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How to Keep Roses Fresh

Posted on February 18th, 2009 by Marck
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Valentine’s Day has just come and gone, and you probably got a bouquet of fresh roses from that special someone in your life. Like all flowers, roses wilt eventually, but it’s such a shame for such beautiful flowers to wilt in a matter of days.

Unless you plan to dry rose petals and flowers, the best way to keep roses looking and smelling fresh is to keep them in a vase. When cut from the body of the plant, roses undergo a normal process of decay. There’s pretty much nothing you can do about wilting, but you can preserve the smell and color of fresh roses longer if you follow these steps:

Tools and Materials

To keep your roses fresh, you’ll need the following tools and materials:

  • A pair of very sharp scissors or shears
  • A vase
  • Clean water
  • Plant food (you can get these from a plant store or an orchidarium)

Steps

  1. Inspect the roses. Throw away any wilted, dead roses; all the care in the world will not bring them back to life. Throw away roses with trimmed thorns.

    2. roses

  2. Check the roses for any signs of disease like insects and fungi.
  3. Cut the rose diagonally at the base, depending on how long you want the stems to be. If you want to cut off the leaves and the stems, you should also cut them diagonally. A diagonal cut exposes more phloem (plant tissue that transports nutrients and water to the plant) to water, which makes the roses last longer.
  4. If your roses come with thorns, don’t cut them. Thorns are Nature’s way of helping roses hold in water and nutrients. Be careful not to prick or injure yourself from the thorns.
  5. Clean the vase, and fill it halfway with clean water.
  6. Follow the instructions on the packet of plant food. For most plant food packets, you simply mix it in with the water in the vase.
  7. Now is a good time to practice flower arrangements. You can arrange the roses in the vase in any way you want. Just make sure that all the stems are fully submerged in the water.

Depending in how old the roses are, you can keep roses looking and smelling fresh up to three weeks. If you really like the roses, you can plant the healthy cuttings on healthy soil, and watch them bloom. With these tips to keep roses fresh, roses don’t have to wilt and die days after you first received them as expressions of true love and affection.

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    Comments

    1. Smart Ideas said,

      on March 7th, 2009 at 4:43 pm

      In order to prolong the life of roses in a vase, make several cuts along the stem at the bottom, i.e. where the plant was cut off. The cuts should be about 1.5 centimeter (1/2 inch) long. Then gently crush (e.g. with a hammer) the stem where you have just cut it.

      See http://www.ideas-smart.com/node/21 for more information why this works.

      This can keep roses fresh for one more week and even longer.