Suckers, sucklers, etc roses.... tell me about them, what shoudl I do

[Flum]

A creeping rose has lots of tall strong red shoots up from ground or near ground. They have no buds on, are these suckers?

My MIL said that you can tell by the number of leaves on them sposed to be only five but if is 7 or 9 then should cut them off.

Anyone know?

sorry two of these, use this thread for your many and varied answers

gardeners all collapse in be d at 9pm I should think

the 7 or 9 rule is a good one,but not always true.The best way to tell is to scrape the soil away round the plant and see where they are growing from, if they are from above the graft (the knobbly bit where the main stem comes from, leave them, if they are below, twist them off,don't cut so you get it all, they are from the wild rootstock, which would take over if you let it,also make sure that the graft is sat at soil level afterwards, not buried

Roses are normally grafted, like apple trees, wiwth the variety you want to see the flowers of on top, and a strong rootstock to provide the, well, roots. Any suckers growing up from the ground are likely to be from the rootstock, which is usually Rosa rugosa, the dog-rose you see growing in hedges. If you don't remove them there is a chance that they'll outgrow your nice hybrid variety which is the one you bought.
If they are small, pull them out, otherwise cut right down at ground level.
Pretty certain your mum's right about hte leaflet number, too.