pruning help

I am helping my church. No big deal, we are going to completely rebuild some day. However until that day I was asked if I could prune, spruce up, the front shrubs.

I don't know how much I should prune these rose bush shrubs? Just make them like a hedge? Or what? Located in mild climate San Francisco Bay area.

 

There are numerous books and websites that discuss pruning of roses. The hard part for you will be determining what you want to do. Pruning for maximum blooms might be more work than you want but you can simply prune to the shape you want. The good news is most shrub roses like that are very tough so you don't have to worry about killing them.

You can whack the exterior to whatever shape you want if you're looking for more of a hedge. It's not the best but it's quick and easy. If you want to promote healthy growth and more blooms you'll want to remove about a third or quarter of the old growth which means getting in there and loosing some blood.

 

Around here you would whack them back about halfway. Then in the spring you have to remove anything that has died back. But our winters are pretty hard on them.

 

Thanks, I have already "lost some blood". I tried to "Google" this but wasn't very successful. I wasn't sure what I was dealing with and wasn't sure what "question" to put in the search box.

I will just hack away they can't fire me, and they certainly aren't paying me enough