New to looking after roses - climbing iceberg rose question

Hi all,

I've just joined this forum after looking for some advice on looking after the many roses in the garden of our new house that we moved in to in April.

The previous owners obviously had a keen interest in roses as I've discovered many rose plants dotted in both the front and back gardens but it's a climbing rose that I'm most in need of help with. From research i think the rose is an iceberg variety and it looks like it was starting to be trained to go over the front door.

It has grown well this Spring but there is only one bud at the very top of the plant at the moment. There are plenty of offshoots that look like they were meant to have a bud but nothing is coming of them.

I've ordered some rose feed which is arriving today but apart from that i've read mixed advice about cutting down new growth. I'd really like to get the plant in to a better and neater state to try and train it over the door as originally intended.

Please see attached photos of plant (our house name plate is blocked out) - one is from when it was blooming last October and the other is of the whole plant at the moment.

Many thanks for any help you can give me

 

Welcome to the forum!

 

Thanks so much @wiseowl! That's really useful. I'm afraid I don't know too much about the age of the plant and soil type but I can tell that it's been cared for previously and has had other attempts at training it over the doorway.
I think what I will do is lay some fertiliser on the soil and begin to train the stems to be more horizontal and accept that I might not get the desired results this season. Now I'm armed with more knowledge hopefully I will be able to grow something beautiful in future years.

Thanks again for your advice!