also thanks for the thread, I found it very useful.  

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