Almost a month later....

The roses are growing really well this season. They love the weather I guess. Storms nearly daily so there's lots of water and we haven't been scorching hot...yet...either. I do have rampant black spot though. I've been spraying regularly with either Green Cure or Serenade but they haven't been able to hold it at bay. So today I sprayed Bayer Disease Control. I hate to resort to that so early in the year but hopefully this will get a grip on it. I'm going to spray again in a week or 10 days with it to see if that does it. Otherwise I won't have a leaf left by August when I usually get my worst case of black spot. Maybe this will hold that off? One can only hope.

I also gave them all another dose of Epsom Salt too, along with some Miracle Grow watered in well. Then I mixed up a batch of Spray n Grow, Superthrive and Messanger and did a foliar feed as well. Over kill maybe but I haven't fertilized the pots since April or early May and they always need more food because it washes through.

I'll report more on the individual roses later but I wanted to get this down right away so I wouldn't forget when I did it.

Jeepers, where has the time gone. Six months since my last entry? I'll have to do better than that.

My roses wintered better than expected and I only lost 2 in pots, Uncle Joe and Always Love You, and none in the ground! Yippee! I thought I had lost Ruffled Cloud too when it didn't leaf out with all the others. Matter of fact it didn't leaf out until the very end of May after I tented it to give it a boost. I think this one must be a heat lover.

The spring flush of the roses was fabulous. The weird weather we've had here seems to have been perfectly suited to roses, cool and wet. I had huge blooms and lots of them. It also caused an early bout of black spot but not too bad and I think I have it under control now. I did have some damage from the storm winds when they blew some of the pots over. Poor Honorine de Brabant ended up on even poorer Disneyland Rose twice and I lost 2 canes on DR. It's rebounding though. I've also gotten a lot of new basal growth that I'm pleased with. I used my epsom salts early in the spring as usual but I also applied a second dose in late May. Maybe that's why? I've heard from some one else that they use it several times a season. I may try some again too.

The seedling crop for this year was fair. I have 18 new babies in the nursery outside. They range anywhere from an inch to a foot high but they're all green and growing. Of the seedlings from the 2 previous years 8 out of 10 survived the winter outside. Not bad. Several of them have bloomed now. Nothing special but mine and I like them. I need to pot them up now as they're all getting too big for their one gallon pots.

I got several new roses this spring. Of course! Really I got too many but I couldn't resist.

New roses breakdown:
Pope John Paul II
Wow! This one has actually lived up to it's hype so far. Gorgeous huge white blooms that smell heavenly, lots of them and they last a long time. And vigorous is hardly the word for it. Think Audry from the "Little Shop of Horrors". If it starts to say "feed me" I'm outta here.

I got 2 John Sheldon roses, Hollywood Star and Strawberry Romance. These are both wonderful roses. HS is phototropic and goes from a pale honey color to a rich warm apricot. Lovely! SR is strawberry pink and white and the blooms are enormous. Both have a nice fragrance too.

I've fallen in love with Falling In Love. Another pink and white with large blooms. It has good form and frangrance as well.

Mardi Gras hasn't done a great deal yet. It's had 2 blooms that were very pretty but didn't last long.

Dream Come True is OK. I'm not thrilled with the colors, yellow with a red edge, and it's been stingy blooming.

Red Intuition hasn't bloomed yet but I only got it the first of June as a bare root and it's leafed out in record time and has buds coming. Can't wait to see it in person.

There are a bunch of minis too. Nostalgia was a replacement for one I lost. Yantai bloomed and it's a lovely soft pale yellow. Snow Ruby is just opening and I love that deep red with the white reverse. Lady Bren had a bloom on it when it came that was beautiful but it hasn't rebloomed yet. Tattooed Lady has several buds showing color so that should open this week I hope. X-Rated has one bloom opening too. I"m going to like it. Wonderful form.

Climbing Peace still hasn't given me bloom. This is it's fourth season and still no blooms. It's days are numbered. My other one that hadn't bloomed for me was Christian Dior. Well it covered it's self with sprays of buds this spring and I knew right away it wasn't CD. I figured I had a nice healthy Dr. Huey on my hands until it opened. Lovely pinkish medium red blooms with a lot of petals. It's been provisionally IDed as Blaze. I think I know a nice spot where a pretty BLOOMING climber could go....

Well Happy New Year!

I did get all the roses winterized over the Thanksgiving weekend. We've had some snow but it keeps melting in between so there isn't any cover for the roses there. None on the horizon either. It's supposed to hit 50 on Monday.

I got my rose hips cleaned and the seeds in the fridge today. With the seeds still left from previous years I have about 1100 seeds stratified. The question marks are hips I had that I broke open and couldn't distinguish the seeds so I'm soaking them to see if I can find the seeds. All of the seeds are OPs. With the late freeze and having to replace so many roses last spring I never got any crosses done. I hope to be able to do some this spring.

Here's what i have:
2006 SEEDS
Anthony Meilland 20
Kaliedoscope 67
Lake Pink Grnd Cvr 3
Louise Odier 4
MacKenzie's rose 6
Madam Isaac Pereire 25
Morning Jewel 24
Queen Elizabeth 20
Outta the Blue 75
Wise Portia 54
TOTAL 298
2007 SEEDS
Altissimo 14
Anne's rose 2
Captain Thomas 16
Dainty Bess 13
Golden Celebration 5
Jacqueline du Pre 6
Karine 8
Knockout 3
MacKenzie's rose 48
Midnight Blue 25
Misc. OP's 12
PinocchioXHot Cocoa 1
Pinocchio 1
Route 66 26
TOTAL 180
2008 SEEDS
Blue Girl 91
Cl. Intrigue 130
Graham Thomas 28
Honorine de Brabant 5
MacKenzie's rose 26
Manor Lake lg rose 53
Manor Lake sm rose 2
Pat's White rose ?
Pinocchio 4
Pointe Lake rose 26
Red Unknown rose 126
Reine des Violettes ?
Rose de Rescht ?
Therese Bugnet 150
Unknown rose ?
TOTAL 641

298 2006
180 2007
641 2008
1119 TOTAL

Oh, and I found one seed of Wise Portia already germinated. I have no idea when it did that but it looked green and healthy so I potted it up. We'll see what happens. I'll post when the others start to hatch.

You know I really did start this out with the best of intentions to keep it updated. However, life happens and you get busy and the first thing you know it's been over a month since you visited.

It was very warm here through the fall and only now are we getting cool days and cold nights. The roses gave me an amazing flush the last part of September and early October. I think with the exception of the two dead heads, Peace and Christian Dior who still haven't bloomed once, everything else in the garden has bloomed nicely. There were some stand outs though. Garden Party was covered with blooms as was Disneyland Rose. Oregold gave me more blooms in the fall than it did in the spring. O'Rilla finally rebloomed too. I was so pleased to see it had much better form than the first blooms did. Both Rose de Rescht and Reine des Violettes had a nice flush, not like spring, but good. Snowfire covered itself with bloons too. And Madeleine bloomed for the first time. It was lovely. I think I'm really going to like all the new mini and minifloras I got this year. Of course Dainty Bess and Golden Wings never stopped blooming all summer and fall just brought out deeper colors in them. All things considered I think I've had a pretty good season so if it frosts now I'll be satisfied. The roses and I are looking forward to a rest. Of course I still have all the winterizing to do but that will have to wait a while until it gets cold enough for them to go dormant. In the mean time I'm already looking at rose sites and catalogues planning for 2008!