Which are your favourite roses this year ?

I put in some new roses last year and they are coming along nicely , the ones that i love out of all the roses are , Fragrant Cloud , Valencia , Firefighter , Olde Fragrance , Camp David , Jubilee Celebration , Baron de Rothschild , the others are good roses too , but these i wish i had room for more of the ones i have named .   Which roses are the ones you absolutely love to bits ...

See Maree you've made me jealous now. Of your favourites I have 2 Fragrant Clouds and Jubilee Celebration. Both of these are underperforming. FC suffered major collapse last spring, I think due to unstable root system after strong winds. They are slowly recovering. Jubilee was a small plant and has grown slowly but not robust. It seems like a delicate plant, has needed lots of water and droops easily. Valencia and the Baronne I plan to plant this year, can't wait. I love the flowers of Olde Fragrance but thought it might be too big here. How big has yours reached?
So far stand outs for me have been Jessika, Best Friend and Queen Adelaide. All new last year, fabulous blooms, strong growth. Also Grimaldi has been a superstar - no perfume but covered in glorious blooms ALL season, hasn't stopped. Two more favourites: Darby Bussell and Munstead Wood. I posted earlier that Munstead was disappointing this year. Well it's making up for it, just superb when in full flush. I should post some pix.

Silky , my Fragrant Cloud is going gang-busters its in the back garden , its a standard , i love it to bits , thanks Betsy , my mum and sisters have had it in previous gardens , but somehow i didn't , Valencia the colour is so unique , love this one too , Jubilee was a sickly rose when i got it and has only slightly improved , but it still puts out blooms , Silkie roses are going to replace it , i don't think it likes full all day sun , Baronne has taken a couple of years to come on and at the moment is lovely .  Olde Fragrance puts out long canes and needs a lot of staking and tying or the canes will brake off in the wind, its a tall rose , probably grows to 1.8 i think . I would love to plant Jessika , B.S and Q.A but no room , good to hear Munstead is going well .... just wish it would rain, nice steady rain , oh well can only hope ....

Yes Olde Fragrance sounds a bit too big for me. I don't want any really tall ones. I have a Graham Thomas planted 2 years ago and it is sooo vigorous, close to 3m tall despite my hacking and the possums pruning. That's fine if you want flowers way up so high you can hardly see them, much less smell them. Flowers are nice but I'm not in love with it.
Interesting your Jubilee took time and doesn't like too much sun. Mine is the same, on the twiggy side but beautiful flowers. It will get a bit of shade from other plants. Mine is next to Abraham Darby which is shaping up really well. Huge beautiful flowers, lovely perfume.
Yes, we need the rain. All I seem to do is water, dreading the water bill.

Yes , the water bill , my husband came waving it at me the other day , look he says , its $100.00 up on last year , to be honest i thought it would be more than that , i've got one last patch of ground left in the back yard which i was eventually going to use for a chook run , but i might have to put another water tank there as the six no dig vegie patches will be up and running this year, more water , bigger water bill , oh well , its all worth it , love the garden ....   Is Graham Thomas a small climber or a big rose ?

Hahaha, my husband does the same. Still think of all the money you will save growing all your veggies. Nothing like home grown tomatoes! YUM!
Chooks...we had them when I was young, brings back memories of collecting their eggs and digging up worms for them. There is a bit of work in keeping them healthy. Graham Thomas is just a big rose but can be a small climber I believe. Unbelievable growth but the ratio of foliage to flowers is a letdown IMO. It's the only rose the possums love!

Think i'll give the chooks a miss , rather be digging in the dirt than keeping chooks healthy , home grown tomatoes yep can't beat em , glad you mentioned Graham Thomas , gosh David Austin gives it a huge rap , but then DA's do perform differently here than in England ..

That's why I got it, everywhere I looked it got rave reviews. Maybe it gives more flowers when it's got a solid structure. I'll wait and see. It sure is healthy but as I said any blooms wave around way up high. Too tall to deadhead even. There seems to be so much variation with DA roses, and they seem to grow much bigger here in OZ.

From what i have read Silky it does need to be trained and supported ..

Flower production: Firefighter hands down. One of my plants in particular just never quit, rain or drought, heat or cold, leaves or no leaves. Next comes Fragrant Cloud, which only paused for breath during January. Bloom bloom bloom. Blew faster in the vase this year, but that's maybe my fault.
Loveliest and most haunting fragrance: Valencia, as always
Biggest surprise: Ebb Tide. Quantity of blooms and general health just was everything I DIDN'T expect from this rose-present from a friend.

Note to fellow pot growers: I used liquid potassium this year, and I am not happy with the results. I thinki the stuff runs through the containers too quickly, and the upshot is that this has been my worst year for flower production, ecept as mentioned above. Next season, it's back to the dry potash.

