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Monday through Saturday 9-6
Sundays 10-5

Roses must be pruned every year to maintain vigorous growth and to keep them flowering well. The best time to prune is while they are dormant.

Steps in pruning your roses:

• Think about each cut before you make it. All cuts should be at an angle and just above a bud that is facing away from the center of the bush.
• Remove dead branches and canes.
• Remove old canes that produce only twiggy growth. If your bush is old and has only these old canes, save three or four and cut those back to 3 feet.
• The height to cut your canes back depends on the type of flowers you want. If you want the long stems for cutting, cut your canes back to 3 feet. If you want profuse flowers, but you're not concerned about stem length, cut the canes back one third.
• Remove all branches that are thinner than a pencil.
• Pull off all remaining leaves, rake up all debris, and put it in the trash. Do not use this for your compost pile, as there may be overwintering insects and/or diseases.
• Spray the pruned bush with dormant oil spray.

By Tamara Galbraith

One of the three roses honored as AARS winners for 2007 has a familiar name and look, and just like her parents, she's a real knock-out.

Featuring even more heavy flower production and disease resistance than previous Knock Out Rose hybrids, 'Rainbow Knock Out' is a bushy and compact landscape shrub rose with short stems bearing glossy, dark green leaves. The delicate five-petaled flowers, two inches in diameter, are a deep coral-pink color with a yellow center finishing nicely to light coral. The blooms are single-form flowers that start out as pointed buds and appear abundantly throughout the growing season...even year-round in milder climates.

'Rainbow Knock Out' does not boast a strong fragrance, but the petals do emit a delicate sweet scent. Its smaller size makes it suitable for container growing in small spaces in nearly any part of the country. This sturdy, reliable rose is hardy to zone 4 (with some protection) and is fully resistant to black spot, mildew and rust.

Gardeners looking for a foolproof, compact rose will do a double take over this new beauty, and shouldn't have any reason to look elsewhere.

Here's a weekly tip to help you live a greener lifestyle!
Our earth is worth it!

*In this new weekly feature, we will explore the little things we can do in our daily lives to help, rather than harm the environment.
Join us, as we journey to "Live Green."

Kitchen Composting

*Studies have shown that home composting of food wastes can cut curbside waste by 30 percent!

Composting your kitchen scraps prevents serious environmental pollution and expense while creating FREE fertilizer for your garden.

Kitchen composting is practically the easiest thing you can do. Find a good place for a pile in a part of your yard that is hidden from your view, (and your neighbors'), and dump everything there.

Compost is made up of three things:

1. Carbon: dry leaves, chipped wood, sticks, straw, paper
2. Nitrogen: grass clippings, weeds, garden trimmings, kitchen scraps
3. Soil: the soils on plant roots such as weeds and spent plants are usually enough to bring the microbes needed to break down other materials and form compost.

Things you shouldn’t put on your pile:

1. Meats or animal products
2. Grain/bread, oils/fats (they attract rodents)
3. Anything toxic or non-degradable
4. Dog or cat waste
5. Weeds with seeds, or strong root systems
6. Plants/leaves infected with disease.

There is not really much else to it. Once you start your pile, all you will need to do is wait for some time to pass and then dig out the stuff on the bottom of the pile.

You will find that it has been miraculously turned into beautiful black compost. Spread it generously on your garden!