Sorry about the absence!

Apologies for my long disappearance from the forum. I had a very busy winter with sick relatives, then sick myself with the flu, all while trying to complete a very absorbing and challenging project. Once things settle down a bit I'll try to find more time to visit the forum. Apologies too to those people who I promised plants or cuttings. I have them here still, just never got around to doing much more than water them.
Ian

Friends are never absence...they are working just around the corner....its nice to see you put your tools down and come for a visit....

Ian I have some interesting seedlings comming through at the moment involving China's and Tea's.

Tell us (me) more!!!!!

I have a few as well... could be some swapping of material going on in future by the sounds of it! Mine have been quite slow growing. It often takes more than a few years before any spare material is available unfortunately. One of mine was from seed off an old tea rose but the seedling has reverted (mutated?) to some kind of miniature thing with almost single flowers!

Now now Balin hold your horses LOL, well I have that one in the new seedlings thread, the first one. Its has Mme C Testou (half Tea), Safrano and Mutabilis in it. This one improve from its second bloom onwards, if not , it becomes a breeder only. I have Bon Silene seedling doing well ,pollinated with a Safrano X Mutabilis. La Vesuve crossed with a number of cultivars. Old Blush and Ten Thousand Lights seedlings from crosses with moderns. Lamarque Hybrid seedlings from previous years and this year. A large number of Veilchenblau seedlings which are doing really really well and then the Mutabilis Hybrids with moderns, which is around four different breeding lines.

All these, depending on their fertility will be crossed back with each other in an attempt to breed BS free or almost roses for the Eastern Seaboard which is prone to this problem.

Ian swapping could be a good way of throwing various genes around making them more diverse. I find the OGR those which are diploid, when crossed with moderns , do take a while to find their feet, but when they do, growth is usually very good.

The rose which mutated what was the seed parent? I was given some Alister Stella Grey seed, which the seedling were treated as to double its chromosomes, ended up as a minature. It only grows to around 1 1/2 ft and has tiny leaves, the blooms are 1" and identical to ASG.

Talking about doubling chromosomes, here is a pic of Mutabilis X Mutabilis) which had its chromosomes doubled, as you can see the results are quite interesting.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Your mutabilisxmutabilis is very interesting. It's very like a Floribunda in many ways. My seedling was a Rosa xodorata from seed I got from India. The other parent could be anything... although the growers mainly grow Chinas and old teas. They are also experimenting with different China/Tea crosses.
I tend not to get too bogged down in the genetics. My method is a bit haphazard. Basically I just collect seed from Chinas and some of the older varieties of teas and try to propagate them. As I have all the Chinas growing together now, the chances that they will be mostly China genes and not modern hybrids is higher. I am just throwing it all to chance and seeing what nature provides.
I have one healthy seedling of Rosa chinensis var. spontanea from China. I will really have to find a good spot where it can grow to its full potential.

Ian , just went on HMF and looked up R. chinensis var. spontanea. Its foliage looks like it may have some R. laevigata or R. bracteata. If you ever have any spare wood for cuttings I would appreciate it thanks.

Welcome back Ian. I too have been absent a lot with a very sick grandchild - he is coming out of his 27th seizure right as I write this so roses and rose talk has been spasmodic.

The more you write out your roses the more I realise that you have some interesting treasure at home. I think I have struck quite a few cuttings of Comtesse Riza du Parc Tea.

Bonita,
I am sorry to hear that and thank you for the kind invitation that I received in the post recently. I am a bit busy at present but will definitely keep it in mind.

Ozros,
Rosa chinensis var. spontanea is a species in its own right. Definitely no laevigata or bracteata in it. Rosa chinensis var. spontanea is the true wild Rosa chinensis species. Interestingly in the Chinese botany there do not appear to be any other wild varieties of Rosa chinensis mentioned! The var. spontanea part of the name must be some historical name that it inherited from horticulture. It hardly seems necessary. Most of the miniature forms of China rose are actually hybrids or chance mutations of the wild var. spontanea. In strict scientific terms, they are not varieties in their own right.

Rose naming has suffered dreadfully from horticulture, mainly because it began by classifying horticultural differences in roses and not species differences. If it had been done properly from the outset, true species would have been separated into varieties and forms, and hybrids between species would have been recognized and recorded as such. But this did not happen. So we ended up with these bogus names like "Rosa semperflorens" and "Rosa Mutabilis". The assumption is that these are species when actually they are hybrids. I guess this is why when I mention species roses to many people I often receive a blank look in reply. Some people think Iceberg is a species or a variety of a species. In fact it is neither. It is actually a hybrid cultivar.

Anyway, I'll get off my soap box now. I'll be sure to send you some cutting material when it is ready. I hope to plant this one in a place where I can give it plenty of room to grow.

I could never work out why they do the "Rosa" bit on hybrids. It si very confusing to say the least as you expect the plant to be a species roase when you see it.

I just went back and fixed a mistake in my last message. Clearly leavigata and bracteata are also species roses in their own right. Oops!

Modern hybrid roses are often referred to as Rosa hybrida, which is not valid scientifically. Well they are hybrids, but they are not all the same species called "hybrida" (as the name suggests). It is true however that they still all belong to the genus Rosa, despite the fact that they are hybrids.

Incidentally, it would appear that Kew places Rosa chinensis var. spontanea in synonymy with Rosa sinica (which is itself a synonym for Rosa laevigata). They are wrong. The white form of Rosa chinensis var. spontanea shown on the Kew site is in fact none other than Rosa laevigata!! What ARE they talking about?? [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

The true Rosa chinensis var. spontanea has different growth habit, different leaves, larger, more floppy flowers which are pink, and different spines.

I did find mention on one web page that the var. spontanea was chosen to differentiate this wild species from all of the forms (and hybrids) of Rosa chinensis that are found in cultivation. I suspect the name simply means "spontaneous" (i.e. as occurring in the wild without human intervention).

This article may be of interest. [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I do not agree that Rosa chinensis var. spontanea is a hybrid with Rosa laevigata as claimed by Rehder in 1932. The var. spontanea is far too widespread and common in many parts of China to be hybrids. Hybrid roses occur only rarely in nature and are more often found in horticulture. Rehder also ignored the fact that var. spontanea is often found in places where no laevigata is found.