Have I just been nurturing a runner?!

Hi everyone. This is my first post here and I’m looking for some advice please. I would describe myself as a completely novice gardener!
Back in 2010 I was given the pink rose “Lucky” as a house warming present. I planted it in my new garden and was really pleased with how fast it grew… however I’m now trying to educate myself about pruning and in the course of my “google research” am wondering whether all the healthy growth that I have been so proudly nurturing is actually just a runner and that the “actual” rose is the straggly little bit at the base on the right of the photos below?

 

Its possible, it could be a sucker.

Have you had any flowers on the big part?

 

Ah yes, sucker was the word I meant.
The big part gets loads of flowers, more than the small part.

 

Got any pictures of the flowers and are they different on one part to the other?

 

I'd chop it all down to within six inches of the ground and see what comes this summer.
Seemingly they say it is best to get your worst enemy to prune your roses.

 

From memory the flowers are very similar, if not the same. Possibly slightly smaller but more plentiful and closer together on the big side.
I’ll see if I can find some photos. It might take a while…

 

The small shoot had flowers last year by the look of it. If it is a sucker the flowers would have been 'wild roses' as opposed to the rose variety. Also the leaves on a sucker have more light green leaflets than the budded variety which have darker green thicker leaflets(usually 5 or so)

 

Welcome Curlylocks.

Lucky! (the exclamation mark is part of it's name) is a floribunda rose shrub which should have dense foliage and a mass of perfumed, lilac pink blooms throughout the flowering season. I had one amongst the roses in my last garden....





It's the only rose I've had that was completely disease free.

Sorry, but I'm not sure your rose is Lucky! at the moment as it looks rather sparse. Below is a diagram of how shrub roses should be pruned - I hope it helps.



Point 4 can be ignored, there is no need to remove remaining leaves from the previous season.

I would prune yours down to halfway and see if it puts on new lower growth this year. Any lower and it may not re-shoot from the older stems. Clear all weeds and debris away from the base then feed it. If you have any compost it would benefit from that too.

Is the rose in shade all day? They prefer six hours sun and three as a minimum during the growing season - when it shines of course.