Article (magazine)  (2023)  
 
Rosa xfortuniana, Source/Accession MHCREC [Mountain Horticultural Crops Research and Extension Center, Mills River, NC]  ...Estimated ploidy level(x) 2

Newsletter  (Sep 2020)  Page(s) 11.  
 
[From "Fortune's Five Roses", by Darrell g. h. Schramm, pp. 9-11]
The most historically fascinating of Fortune’s five named roses is the incredible ‘Fortuneana’. One of the healthiest of hybrid roses, and rather similar to a Banksiae rose, it produces very long, slender and pliable canes with double flowers decorated all along the sleeves of each branch. Cream-colored roses, they exhale a wisp of violet fragrance. Three lanceolate leaflets to a leaf, the foliage is light green and shiny. Easily, even in poor soil, this huge plant can parade more than a thousand roses. It requires very little care, yet will grow spectacularly over a pergola or arch. Though some Western rose specialists believe it to be a hybrid of R. banksiae, it is, according to Chinese experts, much older than the several Banksiae forms. In fact, ‘Fortuneana’ is not one specific rose variety but a small class of roses found in China, a class known as Tu Mi (or Tumi). According to Dr. Guoliang Wang, Chinese rose authority and botanist, “A distinctive Tu Mi flower culture of the Song Dynasty was born a thousand years ago” when these roses spread from southwest to northeast China. Indeed, a large Chinese scroll painting 1000 years old clearly depicts a large ‘Fortuneana’ in front of a temple, both still to be viewed to this day. Therefore, whatever date we Westerners attach to this rose—1845 or 1850—the date 1000 is probably more accurate.

Book  (2016)  Page(s) 13.  
 
'Anemoneflora'..... The flowers of this rose are blush white, double (Anemone-like), and small. The central petals are narrow, packed together in a clump and may have slightly ragged edges whereas those in the outer row are wide and smooth tipped......'Fortuneana' is similar, but does not show the extreme contrast in morphology of the inner and outer petals

Article (magazine)  (Nov 2015)  Page(s) 1623.  
 
R. x fortuniana, which is traditionally placed in the R. sect. Banksianae, formed a clade with R. laevigata with 100% posteriori probability and 100% bootstrap confidence in our plastid sequence analyses (Fig. 1). R. x fortuniana is thought to be a hybrid between a R. laevigata seed parent and a R. banksiae pollen parent, and its cpDNA matK sequence matches that of R. laevigata, not R. banksiae (Matsumoto et al., 2001). This matK sequence result is consistent with our molecular data.

Newsletter  (Aug 2014)  Page(s) 15-16.  Includes photo(s).
 
In 1850 Fortune sent to England a rose he repeatedly observed in numerous gardens of Ningpo and Shanghai, a hybrid banksiae, probably R. laevigata x R. banksiae, christened ‘Fortuneana’. The date 1840 often cited is incorrect, for Fortune did not set foot in China until 1843. No doubt the incorrect date is a typographical error, the numeral four struck in lieu of the five, an error harking back to 1873 in Les Roses written by Hippolyte Jamain and Eugene Forney. Fortune himself does not mention this rose in any of his three editions of his first book on his initial visit to China. (He changed the title with each succeeding edition.) The first description of ‘Fortuneana’ occurs in 1851, given in Lindley and Paxton’s Flower Garden. Parsons on the Rose, 1888, clearly states it was introduced in 1850.....At any rate, belonging to the banksiae family, ‘Fortuneana’ (also ‘Fortuniana’) has shining leaves like those of R. laevigata; five leaflets to a leaf; scattered, white or cream-colored flowers the color of natural butter before any dye is added. Fortune himself in 1860 wrote that this rose was “held in high esteem by the Chinese,” that it was frequently used on “Trellis-work formed into alcoves or built over garden walks.”

Website/Catalog  (27 Jul 2011)  
 
Rosa ‘Fortuneana’
‘Fortuneana’ is a rampant climber with scented, double white flowers, as large as those of Aimeé Vibert..  [Rivers (1854, 1857, 1863), Paul (1888, 1903), Amat].

Horticultural & Botanical History
An ancient Chinese garden hybrid between Rosa banksiae and Rosa laevigata introduced into England by Robert Fortune in 1850.

History at Camden Park
Arrived from Veitch’s Nursery, Chelsea on Dec, 31st, 1859 on board the ‘Hollinside’ but dead on arrival.  For more detail see Rosa ‘Ducher’.

(2010)  Page(s) 53-54.  
 
Cloudehill: A Year in the Garden pp 53-54 (2010)
Jeremy Francis
Rosa x fortuniana as rootstock in Western Australia
I came to know the nurseryman quite well and after a time he accorded me the special privilege of telling me how he propagated his plants. After much experimentation, West Australian nurserymen have found roses do well in Perth's deep sand only when budded onto Rosa fortuniana rootstock. In fact, an understanding was reached by these nurserymen that roses must be put onto this rootstock in WA. This, I should point out, is exactly the reverse to just about everywhere else where roses are expected to do best in clay. It happens, though, R. fortuniana has roots adapted to delving into sand and plants grafted onto this stock in Perth are some of the finest to be seen. Unfortunately, I was told, budding onto fortuniana is no easy matter. Perversely, the buds will not take unless the task is performed during hot weather, in fact, very hot weather. On warm days when the temperature is in the low 30s, the take is barely passable; on high 30s days perhaps acceptable. However, budding onto fortuniana during a heat wave, when temperatures are in the 40s, or even better, the high 40s, results in the cultivar buds clamping to root stock stems with barnacle-like tenacity. R. fortuniana's growth habit also bore consideration. In my friend's field, fortuniana root stock protruded from the ground as a bare stem to around 30 centimetres, then branched sideways into a mass of twigs armed with long razor-sharp prickles. Plants in each row were spaced 4 centimetres apart with a 1.2-metre gap between rows; lateral growth formed a continuous, briar-patch-like canopy. My friend was on his belly below this for most of each day and, with his head twisted sideways and one ear brushing the ground, with luck there was lust sufficient wriggle room to make each 'T' incision, slip a cultivar bud into the cut, bind the wound and snake along to the next plant. Naturally, if air temperature was in the 40s, the ground temperature was hotter, enough to blister bare flesh not already slashed and bloody from those re-curved (backward facing), exquisitely sharp prickles. However, I must say his roses grew magnificently.

Book  (2005)  Page(s) 218-219.  Includes photo(s).
 
Rosa X Fortuniana, Banksian Epineux
Discovered by Robert Fortune in China in 1840, this vigorous plant...needs frost free consitions, not easily provided in northern climates due to its preference for 'making a great show from tree tops'. The flowers are larger and fuller than those of the parent Banksian 'Alba Plena'. The other parent is R. laevigata. In warm climates such as that of Florida in the United States it makes a successful understock.

Book  (2 Nov 2003)  Page(s) 20.  
 
Barbara May and Jane Zammit.  Rookwood Cemetery Roses.  
The following roses have been identified at Rookwood, primarily in the old and Heritage listed areas  Fortuniana

Article (misc)  (2003)  
 
The nucleotide sequence of the R.×fortuniana ITS has also been determined (AB034194). R.× fortuniana was confirmed to be a hybrid between a seed parent, R. laevigata, and a pollen parent, R. banksiae.