After a few years

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A cross from 2007, between an English rose and a Tea-Noisette. It is a beautiful, double, prolific and very healthy cultivar. A mixture of red and crimson on top (it has more yellow pigment thanks to its pollen parent, hard to see in this pic taken in an overcast day), and deep silvery-crimson colour under petals. Ornamented with a strong, old rose scent (Damask), similar to the scent of a Mr Lincoln rose, with some fruity overtones, reminiscent of citrus and oranges. Mid to dark green foliage, not very thorny. Has thicker, semi-silky, semi-velvety petals, that enable this rose stay long in vase and it surely makes it very heat tolerant. Opens up in a beautiful rosette shape, which is not as shallow and flat as the old rose rosette shape, but it has more 'Tea' nature to it. I believe this is going to be a delightful one for Australian climates.
Fingers crossed

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Another 2007 cross is now a very prolific and healthy rose. Middle pink, with slightly reddish shades. Adorned with a delicious, old rose scent (Damask), similar to the scent of Gertrude Jekyll, but is definitely with fruity overtones. Mid green foliage, few thorns. Double, opens in a beautiful rosette with some definite ‘Tea’ nature too. Stays in vase a few days longer than any of the English roses/ HTs I have, has a mixture of both velvety and silky film on petals (more silky), that reflect light (and perhaps protect from heat?) better than any of the English roses I have. I quite like this one. It seems it loves warmth, like the other one above. Fingers crossed once again

These are beautiful Oz! Have you grafted these, or had them grafted, at all? Is the bottom one part noisette too... it looks to have either tea, noisette or china in it.

Hi Simon!
No, I have not grafted them yet. I wanted to test them through this year to finally decide where to go from there. Now I believe they are both great and well worth introducing.
Yes, the bottom one is also part Tea-Noisette. I believed that following that road is a good way to breed roses suitable for Australia. I also cared about where, on a relative scale of 'rose evolution', are parents situated at, trying to avoid big gaps that oftentimes produce a bit 'crazy' progeny.

They seem to grow well on their own roots then... that's a massive plus IMO. Have you tried striking them yet or tested them anywhere else?

I've been a bit cruel, so to speak, and was replanting them several times, in pots, then back into ground, and then in different spots. And they loved such treatment, and grew bigger. Since day 1 they've been exposed to elements. I did not spray them either. That is how I select best cultivars worth working on, for my breeding and testing grounds are rather very modest. I'd rather have a couple of exceptional roses than dozens of 'so-sos'. This year they're front row, facing full sun, and while English roses in the back curl their petals and leaves in heat, those here readily open, never ball, and even the new shoots don't curl in the sun as much. Little heat warriors.

I'll definitely start grafting them next season. Perhaps it would be a good time to register them too. If anyone's interested, I'd be glad to provide them for trials.
Ta.

I have been thinking of trial grounds for a while... Here on RT we have members in QLD, NSW (north and south), and VIC that can easily test roses. I don't mention WA because getting them there is problematic. They need to go via quarantine and then struck etc. Lots of external factors. Same goes for Tas. I can bud or strike cuttings so that does opens up a Tas trial and I would prefer testing own-root samples but it is still problematic. I don't know how the others in WA feel about obtaining propagating material to strike before testing. Maybe we can put together a network of locations to which we can send roses for tial and come up with a set of standard conditions by which they are grown and evaluated... The trial grounds in SA offer formal testing in that environment as well.

There is one more idea; when breeding, we create some interesting cultivars which are well worth exploring and testing, but there's not enough room for them all. For example, I have a dozen or so climbers to semi-climbers I'd love to have planted properly and evaluated over the next few years, but I cannot accommodate them all.

I was thinking that if there are interested people here at RT (with gardens but who don't breed roses and are buying them in nurseries & shops) who would perhaps like to have those new cultivars and grow them? Dare to have something no one has? Trial test them for two years, say, to see how they go. If they do like them, they can keep them, and we can have cuttings for further propagation.

I think that good cultivars designed specifically to perform well in Australian climate will perform better in every single respect than any European or American rose with a famous name that costs $. For example, I'm already looking forward to graft those two above and replace many well known European roses in my garden, simply because those new ones are far better resisting heat.

A totally freebie rose(s) can make someone's garden great looking, and if the rose fails in some respect, no money is wasted, and the person can get a new cultivar at any time. Well, same happens in big trial gardens too.

Does this sound too dumb? Or perhaps there's some potential in this and there are interested gardeners? We can create a little network of people who enjoy creating new roses, spend 0$ for purchase and grow them in a fashion no one else is doing.

congrat' to your beautiful roses Oz..Apart from the pics you gave a very detailed description including your sense of the fragrance... a topic we forget sometimes

cheers
Bernhard

Very nice Ozrosarian, most of the roses with a lot of Damasc fragrance are usually unhealthy here. Let's keep our fingers crossed for you and hope it's a good all rounder.

Would be worth testing it here or Queensland. It's wonderful to see hobby breeders getting a good result, keep on pollinating.

I also think it is testimony to the breeding potential of the roses from within the China, Tea, and Noisette class. I'm REALLY looking forward to a whole swag of crosses with Teas and Noisette's this year. No China crosses this year but next season, when they are bigger, I'm hoping to explore that avenue too. This season I used 'Crepuscule', 'Reve d'Or', 'Monsieur Tillier', 'Lamarque', 'Comtesse de Labarthe', 'Marie Van Houtte', and 'Lorraine Lee' with various other modern roses. I also have, but didn't use, "Adam", which mildews a bit but may combine well other roses, 'St Francis Xavier' but haven't found any pollen on it yet (seed didn't germinate for me from last season), "Francis Dubreuil" which is a dud, and 'Souvenir de Madame Léonie Viennot' which flowered poorly this year. I'd like to use SdMLV at some stage if she ever decides to cooperate.
There's some unknown Noisette-type rose growing in the back paddock too that I could use but so far I am underwhelmed by it. 'Fortune's Double Yellow' is on my list of roses to use next season too if mine decides to flower.

