I don't know about you, but roses intimidate me a little. I can never quite understand their pruning requirements and feeding schedules. Their thorny limbs, moreover, do not welcome casual investigative bumbling. And when I seek help from books I find neat, two-dimensional diagrams of well-behaved branches that look nothing like the confused and angry briars that live in my garden.
Here, each stem has a wilful way of going off on some mission of its own, especially if it belongs to a climbing or rambling rose ("rambling" seems far too benign a word for the determined expeditioning of this type of rose). When you attempt to interrupt its journey with secateurs, or redirect it with stout twine, the living barbed wire grabs you by the hair, slashes your arm, or attaches itself to the inside of your leg.
But such irascibility is forgotten when roses bloom. When the hard buds enlarge and open into clusters of romance-laden, sensual, scented petals, all is forgiven.
Someone who knows all about these prickly, bad-tempered prima donnas is John Slattery of Slattery's Rose Nursery in Cahir, Co Tipperary, the oldest such concern in the country. "They need attention," he says. "Roses are not like bedding plants or other short-lived things. They are going to be with you for the next 20, 30, 40 - or even 50 years, depending on how well they are looked after."
"You don't plant roses in hungry ground. Make sure that you have a good depth of good fertile soil. Roses are deep-rooted and like to have room for their roots to travel down and expand," he explains. "If they are in shallow ground there is a tendency for them to get diseases."
Find the right place in the garden, he recommends, "which is in plenty of sun. And spend a bit of time making the bed." Dig down half a metre, or more, "and if you can get your hands on some humus, like well-rotted farmyard manure, or stuff from your organic compost heap, dig it in."
As for pruning, he makes it all sound so simple - but so he would, being intimately acquainted with the vagaries of the 450 different roses that he grows. "Pruning of climbers consists of training and cutting out dead wood and branches that are going somewhere they're not supposed to go. You try and fan them out across the wall and train them," which is a lot easier said than done.
Hybrid teas and floribundas - those staples of the rose garden - are thus: "In mid-February, cut out any dead wood and twiggy growth that is going across the centre. If the plant has 10 or 12 stems, reduce it back to about seven or eight healthy stems, cutting just above an eye. Prune back to at least half their height."
A post-pruning feed with proprietary rose fertiliser and well-rotted manure will set them up nicely, he adds, followed by another feed at the end of April, and a final one in early summer. He also suggests a rough pruning of the heavy tops in late autumn - with a hedge-clippers, if you like - to stop the bushes from rocking in the winter wind.
If you're in any doubt, says John, "speak to someone who knows what they're talking about, like a rose grower." And it just happens that this weekend there is a posy of rose growers and experts (including John Slattery) at a two-day Millennium Rose Festival. The venue is St Anne's Park in Raheny, in Dublin, where Dublin Corporation's Parks Division cultivates over 10 acres of the fragrant flower. It is the largest rose garden in Europe, with more than 160 different kinds rambling, scrambling, sprawling and spreading across its good, free-draining soil. International rose trials also take place here: new varieties from all over the world are grown and judged for qualities such as beauty of form, freedom from disease, general vigour and fragrance.
The Rose Festival kicks off at 9 a.m. today, with the judging by a panel of international experts - that can be watched from a respectful distance - and further events happen over the weekend. This afternoon, at 3 p.m., for instance, American rosarian Helene Pizzi and Colin Horner, president of the Royal National Rose Society, speak on roses. Afterwards, Carlow rose-breeder David Kenny chairs a discussion, offering a rare opportunity to thrash out the thorny subject with the experts.
Meanwhile, the Royal Horticultural Society of Ireland fills a pavilion with a "Floral Extravaganza" where the best growers of roses, sweet peas and other plants compete for prizes in 37 classes. Further marquees host displays by the National Botanic Gardens (entitled "Plants through the Millennia"), the Irish Fuchsia Society, the Tree Council of Ireland and other plant groups.
Trade stands include those selling roses (of course), border perennials, fuchsia and other garden favourites. And, if that's not enough to keep the gardening public happy, there are tours of the St Anne's rose gardens, woodland and herbaceous border each afternoon. Tomorrow is "family day", with a Gerry Daly clinic at 3 p.m., a "Choose Your Rose" competition, face-painting, magicians and general high jinks. If you've ever dabbled in roses - and few of us haven't - this is the place for you.
Dublin Corporation Millennium Rose Festival, St Anne's Park, Raheny. Today: 9 a.m.-6 p.m., tomorrow: 1 p.m.-6 p.m. Free admission and car-parking. Jane Powers can be contacted at: jpowers@irish-times.ie
