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'Devoniensis' rose Reviews & Comments
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I have a bush 'Devoniensis' on its own roots from Zephyr Brook Heritage Rose Garden 7-48 in Pinjarra, WA, taken as a cutting in 2000.
Two metres to the west I have another bush which eventually turned out to be the bush 'Devoniensis' from Hill Farm, given to me in 2004 by Natalee Kuser and which is on Fortuniana rootstock. Both these roses are about knee height.
'Climbing Devoniensis' which I found in Dave Fowler's garden in Yornup is a further three metres on to the west.
I cannot understand Helpmefind's notation of "thornless - or almost" for the bush 'Devoniensis' (unless my two bushes are incorrectly named). If the true 'Devoniensis' bush was thornless (and the first reference to refer to it as "few prickles" was in 1936 - 98 years after its birth), how on earth did a thornless tea rose produce such a thorny rigid climber. In both my bushes and the climber these are strong thorns, almost welded to the canes, but so much more evident in the climber.
Wandering (or wondering) on - how did a very slow-to-take-off (a decade?) bush sport a climber which almost leaps out of the ground.
(I think the HMF height for the bush needs adjusting as it the same 10' to 12' as shown for the climber.)
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#1 of 5 posted
1 JUN 09 by
 jedmar
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I think we can disregard the "few prickles". This description refers to a plant in Sangerhausen in 1936, which is no longer there. Both of the older drawings of Devoniensis show hooked prickles.
Where I am uncertain is whether Devoniensis Clg. is really a sport of Devoniensis. The bloom colour is just not the same. Are we sure we have the same Devoniensis all over the world? Maybe we could have some other details posted for both for comparison.
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The climbing form of 'Devoniensis' is identical to the shrub in all but vigour and habit, so it sounds as though there might be more than one rose going under the name 'Devoniensis'. That said, it's worth keeping an eye on the suspect rose for a few years. Leaving aside the blooms, how does it compare, feature by feature, with the climbing form?
The blooms of 'Devoniensis' do vary in fullness from season to season, but both shrub and climber have blooms that go through the same range of form and colour, and they have the same leaves and purplish-red new growth and glandular pedicels. The portrait in Henry Curtis' 'Beauties of the Rose' is a pretty good likeness and captures the posture of the buds very well.
Right from the start, the climber has impressive prickles that are - as Patricia noted - so hard to dislodge they seem to be welded to the stems. For us, the shrub had less prickles when young but as the plant aged it became pricklier.
I've found the shrub form to be very slow to establish. The plant in our garden grew so slowly for its first eight years that I worried about its constitution. In its early years it made a sparse, awkward plant, barely 3' (approx 1 metre) high and didn't put much new wood on each year. It was definitely the runt of the Teas here. Despite that, it still produced intermittent crops of gorgeous blooms from that scrawny frame.
After its eighth year it seemed to change gear and began to grow much more strongly and now it takes conscientious picking and trimming to keep it to reasonable bounds. It's one of the healthiest roses in the garden and repeats its bloom so quickly that it's rarely without a crop of buds and flowers.
Impressively large old Devoniensis 'trees' (like the one in Jeri's picture) are seen in old gardens and cemeteries and there's been some speculation re whether they can possibly be the shrub form or whether the forms in commerce have lost vigour. Watching our shrub over 15 years, I don't think it's a case of diminishing vigour - just that the shrub form of 'Devoniensis' has an especially long childhood and adolescence and if you're prepared to wait for a decade (in the right climate), the mature shrub is really something special.
2 photos attached - all blooms are from the same plant - shrub form of Devoniensis.
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I am only now seeing your pertinent question now about whether all plants of 'Devoniensis' are the same worldwide. There was some discussion on the Antique Roses forum about 4-5 years ago about this question, and I don't know if anything was decided for certain, but it does seem possible that there may be two different roses being sold in the U.S. as 'Devoniensis'.
I don't think it's possible to read the entire thread without being a Houzz member (which I no longer am), but parts are visible: https://www.houzz.com/discussions/1568872/why-is-devoniensis-not-more-popular
Both roses have similarly colored flowers (cream with yellow and pink shadings), dark green foliage, and reddish/ purplish canes/ new growth. One rose has larger leaflets, and looks more tea-like, and the other has smaller, glossier leaflets, and seemed HT-like. I believe that they are both very fragrant.
I doubt anything was proven decisively, and i is possible that there is only one clone that grows differently in different conditions. Even if there are two different roses, I'm guessing they have enough in common that someone could grow both, and not think to compare them closely.
If there really are two different 'Devoniensis' roses being sold in the U.S., I wonder if that error could have occurred in other countries also via imports from North America or independently. Devoniensis was introduced almost 200 years ago, so that's plenty of time for more than one "confused in commerce" situation.
Virginia
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#4 of 5 posted
22 OCT 19 by
jedmar
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In Europe, 'Devoniensis Clg' is often 'Souvenir de la Malmaison Clg'.
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#5 of 5 posted
19 JUN 21 by
Hamanasu
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Over the years, I have had a Devoniensis (bush) from La Roseraie Du Desert, a climber from Trevor White Roses, and another bush from Loubert. Except for vigour, I have never noticed any difference. The blooms and scent were the same on all plants. But it's true that I have seen some pics in other European nurseries' catalogues that look suspiciously like SdM.
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