Rosa Colored Glasses

Since before I can remember, I have had an indifference to roses. While, I don’t necessarily dislike their fragrance, habit, flowers or their over saturated market prominence; I could never find a reason to fall in love with the humble rose. To me, the overpriced cut flower marketplace was the only location for roses. A cool dozen, wrapped in tissue, and packed in a box.

Tea roses were the biggest joke, an unnatural combination of a hardy rootstock and a single unsightly bud graft. These roses required more care than tiptoeing through party politics in the primary season. Ensure the bud is protected over the winter, but not too deeply covered. Cut back to 2′ in early winter, and then back to 1′ in early spring. Monitor moisture in the monsoon season of early spring- too much water=death. Monitor insects and diseases since the rose family is afflicted with every disease in the plant kingdom, and some from the animal kingdom. This is the only genus I know of that has a solution to a disease that causes a different disease, but I digress.

In recent months, I have found myself being drawn to roses, and why not? They have a society dedicated to the “enjoyment and enhancement” of roses. Tens of thousands of people can’t be wrong, can they? However, it is not the mass marketed carefree “series” (note to the masses- “series” in horticultural terms means true breakthrough + seconds and thirds=lots of $$) or the more well know hybrid teas that draw my eye, but rather the non-conformist rose, the roses that the hard-core enthusiasts enjoy. The English roses are better known by their most famous breeding house, David Austin.

While browsing the selections, I can’t help but notice the differences between some varieties. The perfect rose is a taller (6-8′ tall), highly fragrant, standard variety that can be used for training on a fence. Heronswood has carried Rosa ‘Glorie de Dijon’, ‘Darlow’s Enigma’, and ‘Paul’s Himalayan Musk’. Although amazingly gorgeous, they are a little too tall for my shorter growing needs. Although not an Austin bred variety, ‘St. Swithun Climbing’ might be the rose that has the opportunity to alter perceptions, and change the opinions of one lone horticulturist.