Betsy , how old is your Ebb-Tide , they say it takes 4-5 years for it to mature , and fragrance , has that improved ?

Maree, my Ebb Tide is young. It was delivered to friend as a bareroot from Treloars last July.  I think Treloars bareroots are , what, 1 1/2-2 yrs old? So this plant wouldn't be much older than 2 1/2 years right now. I guesstimate the height to be maybe 2ft from to leaf to ground.

The fragrance definitely has a way to go, though. To other people, it's nice. To me , it's tsill a fairly basic acidic scent, no complexity. As for strong cloves, here is the sleeve up which I am laughing.

Haha Betsy. My Ebb Tide has been in the ground 2 years now, 2ft high, bit stingy with flowers, fragrance there but doesn't do much for me, especially as I have to bend down lowwww to get a whiff.

I bought a Ebb Tide when it was first released , i put it in a pot to see how it went , i was so disgusted with the small, pale , purply ,grey flowers and a faint perfume that i yanked it out and threw it in the bin , i think thats when i realised that rose companies can exaggerate and stretch the truth somewhat ....

Never in a bazillion years would I have bought an Ebb Tide for myself. I was tempted to throw the gift thing out and re-purpose the large pot it came in. Didn't get around to ripping it out of the pot for a few weeks after it arrived and the next time I turned around, it looked like this
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I thought it was a freak flush, and that those 15 buds would be it.  Nope. After 6 weeks, it started budding again. Ten more buds. Blooms on both occasions lasted well on the bush, turned a pleasant puprle-merlot, and didn't go grey daggy as they faded.

I still think it's a freakish plant. It's just started to form yet more buds. I suspect it's confusing itself with its parents, the nearby Sweet Chariots.

PS: The Ebb Tide and the particularly booming Sweet Chariot from same friend came potted up in "Lush Growth" potting mix by Beresford Park. Next season I'm going to repot  everything in that stuff

Well Betsy all I can say is...wish mine looked like that! Good to know that there is at least one plant out there that is a goodie.
Your garden looks gawgus, all that greenery and mature trees - love it!

Well , if i hadn't seen it with my own eyes , i wouldn't believe it , maybe it just likes your climate Betsy and the view it gets , happy rose lol !!

Climbing Teasing Georgia    Performs every year without fail   

betsyw wrote:Flower production: Firefighter hands down. One of my plants in particular just never quit, rain or drought, heat or cold, leaves or no leaves. Next comes Fragrant Cloud, which only paused for breath during January. Bloom bloom bloom. Blew faster in the vase this year, but that's maybe my fault.
Loveliest and most haunting fragrance: Valencia, as always
Biggest surprise: Ebb Tide. Quantity of blooms and general health just was everything I DIDN'T expect from this rose-present from a friend.

Note to fellow pot growers: I used liquid potassium this year, and I am not happy with the results. I thinki the stuff runs through the containers too quickly, and the upshot is that this has been my worst year for flower production, ecept as mentioned above. Next season, it's back to the dry potash.

Thanks for that info on liquid Potassium, I to used the liquid and it seemed like I never used any at all.   

Well for me, my standouts have been, Neptune, Bright Spirit, Child's Love and the ever reliable Honey D'jon

Paul I remember being quite taken with Child's Love if I recall correctly. Pink, frilly petals, strongly perfumed? Is that the one? It was a lovely thing.

silkyfizz wrote:Paul I remember being quite taken with Child's Love if I recall correctly. Pink, frilly petals, strongly perfumed? Is that the one? It was a lovely thing.

Yes Silky, great fragrance quite vigorous and plenty of thorns ouch

Ain't it the truth about that expensive liquid potassium, Paul? I'd have been happier mixing it with tequila, and pouring it down my own throat.

I forgot to add Sightsaver to my list of favs for the year. I think when she gets older, and actually gets a decent uptake of potassium, the buds might be more-of.

A few challenges the last few months. My top "girls" have been:
'French Lace'
'Ashram'
'Oklahoma'
'The Squire'
'New Duet'
'Eyes For You'
'Olde Fragrance'
'Tess of the d'Urbervilles'

And for the spring-only:
"Bridezilla" (aka Rosa longicuspis var. sinowilsonii... I think)

And for the newbies this year:
'Wisley 2008'
('Amazing Grace' and 'Flemington' are doing well but not as much growth on as Wisley)

betsyw wrote:Ain't it the truth about that expensive liquid potassium, Paul? I'd have been happier mixing it with tequila, and pouring it down my own throat.

I forgot to add Sightsaver to my list of favs for the year. I think when she gets older, and actually gets a decent uptake of potassium, the buds might be more-of.

Ah tequila and potassium, Hmmm tequila sunrise and potassium would make a nice coloured sunrise lol