some of my babies

Some of the seedling roses that I really like out of some breeding I've been doing. I hope you enjoy[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Hi, Welcome to Rose Talk. Is there meant to be photos here? I'd love to see some of the photos of your seedlings. If you are having trouble you can email them to me at [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] and I'll post them for you

Thnks Simon, Im working on it again

I just went in and edited the code so the images show up

Really like the 2nd last one the most. Great form.

Nice roses you have there sreeves ...I particularly like the glowing colour of baby #5!!!

Great roses, screeves! Do you know the parents?

The Pink is a queen Elizabeth,
The yellow and pink is Don Par and Grand Nord
The little cream is two really old world roses in my mother garden. The colder the climate the more the colour gors with the cream one it changes right through to pink on the outside on white in the inside. As i live in a hot climate 90% of the year i only get to see the two tone in July. Thanks for your help Damo

QE is a great breeder - I've got a QE x Tamora which I love as a picking rose - semi-single, creamy pink. And not leggy like mum.
Keep up the good work!

sreeves, really nice seedlings, good to see a youngster playing around rose breeding. Keep up the good work and I look forward to seeing your progress.

Do you mea, for example, the pink IS 'Queen Elizabeth' or is a seedling FROM 'Queen Elizabeth'?

Simon they are all seedlings, Its a pod from my nanas garden of her Queen Elizabeth. It was out of my first attempt 18 months ago and i didnt label seedlings. The red is at its end but it is a thornless rose seedling

one and 4 are the same seedling, the first shot is of it first real flush and the second is as the temp drops here.

This is excellent news. There are a few of here that are into hybridising and to know there are more of us out there is great. If I can ever be of any assistance just let me know. Every rose breeder that I have ever met (online or in person) started out just as you have by growing what we call open pollinated hips. From there, everywhere you go you will see hips forming on roses and you will think... what a waste And you will collect them and grow them and then you'll start hitting the books and reading up on all the incredible roses and the equally incredible people behind them and then you'll start collecitng breeders and start planning your own crosses. This is how I started as well about 10 years ago now. I still have my first seedling; I call her 'The Ugly Duckling'. This is her:

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There are only two plants of her in existence.. one own root and one grafted one and she's a pretty terrible rose... but I will keep her forever.

Finding good breeders can be difficult because you can't just use any old rosethat forms hips. Some a good breeders and some are hopeless... sometimes a rose is unproven and you must test them to see if it might bear fruit... So... if you are looking for specific breeders mention them here and we might be able to help you get them. I can also totally recommend going to the Rose Hybridiser's Association website forum to learn as much as you can. You can find them here: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

There is a forum here for hybridising too where you can show us your latest treasures and get more tips from us or share your tips with us. I believe strongly that if we share our knowledge and stock then the ultimate winner is roses and rose gardeners.

I look forward to seeing your progress and don't forget... if there is ever anything you need all you have to do is ask

I can also totally recommend joining HMF here: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Thank you for you input Simon,
I have been learning as i go. I have a big purple cross parole seedling growing, fingers crossed it will survive. It is not a terrible strong plant.Delbard roses grow very well in our area with the heat and I am playing with them as well. I thank you for your offer of assistance. why havent you in ten years released a rose of your own t'o the market.People love Australian made. Mum went to the rare plant show in the blue mountains and was talking roses there with greeneroses from sydney, He had lots of interesting stff to say. Im excited you have put this site together.

I will also comply a list on here of all my varieties so if there any anyone would like i can send them on. there is easy over 100 different ones my garden has presently 720 in the ground and 700 in pots an today i set up a new trail cutting system in the hothouse. great spot to be since it has rained for the last week solid here and every other week this yr

I'm pretty unconventional in my crossing as I use a lot of species. These have limited commercial appeal as they are. To be honest, it doesn't take much to produce something modern and marketable in the current rose environment. You can put two modern roses together and make something nice without too much trouble, graft it on to give it false vigour, and produce thousands without too much trouble. I don't follow that path, however, as I don't want to just make roses with nice flowers. I want to make roses that look good in the landscape and are nice looking plants as well with little or no need for chemical intervention. I want to make roses that grow strongly on their own roots to remove the need to graft them. That means the number of seedlings I go through is in the thousands every year and the process is very long. I have registered one rose with another in the pipe line but they have to be very good for me to do so. I don't want to stir the same old pot just to make a variant of something that already exists. It also takes a long time and a lot of money to acquire breeding stock and when you are into species roses this can be even more difficult. That's why I don't release rose... oh.. that and I teach full time and have three kids and a few acres of land... so my time is very much at a premium.

That's interesting you should mention Delbards, sreeves. I just bought my first impulse one at Bunnings - for four flimsy reasons - it was called Paris 2000 and I love Paris, my favourite city. It had some beautiful apple blossom like almost single blooms. It had hips. There were two plants in the pot. Both are thriving.

As you're probably north of me (Lake Macquarie) I'd be interested to know just how well they grow in the heat/humidity. I don't spray, so the roses have to be survivors. Over the last few years, balling has been the worst problem, which is why I'm heading towards singles etc.

