My neighbor insisted I prune my roses in July and now half of them are dead

So this older guy named Frank who lives three houses down kept telling me to cut back my climbing roses in the middle of summer because it would 'force more blooms.' I was skeptical but he seemed to know what he was talking about, grew up on a farm in Iowa or something. I went ahead and did it last July 15th and now four out of my six bushes are completely brown and lifeless. Has anyone else gotten bad pruning advice from a well-meaning neighbor that wrecked their garden?

2 comments

2 Comments

umamartin1mo ago

My buddy Steve fell for the same thing from his neighbor Larry. Larry told him to prune his azaleas in August because they'd 'come back twice as thick.' Steve lost about half of them and the rest looked terrible for two seasons. Turns out Larry's a great mechanic but terrible with plants. I've learned to check pruning advice against a reliable source before taking snips to anything.

paigep201mo ago

Did your buddy ever find out why Larry was so confident about that? My friend Jenny had a similar thing with her neighbor Mike who swore by planting tomatoes in the same spot every year. He said his grandpa did it for decades and always got a great harvest. Jenny tried it and ended up with diseased plants two years in a row. Turns out Mike's grandpa lived in a different state with totally different soil and climate. Now she rotates everything like clockwork.