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Rosa Sherardii Davies, an overlooked species in Vermont and new to North America
(2012) Includes photo(s). Rosa sherardii....forms an arching-erect, tall (ca. 1.5-2 m), loosely patch-forming shrubs with large, bluish-green, moderately but not densely pubescent leaves and single, medium-pink flowers that are ca. 5 cm in diameter....The best characters for recognition are the presence of reddish-brown, sessile glands with a resinous scent on the abaxial leaf surfaces and large, bright scarlet, plumply ellipsoid to globose hips that are glabrous to only sparsely stipitate-glandular.... ...A small section of northeastern Vermont...was settled directly from Scotland in 1774-1775....as many as 40 settlers from Renfrewshire in the Caledonia County town of Ryegate by October 1774 and the neighbouring town of Barnet had settlers from Perth and Sterling soon after...These areas in Scotland are well within the range of Rosa sherardii...and I conjecture that the plants, cuttings, or seeds were brought by these early settlers, or perhaps later by their families, directly from Scotland to Vermont...
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