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Similar principles apply in arranging a stand of bunches or vases, except that they will all be nearly the same size, and so colour becomes the main consideration. Added foliage in bunches counts as an extra stem.

Badly bruised or broken outer petals should be removed, leaving no fragments as evidence of their former presence. Detection of manipulation will lead to disqualification. It is advisable to leave their removal as late as possible before staging time, for the absence of one petal often allows another to fall back slowly, leaving a gap in the balanced contour of the bloom. Judges carefully examine the back of blooms as well as the fronts.

Before leaving any stand, remove all pellets and insects from blooms, clean any soiled foliage, arrange each flower to face slightly forward, especially those in the back row, and spray the whole stand lightly with water. Experienced exhibitors know well that spraying can make slightly stale blooms, especially white varieties, look fresh, and that it prolongs their life, but it should not be overdone.

All individual specimen blooms and bunches, bowls, vases or other arrangements of roses of one variety should be legibly named on small cards, usually provided by the organization holding the show. The writing should be done in pencil, for subsequent spraying, even of a nearby stand, causes ink to blur and become illegible. Lack of naming of exhibits greatly detracts from the interest and educative value of any show.

It may appear that some of the procedures advocated savour of trickery. All exhibitors, in all parts of the world, follow most of these practices. There is quite a lot to be said in favour of not wiring or covering blooms, or even showing roses at all; it leads to a tendency to pay too much attention to roses of the specimen-bloom type. These are the most perfectly formed flowers, but are not always the most beautiful. In bygone years there were many rose enthusiasts who could find no use for any rose, however beautiful, that did not help them on show day. The varieties that bloomed earlier or later than the usual show date were quite ignored, as were also roses lacking perfect form. There would have been no admiration from these people for such glorious creations as Mme Henri Guillot, Faience, Christopher Stone, and our Floribundas.

Our societies and our more recent shows have done much to break down this fetish. We may yet see other societies follow the lead of that in Western Australia and prohibit wiring and added foliage. Bunches, as staged in Melbourne, are wonderfully effective, and surpass in beauty anything that can be achieved in vases, as shown in Perth. These bunches and their arrangement are possible only with the help of wiring, but they tend to mislead the public. Before ordering any rose, the habits of which are unknown to him, every rose-grower should seek advice from his nurseryman or some other grower who knows the variety well.

Nurserymen who grow large numbers of roses have a tremendous advantage, as exhibitors, over amateurs in that they can cut many blooms from shoots from dormant buds, which are seldom equalled by blooms from established plants.