Summer Roses - What's Looking Good This Week

This year, summer has seemed never ending, perhaps because of the unseasonably hot weather we experienced from October onwards, with just a small reprieve before summer really began in earnest in late November/December, and we still have all of February ahead, a month that is notorious for throwing lots of hot days our way.

With the hot and steamy days comes the humidity and with humidity comes the unwelcome pest-guest, Black Spot, on many of the roses.

I'm now feeding my roses every month and they are responding with lots of new red growth and many new flowers. Many of my roses are living a nomadic existence at the moment whilst they await completion of the new rose garden.

I love each of my roses. They are all different and each has been chosen because of some special appeal, such as an unusual growth habit, etc. One of my main criteria for selecting a rose for my garden is its fragrance and if it isn't fragrant, it needs to be very special in some other way.

Long Tall Sally, as the name suggests, has an unusually tall and upright growth habit. I believe ours is only about 3 years old and already she is delightful.

The sweetly scented single flowers grow in bouquets. The buds start a light apricot colour then fade as they open, first to a delicate pink and then finally a creamy white.

The centre or each is dotted with rich yellow stamens.


When I first saw this rose in a nursery, the mature display bush had somewhere between 20 and 30 blooms on each bouquet, and this was when I decided my garden needed a "Sally". Ours is a potted specimen and she lives in a wooden half barrel.



















I also have a couple of twin grafted patio roses. A patio rose is, like a standard, grafted onto a stem. The difference is only the height, a patio being approximately 60cm and a standard being approximately 90cm high.

With this twin patio rose, there have been 2 different kinds of roses grafted onto the stem, in this case the twins are Burgandy and Blushing Pink Icebergs. This combination works particularly well because the grafts are both colour variants of the Iceberg rose, with the same foliage and same growth habit and the branches from both grafts appear to become intertwined, creating a very eye-catching effect of two different flowers being produced by the one rose.

Generally speaking both colours usually bloom fairly equally, although the Blushing Pink side is flowering a little more proficiently at the moment.

Being so happy with the Blushing Pink and Burgandy Pink Iceberg patio twins, last year I decided to buy another twin patio, this time selecting the Iceberg (white) rose grafted with Bonica.. I thought this would be another wonderful rose but unfortunately this combination is not as successful as my other other twin rose. The foliage on the Iceberg and the Bonica are so different that the two parts do not meld well together. Whilst the Iceberg unceasingly throws out long and luxurious canes, the Bonica's growth habit appears almost cramped by comparison. So far Bonica has produced far fewer blooms than Iceberg and frequently the two parts have been badly out of sync, with them each appearing to be taking it in turns to flower. Also, so much strong growth on the Iceberg side does tend to make the rose a list to one side. All this being said, it does still have its own quirky appeal.

By the time mid spring arrived, I had vowed not to buy any more roses, at least not until the new rose garden had been completed and the poor nomadic pot roses had been settled into their new permanent home. That was until one of my local nurseries, a rose specialist, advertised  very intriguing "Rose Duets", which then necessitated a visit, if only to satisfy my curiosity. The Duets turned out to be two roses, planted very closely side by side in the same pot.

Needless to say, I did weaken and bought the combination of Neptune (right) and My Hero (below). These two roses make excellent companions, the foliage and growth habits are very similar and the flowers are also similar both in size, shape and even fragrance. These two roses will never join together and will live happily side by side for many years.

Another favourite is Love Potion.

I adore the beautiful colour and the slight ruffles of her petals. Not to mention the gorgeous fragrance. This little rose survived many years of neglect before I moved her into a more favourable position and gave her a little TLC. Although she was a little quiet last year (in recovery mode I think), this year, with the benefit of better pruning techniques learned last July, she has produced new canes from the crown and has already had two or three flowering flushes.

As an early Christmas present this year I bought my mother half a dozen or so Smooth Touch roses (much less likely to "attack" her) to add to her rose garden and at the same time I weakened and bought Smooth Moonlight for myself.

The Smooth Touch range is 99% thornless and the majority of them have a good fragrance, making them an ideal rose to grow around children or more mature people, or just because you want to.

At the moment Smooth Moonlight is in temporary (pot) accommodation, she will be moving into the new rose garden once it is completed.

Last year I also added Pope John Paul II to my collection. This is an outstanding white, very fragrant, very free flowering with a strong growth habit and lush green leaves.

Although I am not usually a fan of orange or yellow roses, Chicago Peace convinced me to break this rule. The soft yellow and pink are delightful and the fragrance is very pleasing.

Brilliant Pink Iceberg is a great rose to have in your garden. The growth habit is vigorous, without being rampant, the fragrance is moderate and the flowers produced by my bush interestingly cover a wide range of hues, from a brilliant to a pale pink.