on some of my rosess I have I think what you call them are sucker stems am I right by saying I should clip them off my dad always told me so lol

I believe you are supposed to tear, not cut them off the parent plant below the level of the rootstock graft (which often means below the level of the soil.) I am sure someone on here will know and put me right if this is an old wives' tale!

Hello and welcome to GOY Andy

My Dad always grow roses and he cut them out right below the soil and he had excellent roses .

But not sure if it was the correct way.

But yes there will be someone here that can tell you the right way.

The trickiest thing is deciding whether they're actually suckers or not, but there are a couple of useful pointers, the main one being, if it's growing from below the graft point, its definitely a sucker. If its coming from below ground, clear away a little soil to see if its below the graft point (the knobbly bit at the bottom). If its above the graft, its just new growth. Other signs are they tend to grow faster, straighter, have more thorns, are a lighter green and often more pairs of leaflets than the original rose - but these things are harder to pinpoint in, say, climbing roses, and the differences are only obvious in some roses. Advice is to 'wrench' them off by hand, by twisting them, but it's often not possible to successfully detach them, depending on their thickness, using this method, which means you may have to cut them off -but always as close as possible to their point of origin.

Wrenching them off usually works best when they are young and soft. Trying it with an old, woody one is likely to do serious damage to the base of the bush, and/or your back! To deal with an old one, I would cut it as close to its origin as possible with shears, and then use a sharp knife to remove the rest of the stub, plus about 1/8" of the bark around the stub. If that is underground, dabbing it with lime-sulfur and letting it dry before re-covering it would help prevent infection setting in.