Hi Dave Im right up on the border 2 hrs south of brisbane, Delbards grow past recommended height here, very healthy I put 35 different varieties in. I love Maurice Utrillo. I dont spray, my main problem is a butterfly farm instead of roses. Paris 2000 would be a g8 breeding rose always has hips not one of my favorites as i do like more then a single. Red intution is propbably one of the most disappointing in the serious for heat and performance. Imperatrice farrah is my all time favorite pretty.

Va

I don't like getting into conversations like this online because it always looks like I'm having a go at someone or trying to offend someone... I'm not... None of what I'm saying is aimed at anyone in particular and pretty much reflects my own philosophy of breeding roses. It's really just me sitting on my

What I'm talking about goes way deeper than looks. Roses have suffered from 100 years of breeding for exhibition form. So long as it had a nice flower that's all that mattered. You could pump it full of fertlisers and fungicides and stick it on a vigorous rootstock and they looked fine(ish). What you have shown is what I am talking about. Sure, it takes a lot of careful research to produce seedlings that are nice, but you got that rose in one go with a single cross using the same set of genes we've been stirring around the pot for a hundred years. In essence a lot of careful selection has gone on before you got the roses and we are benefittnig/suffering from the hundreds of years of selection that has gone on to get us to this point. A study done on the genetic variation that exists between modern roses (of most groups; HT to HP... to miniatures etc) revealed that the modern rose gene pool is actually very shallow and that as time has gone by what we are actually seeing is inbreeding depression occuring despite the fact the breeding is being done by different people in different places at different times (I'll have to try and find the thread on RHA that mentions this study).

Please don't think I'm having a go at you or your roses. I love them for their look but I firmly believe that drastic changes are necessary to prevent roses from falling into oblivion (and they are on the slippery slope now), and these drastic changes will only come to fruition if people think out of the square and thinking outside the sqaure means not breeding within things that have been bred within for 100 years. You are thinking outsidethe square yourself by introducing species. Alister Clark did it by using gigantea. I am doing it by using a whole swag of species like sinowilsonii. It will take time and a lot of effort because you are recreating the wheel... but this needs to occur because it is going to get worse before it gets better.

Times have changed too. Bruce has, on more than one occassion, described the scene being repeated all around the country of people pulling out their 'Icebergs' to replace them with natives. Roses are seen as hard to grow and sickly requiring a steady chemical infusion to keep them happy and healthy. Take this away from them and a lot of them are very sad and sorry looking excuses of plants. I can guarantee that if you sent me that beautiful looking seedling above and I planted it here where it would get put into good soil but denied frequent pampering there is a good chance it would go into a steady spiral of decline because Charles de Gaule is terrible here. You are never going to get a rose that does well everywhere but you are not going to get close unless you start to introduce some hybrid vigour and species genes into the mix either. This is why your chromosome doubling ideas are such a great idea.

People are more aware of sustainable practises and this is reflected in the garden choices they make. I visited someone today who lived in a new estate and the entire estate had a caveat that forced them to only plant native plants. In a conversation I had recently with Ping Lim, a U.S. rose breeder, he mentioned that the Australian rose market was estimated at some 4 million roses sold every year. Why is it that more than 4 million roses are sold here every year but the majority of them are Flower Carpet roses... I'm not talking about the rose collector or breeder. I'm talking about the general public who does not want to spend lots of time or money in the garden. People who frequent this forum do not accurately reflect the general rose buynig public as we all have RMV (rose mad virus).

So... whilst your rose is beautiful, without a doubt, it is still a variation on a theme. New radical approaches to breeding need to be made and we need to do everything we can do to deepen the gene pool and toughen up roses everywhere and get away from this idea of needing picture perfect roses. Anybody can put two roses together and make something beautiful, but I would argue that it isn't really different in any other way except the way the flower looks. When you start using Teas, Chinas, Noisettes, and species in the mix... that's when I really sit up and take notice because this is what we need to be doing.

Remember, this is just my opinion. What you said earlier about having fun with it should also be at the top of the list of why you do it too.

One of the best things I find about this forum Simon is that it encourages my lazy[ or child numbed not sure which ] brain to think . Whether it manages to get outside of the square now , well that is another matter altogether.

Hi Sonya from me over here in W.A . Thanks for the show and tell with your babies . I rather like the little bi-colour in the middle .

cheers. Rosalie

simon I want to terminate my membership

Warren, please don't do that as I enjoy your input. Everyone has their own idea on breeding roses for their enjoyment and one day a good financial return.
I am still trying to get the necessary breeders to maturity to hopefully breed trouble free bushy roses. What a boring site this would be if we all agreed and were breeding with the same roses.

The rules are changing for councils are stipulating low water useage plants in Town House Complexes. They even check this just prior to final inspection.
Home sites are getting smaller and houses larger so small bushy plants are the future.

Don't go for we need you to breed some roses like I mentioned above.

Thanks Oze, A friend came up to me one day and said(you going to make any money out of these roses) I said to him , i do it for the love of it , the day you breed roses for money is the day you quality goes down. I get a buzz if I see some one get pleasure from one of my creations, when I approach growers it just so I can get them out there to bring pleasure, I am not overly interested what I will earn from them. Any way enough said