Grow a Wild Rose Garden!
Do you dream of ‘Cottage Rose Gardens’ filled with roses, foxgloves, salvias and other beautiful plants like Hollyhocks and those oh oh so sweet phloxes of Summer… All those lovely pinks, yellows & purples!
For 3 years, I’ve been planning a NATIVE COTTAGE ROSE GARDEN~ brimming with native roses and other beautiful native flowers. My Pinterest boards are filled with EPIC cottage gardens and gorgeous native roses & other plants!
After lots of hard work, 2023 is when this garden happens becomes a reality friends!
I’ve cultivated native roses and other native perennials with lots of tender loving care. This Spring I’ll be planting my Wild Rose Garden AND sharing a few with YOU!
Meet a Wild Rose…
Carolina Roses are the star of this special garden. So let’s chat about her a bit…
Native to New York this beautiful shrub rose wants very little fuss once established. She’s like that buddy who comes over for tea but is happiest with a mug and not the fine china!
She wants to bask in a full 6-8 hours of sunshine. She is STAR after all!
Her pedestal is a little mound of soil with a bit of compost and a few weeks of loving care to get settled in to her kingdom.
Unlike her hybrid cousins… Carolina Roses are WILD.
As such she is somewhat independent. She doesn’t want a fancy updo like her cousins either, after all she is a WILD ROSE. If anything Carolina Rose only wants her ‘bangs trimmed’ (very lite pruning) in late Winter to very early Spring.
Carolina Rose doesn’t need fancy cocktail fertilizers to thrive except perhaps a wee comfrey cocktail just after flowering. Hey flowering is hard work so she will have earned a little comfrey cocktail!
Once settled in she’ll be drought tolerant but appreciative for a little drink of water at her roots every so often in hot dry weather. She prefers her cuppa in the morning too!
TIP: not a fact but I think Carolina Roses grow more HAPPY when you sing Sweet Caroline to them…
There is nothing quite like the beauty and fragrance of native roses…
Wild Roses love company…
specifically other native plants with similar drought tolerance and low maintenance. Some native species for color and texture are Foxglove Penstemon, Little Bluestem, Wine Cups and Meadow Phlox give support and romance to a native rose garden.
Any rose garden also needs a bit of lace and columns amongst the layers. Anise Hyssop, Liatris, Bradbury’s Monarda, Common Yarrow, and Mountain Mint lend Carolina Roses soft purples and whites while also giving ‘fluff’ and height to the rose garden.
But every cottage rose garden needs a dash of whimsy too!
To bring the fun and BUTTERFLIES, native species that are pollinator magnets join Carolina Rose in the garden. Purple Coneflowers, Rudbeckia Triloba, Wild Bergamot, a dash of Salmon Rose Zinnias and Aromatic Asters will feed and shelter pollinators all through the growing seasons.
** remember to leave your garden ‘messy’ so pollinators can have shelter over the cold Winter months!**
Right plants ~ right place.
It’s taken me over a year to design my Wild Rose Garden. Carolina Roses like medium to dry soil and LOTS of sunshine in a spot that gets good air flow.
Many of my favorite native plants for cottage gardens also enjoy those same conditions. This made choosing specific plants very difficult simply because I wanted ALL of them!
Looking at plant spacing based on mature size of the native plants helped tremendously! For instance, my goal was to only fill a 20 x 20 space. This meant that my selection of Common Milkweed had to go ! These lovely pollinator host plants can grow over 4’ and can be somewhat aggressive over time. Instead I chose to add New Jersey Tea, a low 3-4' high shrub covered in fragrant white blooms June thru July when Carolina Rose is also in bloom.
Wild Rose Garden Dreams
finally come true this Spring! Last Fall, I overwintered all the Carolina Roses and other natives for planting out this Spring.
Originally, my garden would have been planted in September but life got busy. Instead these lovely plants have gotten pampered indoors and protected from Winter’s bitter cold, wasn’t the 2 days of -30 degrees in February something else!
Wild Rose Gardens can be small or grand so I’ve planned 2 size gardens:
Pocket Wild Rose Garden has 1 Carolina Rose as the ‘Queen of the Garden’ and 13 companion native plants for up to a 100sqft garden.
The Grand Wild Rose Garden is DOUBLE the fun with 2 Carolina Roses and 30 companion native plants for her entourage for up larger gardens.
Here’s what I LOVE about this Wild Rose Garden..
#1. Fragrance & Beauty in flowers, textures & all those amazing pollinators and the birds they bring into my gardens.
#2 EASY to GROW! The plants in this rose garden are drought tolerant & low maintenance! After all we want to WATCH our garden grow not be sweating over it every. single. day. Right?
#3 Carolina Roses~ oh friends these roses are stunning! Their simple and classic colors from pink & butter yellow blooms to their gorgeous green foliage. Their light sweet glorious scent. just makes ya swoon!
Did I mention they only need a little comfrey tea after blooming & a slight trim in late Winter— NO chopping them down & NO pesticides/fungicides needed… PRETTY & LOW MAINTENANCE… hmm that’s the rose for me!
Last but not least…
#4 VIBRANT COLORS… this Wild Rose Garden is going to be an endless show of colors from sweet pinks to bright yellows to rich purples from Spring until Fall!
In the Winter the textures of a Wild Rose Garden will look so ethereal covered in snow. PLUS their seed heads will feed the birds and stalks for pollinators to overwinter (and feed the birds).
Lucky for YOU…
I successful grew EXTRA CAROLINA ROSES and native companion plants so YOU can have an easy NATIVE ROSE GARDEN too!
There’s only 5 Wild Rose Gardens available for this year due to limited supply. I’m starting small but mighty; ya gotta start somewhere right?
Anyhow— I’m taking pre-orders NOW thru March 1st while they and my other Pollinator Gardens are in stock.
Each Wild Rose Garden
comes with a lovely Garden Journal for taking garden notes and documenting all pollinator visitors that visit your Wild Rose Garden!
AND you’ll get an exclusive VIP FLOWER CARD for 10% off any plant purchases in 2023! This fun card is only offered with the purchase of any of our Pollinator Gardens and can be used for our Fall Blooms Plant CSA.
I hope you’ll join me in creating a beautiful Wild Rose Garden for your home this year. If you have questions about this beautiful & creative garden just send me a note HERE
Cheers to YOU & your garden dreams!
