How much of a pain are roses

[Anonymous]

I will be having someone come to remove some overgrown shrubs at my new house.
While they are here, I am wondering if it might also make sense to have them remove all of the rose bushes.
All I can think about is all of the beetles. I don’t want to deal with it.
Am I making too big a deal about it?
Generally I only want things in my garden that are low maintenance and don’t require chemicals or special treatment.

[Anonymous]

There are some roses that will do reasonably
well in the DMV area. There was a nice thread about no-spray roses in the Antique Roses forum in the late Gardenweb with excellent suggestions from folks In Kensington and Rockville. My neighborhood has several homes with old roses that do beautifully without chemicals.
Others will have to be sprayed. The Japanese beetles don’t bother me but I hate dealing with black spot. If you are new to your garden you can prune the roses and see how they do before you decide to remove them.

[Anonymous]

I have roses and I don’t spray them with anything and I don’t have beetles. (The kind I have are climbing roses, New Dawn and Eden.) If you like roses you could leave them and see what they do, and take them out if they don’t thrive without fussing. I am a passionate gardener, but nothing in my garden gets sprayed or pampered. Thrive on the conditions in my garden as they exist or you are out - lots of other plants that would happy in that spot!