Question
My friend asked me to prune back her old rose bushes. The question that I have is that the bushes have been neglected and are running rampant. How would I prune them. She would like to prune them now. I live in Southern California. We do no get very cold winters here. Would that make a difference on if I can cut them now. Thank you for your advice.

Answer
Because you didn't say what type of roses your friend has, I am assuming that they will be hybrid teas as hybrid teas are the classification that are most grown. If they are other types then there is a general rule of pruning for most roses. I would be careful abut cutting the rose bushes down too hard as the shock could kill them even in your warm winter. Every gardener and even professional rosarians, all have their way of pruning roses. However, the basic rule for pruning a rose bush is to first cut the whole bush down by a third. Or if you want cut them back to about 4 feet tall. Then cut out any cane that is thinner than a pencil. Also all dead canes and any canes that have been damaged or look like they have a disease which will show up as brown on the canes. Simply cut below the brown marks. What you want to do is save the new growth and take out the old growth. The old growth has a brownish grey colour to it and the new is a spring green shade. Because I have hundreds of roses, I use an electric reciprocating saw to neatly take out the base of the old growth. Trying to get a pair of loopers down at the base usually ends up damaging the new growth. But you can just use a little tree saw. If the rose has mainly thin canes, you leave more than if he had thick ones. You can tell by looking at the rose bush when you are at that stage, if the thin canes are too crowded and so take a few out. With the thick canes, leaves at least five good ones. I must warn you that instructing a person in pruning roses that have got away on you, isn't easy because when you prune a rose you may have to do it differently than another one. Go on the easy side and then next year see how they respond and you can always cut more out but you can't glue the canes back on. Write again if you need more help.