Question
I just bought a beautiful rose bush (gene boener) at walmart and it is loaded with buds (one already blooming) and I would like to cut the flowers sometimes to enjoy in a vase on my table, that was one of the reasons for picking this plant as it has 3 buds to a stem, but I can not ever get a answer on how to cut them to enjoy them. Everyone says that you have to count the leaves where you cut and cut them on an angle, I have done that with other bushes and have had the worst looking rose bushes ever, the grow straight up with a bloom on the top. How can I enjoy the blooms without destroying my beautiful plant and how and when do I prune it for the season so it continues to grow and fill out? These roses are beautiful and at the center of my flower bed I am creating and I am really wanting to finally grow a beautiful Rose bush and add more with some success. I would appreciate so much to finally learn how many leaves to count before cutting and finally get the correct answer on how to prune it for the next season. Any information you can offer on this type of Rose I would be grateful for. By the way we just moved to eastern Kentucky from Florida so I have a whole new type of soil (clay instead of sand) and a totally new climate to adjust to, it is beautiful here. Thank You

Answer
When you read about how to cut roses to bring indoors, they are usually talking about the hybrid teas as these roses grow their blooms on long canes. The idea of cutting back to five leaflets has been  dismissed as not necessary. You cut the flower off and another side cane will grow and then produce another flower. Gene Boerner is a floribunda and they don't have nice tall stems with flowers on the ends. A floribunda usually blooms in bunches on the ends of their canes. So you get quite a few flowers but not long stems. This does make it awkward to cut, as you end up having to cut the whole candelabra type end off.  But more grown will come an there will be more blooms. All I can advise you is to try and cut right below the many flowers and this will keep the bush looking tidy. Gene Boerner has good disease resistance and also is a tall rose and can grow to about 5 feet. It really doesn't need hard pruning. Each spring just cut the rose back by about 8 inches and remove any dead or diseased canes. Spring a handful of any type of rose fertilizer all around the base and water the bush. You made a good choice