'Nancy Hayward' in a REALLY cold part of Tassie

Recently I was away in Hobart for the weekend. We stopped in at a little town called Oatlands and found a tiny little nursery. I was hoping that there might have been some nice roses seeing as there were so many old colonial sandstone buildings with heritage gardens around (unfortunately this wasn't the case ). Growing in the garden was, however, quite a lot of nice old roses including a lovely plant of 'Nancy Hayward'. It was in flower and covered in hips. It get's to -10ºC with quite heavy snow there in winter and yet the owner told me it grows strongly despite the cold and was some 7-8 years old. It was really healthy looking with characteristic gigantea-like leaves. She didn't have any plants of it in the nursery but was kind enough to offer me a bunch of cuttings (which are sitting here now wrapped up in moist newspaper) which I accepted eagerly Given how cold this part of Tassie is (much colder than where I am here), I was surprised to see how well it was growing and the number of OP hips on it made me wonder why nobody has used it in breeding... it's clearly a fertile parent. With any luck the cuttings will strike and I'll be able to splash a bit of its pollen around over the coming years. Anyone else grow it? A number years ago I saw an episode of Burke's Backyard on which Peter Valder was showing off his wisteria 'trees'. I'm thinking I might have a go at trying to make a 'Nancy Hayward' 'tree'... with a garden seat around its trunk.

I have it over this shelter. Not in flower in this pic but you can see its canes on the upper left reaching for the sky.

In spring it it magnificent.

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Looks like a beautiful bush too! I can't understand why nobody has used it in hybridising here???

Today I saw - for the first time - a huge plant of 'Nancy Hayward' with a few blooms on it & OMG...very nice!

Damo... I have about a dozen struck cuttings... I'll put one in your goody bag

very nice indeed

Simon wrote:Looks like a beautiful bush too! I can't understand why nobody has used it in hybridising here???

Not yet, but I do intend to, in the following spring. I was waiting my Nancy Hayward to develop first. Very happy with it; from a 50 cm high little bush up to a 4m gorgeous thing in less than a year. True Australian beauty.

I do as well... It fits all the criteria of a useful parent IMO; it strikes easily from cuttings, it requires no chemical intervention, growing naturally as roses were intended to do so, it is robust and it seems to develop hips from what I've seen (the one mentioned in the opening post of mine was covered in hips). In true gigantea style, the seeds will probably be very difficult to germinate but I think some very beautiful roses could be bred out of it with a little patience. I look forward to trying it out

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