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Having read a few posts on roses, I'm just curious...

Oh dear hard to answer, I have a love/hate relationship. I love the flowers and the perfume but hate the blackspot, thorns,and all the other diseases they seem to get. I guess that would make me a, I don't know...how silly is that. ;D

non-edible?
i like the wild hedgerow roses because they produce rose hip - which is excellent for tea.
otherwise, they are just another flower to me.....

None of the above.

I like the old fashioned ones and climbing ones in cottage gardens - i.e. other poeple's gardens. I do have one, but it was given to me and i would not have chosen one for myself. Also, I don't get on with them - I had two at my previous house and was plagued by blackspot, greenfly, etc. They don't really have a place in my garden.

Have to say that I am  a bit like Val.  I adore the smell,especially the old roses,  hate the thorns, blackspot and the greenfly.  Hate pruning.........does anyone really know how to do it... I have heard so many different ways. I do only have a few and then only for the scent.

How can you live without them?? Is there anything so perfect??

Wife excepted!!

My opinion of roses would have to go in the Watershed !
I don't even like the smell that much!

Some old variety roses smell divine!  I adore them and if I had a bigger garden, I would have zillions  ::)

I love roses and choose varieties mostly for their fragrance.  I inherited some very old climbing roses when I bought my house.  I don't have a clue what they are but they are disease free and smell wonderful.  Their scent fills the garden in the evening and their white flowers show up even when it's quite dark. I don't feed them but I just trim them a bit as they are by the path.  I dead head them as the flowers fade but that's it.  Their fragrance is delicious.  I think they must be a very old variety but they fit in well with the shaded Victorian green garden.  It's so dark in places that only white flowers show up.
Roses will be grown long after other plant fashions and withered and died

Yuck!

Your garden sounds gorgeous Wardy !  Roses do smell nice, especially as the day draws to an end. 

I bet you have lots of other beautiful perennials in your victorian garden.  Any chance of a photograph?

Take care -  :)

Love.

Absolutely gorgeous.

Wish I had room for more!!!!!!!!!!

A garden without a rose is not a garden (in my personal opinion).   Their wonderful perfume is great for lifting the spirits.   

I prefer hybrid tea roses as my grandparents always had several varieties in their garden & the smell of the flowers always reminds me of two wonderful but sadly departed people.

Like Wardy I love the climbers the only thing is they don't seem to like me - they always seem to bite!!

We have a 'new' garden (rescued from thousands of horsetails last year - the battle against them will soon recommence!!) so I have only planted some climbers this time - my favourite is 'New Dawn' loads of flowers, gorgeous smell and doesn't seem prone to usual problems.

Absolutely right !  An English garden wouldn't be a proper one without roses....

I can't wait for my arch to be covered in them.  Have a tag somewhere which bears the name of the roses, they will be tiny Bright red ones and very fragrant !

Happy rose growing everyone !

;)

Bought six Climbers yesterday ???

First time....for the Mrs!!

Hope she enjoys them Tulip-23!

I love them but probably in other peoples gardens.  The problem is they don't like my conditions (dry soil, wind, sea air) and the one or two I have tried have really never been happy, the leaves go brown and curly and the blooms mis-shapen :-\  This is a terrible shame as I'd love to have more of them as they're just lovely when well grown and so many of them have fabulous scents. Ah well, I'll just have to dream when I'm visiting other gardens!

Iain

Marianne :)

I hope so !!    Mind they were´nt that expensive either at our Local Lidl Cost 1:39 Euro per Rose ???

                                Mike

Iain,

I wonder why your roses are mishapen and the leaves brown??  Your soil may be too dry and needs some leaf mould dug into it ??  It's a shame.  I am sure there must be something on these very good boards that explains what type of soil roses require.  I'll try and have a look.

Tulip-23,   ;D - Now that IS cheap!  Never seen them that cheap in this area !

For,

four for my wife

:D

Col

(http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y40/simon404/rose.jpg)

Gorgeous rose S404!  What is it?  Mary Rose?  Gertrude Geykll.  Do tell   Whatever it is it's lovely  :)

Sorry I dont know, it was here before me! Perhaps someone can recognise it?

Against, well in this neck of the woods. they end up as twigs because we all get blackspot so badly, so I am an anti-rose person!

That is a beauty !  I bet it smells heavenly too !
I think it contains the word "floribunda" in its description, probably meaning that the plant gives loads of flowers.

Lucky you !

Diseased roses is because we have cleaner air.  When the air was polluted with sulphur (as was the case near us until recently) we didn't get blackspot.  Now these toxic sites have closed down we're getting it again.  I'll just have to search out disease free varieties as I don't spray.  the only thing I use to spray roses with is water or water with fairy liquid, or garlic water which is very good at zapping aphids  ;D

Wardy ;)

Does that really work on the Beasties Garlic Water
Serious ???

It doesn't kill them - it's supposed to repel them.  I plant garlic under each rose just to be sure  ;D

Poetry by A.M. Juster

Against Roses

A long eugenic past
reduces roses to
a vain and pampered caste.

Their charm is artefice
their fragile shell of cells
unfit for wilderness.

Their languid symmetries
and anorexic airs
exalt deformities.

A run of blossoms, thick
and tangled by the road,
displays a truer pick.

prefer the bindweed vines
that cannot stand alone
yet clench the mossy spines

of trees and grasp as tight
as nightmares or disease
while hoarding hints of light.

By cloning a delight,
obsessing towards as some form,
we dull what should excite.

A rose bouquet contrives
to label wordless joy
when nothing true survives.


:D

I love roses and have put myself in the 'for' category, but have never grown them - no space in a flat   :)

To combat the beasties, I used to spray with just water and elbow greace.  Start at the top and work your way down the stalk.  It worked every time !
;D

Can't afford the water we're metered, and all 4 butts get empty very quickly in the summer.  :'( :'(