Zvonimir, I was also thinkning ahead a little with your roses... I think it would be a good idea to do a deliberate self-cross of your roses or, even better, cross seedling one with seedling two. The two above are likely to be triploid because the teas and noisettes are generally diploid and the English roses are usually tetraploid, but they may have some fertility (like the triploids 'Lady Hillingdon' and 'Papa Gontier' do), and it may help to provide more seedlings with these lovely flowers and even more tea-like habits just by virtue of re-shuffling the genes again without adding new ones.

Simon wrote:I also think it is testimony to the breeding potential of the roses from within the China, Tea, and Noisette class. I'm REALLY looking forward to a whole swag of crosses with Teas and Noisette's this year.

I believe they have tremendous potential. In addition to Gigantea, those are parents to breed good roses for Australia, period. However, I think that a good homework first helps a lot. In my case, I deliberately avoided messing around with any of the modern HTs. I wanted a clear look of the parentage, especially choosing suitable English roses, which can be a very tricky business.

After my years of observation, I can warmly recommend: if anyone wants to experiment, I think investing your time with Tess d'Ubervilles (very fertile, beautiful hips), WS (very fertile, passes on Damask scent), Teasing Georgia (loves heat, fertile) and Jubilee Celebration (best all rounder ever, IMHO) will be worth every second.

Also, with progeny of these roses, don't dismiss them after a year or two (say, because it appears they don't have good fragrance immediately); if it grows well and looks good, keep it. Say the first one above, it was only last year that I have noticed an overwhelming Damask scent. And this year it's even better.

Zvonimir, I was also thinkning ahead a little with your roses... I think it would be a good idea to do a deliberate self-cross of your roses or, even better, cross seedling one with seedling two. The two above are likely to be triploid because the teas and noisettes are generally diploid and the English roses are usually tetraploid, but they may have some fertility (like the triploids 'Lady Hillingdon' and 'Papa Gontier' do), and it may help to provide more seedlings with these lovely flowers and even more tea-like habits just by virtue of re-shuffling the genes again without adding new ones.

Thanks for the reminder Simon, because I wanted to that as well. There is one more seedling I have not presented here, the result from the same cross. A simply gorgeous rose, with an unusual colour, a mix of dark pink, pale crimson and red, albeit with little fragrance. But grows so well, has silky reflective film on petals, fully double rosette with a Tea rose charm. Loves heat too. Here it is, on the left.

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Well, if I had to choose between that one and an average HT from the shop, I'd go for this one, for not only the bush is much nicer and opens up beautifully, and that foliage looks much better too, but even blooms are nodding more charmingly. And stays in vase longer than many.

Here it is, next to WS (WS is on the left here). WS is a fully developed plant, but this little one — although a not fully grown plant — stayed in this bowl 3 days longer than WS. I'm not sure is this info is of any importance to people, but for me, vase life, bloom and bush shape are very important.

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Wonderful colour!

I'll put my hand up to trial them up here. If a tea/noisette cross is growing to do well it will do so up here. It will also tend to show up any problems the english rose side of things may have in the humidity.

Great looking flower and as you have said Zvonimir, shape, vase life and maybe desease resistance are some important things for a new rose to have. Have you nay thoughts on a yellow or white rose yet. What might the cross include, vaiety wise, notthe actual cross unless you have already done them.

These are some of the best Austin crosses I have seen!! Great choice of crosses. I would would be very honoured to trial some of these up here in my South West Sydney garden when you are ready to start your trials. I live about 40mins south east of Bruce.

I think vase life is important and a big bonus if a rose can survive as long as possible as I love picking and giving my roses to family and friends when I visit. Of course bloom & bush shape are equally important as is scent - if a rose doesen't have that 'rose' scent, then I am very 'cool' towards it.

Love your WS lookalike and your 2nd pic looks so much like Immortal Juno but seems to have Jubilee Celebration in it as well.
Well done! (sorry, don't know your name).
Rita

Hi Dave.
It seems pinks and crimsons love me this time

Breeding good whites is exceedingly difficult. Interesting white one, that may as well hit Australia in due time, is the white sport of The Mayflower, named Susan Williams-Ellis. Now, that is the white I'd love to have!

The Mayflower is already a remarkable rose, wholly disease resistant and gorgeous, with fine olde rose fragrance, and Susan Williams-Ellis should be same. When it comes here, I'll let you know.

However, whites aside, I do hope for some yellows next season. I have used some great yellow parents, hips are ripening well eve in this crazy weather and I'm hoping for the best.

I'd love to show you another pink semidouble, a strong grower with a strong myrrh fragrance, but I suspect myrrh is not your cup of tea

Zvonimir, as long as they have a smell it is ok to have myrrh fragrance. But does a rose just smell like a rose.
Me being in the wine industry listen/hear the taste and smell of wine, wine is wine and tastes/smells like wine. I think the winemakers have a chocolate wheel and spin it

Well done Ozrosarian, I saw an article once by D Austin and he said to breed pure white was quite difficult. A lot of whites look white but most have pink, yellow or green under tones to them, Last year I was lucky with Vanilla Skies and an other called Weisse Magie to give me pure white.

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As for perfume two scents I cannot keep my nose out the bloom is Damask and Myrrh, intoxicating and addictive. These days I suffer a lot from hayfever , and if I sniff a rose giving me a sneezing attack I say the perfume is good and strong.

cheers warren