Flo once gave me great tip, but I've forgotten it

something about telling whether it's a rose or a sucker by whether it has 5 or 7 leaves.
Chopped down lots of ancient roses last autumn.....now I need to know which (if any) of the new growth is likely to produce blooms this year.

anyone?

Dunno that tip

But suckers generally come from below the levell of the soil - if you can get in close enough, you should be able to see where the top bit was grafted onto the rootstock, anything below the graft is a sucker

they are bright green anorl or red and fresh and soft rather than hard like rose stems usually are. You can trace em back and then pull em out by hand (need a good yank though)

Don't we all. Where's Colt when yer need im

Ahem, back to roses. If they're ancient rather than modern hybrids they might be a bit shy to flower. Some only flower once during the year. You'll have to wait and see

My mum always told me the 7 leaved ones are suckers Tara and like t'others say, to look for the graft (only on my gt-grandmother's roses, which are rooted stems from the original plant, there's obviously no graft, so I rely on the 5 or 7 leaf thing). Seems ok so far

I just thought roses was roses like, and I do like roses but only really want natives in my garden. I have discovered a dog rose and a holly tree on my plot where I cleared damson suckers and am well chuffed.

Sounds great Tara I don't know about suckers, but there's a huge established rose bush in my garden and that definitly has 5 leaves