Well! I been and gone and done it!
Inspired by Higgs, I decided to do something about a problem I've been pondering on for months - well, since the beginning of last summer really.
A couple of my roses are just downright pathetic. Not the least bit vigorous and downright surly to be honest.
They are also in the patch of filthy creeping clover that I mentioned sometime back and asked if it could be killed by the application of MCPA without damaging the roses.
Fired up with Higgs resolve, I got out there and started work on one of them. Using my small hand fork, I've very carefully dug up every tiny bit of clover I could find and every bit of blasted violet I could find anywhere within Coo-ee of this particular rose.
Once I did that, I gave it a a good feed of both well matured chook poop, some sheep poop that is so good a keen gardener could eat it for dinner (about 2 litres of each) some compost full of both manure worms and earth worms, a litre of pulverised fire charcoal and then topped that lot off with some well rotted meadow hay and a topping of oaten hay as a mulch. I then gave it a watering can full of weak seaweed solution and planted a pansy beside ti so I can identify which one of these has been treated.
Please keep your fingers crossed that this works and send my poor rose some positive thought for healthy new growth.