devon gardener: thank you for the 2 recs! I will look them up pronto. ann: that's amazing about your 4 bloom cycles with pruning Leander. I wonder if having a real winter helps with the rebloom. We have let our Leanders grow for probably 4 yrs without a trim, but it didn't improve the repeat. In fact, we started trying to trim them back every 2-3 yrs to see if the repeat would get better. Our best repeats have followed the winters with the heaviest rainfall (El Nino years). It's a rose worth keeping even with only a massive spring bloom - magnificent! I agree with you about RMV - I think the earlier imports of grafted Austin roses were generally healthy (all the roses I bought in the early 1990's thrived. When the English roses became quite popular, say from 1996 on, many were weak (& often mislabelled!). I had particularly bad luck with Star roses. Hopefully now the bigger nurseries are paying attention and cleaned up their rootstock. I have had good luck with some ownroot Austins, but certain varieties are hard to get going.

Jiminshermanoaks and I visited Gracie one marvelous afternoon for that trip. She was gracious, lovely and a real hoot! She was one of the "good old girls" network with June Grose and a few others. Very neat lady in all respects and none of them will ever be replaced. "Her rose" is a very lovely shrub in these parts. Those coral pink anthers, which don't often show well in photographs (but are rather well depicted in Lyn's); her ease of growth and incessant flowering make her well worth a place in anyone's garden. She grew in mine for many years and required nothing of me other than water. She isn't in my current one because I could never get her seeds to germinate nor anything worthwhile of her pollen. Had I the room, her rose would be here simply because of its beauty and to honor a lovely lady. Kim

I live near San Francisco, in California , which also has one of the few Med. climates. We have 3-4 months of continuous drought, each year during summer, so water preservation is a concern. Any plant i list here regarding water use, is a mature sized plant. Drought tolerant: I've never watered any of the Mexican Sage, which were on my property when I bought it, because they never need it. Long flowers of a deep lavender hue attract hummingbirds every day. c. 5 feet tall by just as wide. There are many forms of salvia that are drought tolerant. - It took me a long time to take to Succulents, but after I remembered my grandmothers growing ' Hens and Chicks' in her cottage garden, I added a dozen or so to my rose garden. I have several growing in a low bowl shaped container to show off their growth habit. I find their smooth texture adds interest to a rose garden. Pomegranite I keep mine to c. 5' tall by 6 feet wide, by never watering it. Since reading that the climbing rose, 'Sombruiel' is drought tolerant in our area, I plan to move mine so it is in the same bed as the Pom. Mexican Primrose, pink flowers that bloom nearly constantly through summer. plants are about 2 and 1/2 feet tall. can be invasive if given the right conditions. -Allysium, the white form has longer roots and needs less water. -Many of the native Med. plants are drought tolerant, allysium, lavender et cet. Shrub;'Breath of Heaven' has a great scent, and can be grown as a fragrant hedge. Last year I decided that any plant in my garden was going to receive a minimal amount of water during our drought and those that lived could remain. This did, to my great delight. Snow in summer' sorry I forgot the Latin name which begins with C... a low growing plant that spreads over an area of c. a yard. silvery green foliage and small white flowers. Rose Campion, another med. native that has silvery gray leaves. a flower that has been growing in cottage gardens for hundreds of years. I have it growing beside 'Westside Road Cream Tea' I do like herbs planted amongst my roses: smaller forms of rosemary, oregano, there's some fancy forms 'Kent Beauty ' is one of those, mother of thyme makes a deep green carpet and the flowers keep the bees happy. Lemon verbena near a path gives off a lovely and refreshing scent as one walks by and touches it. Poets Jasmine, again on a north facing wall so the shade lessens its' need for water. I'd plant it by a pink remontant rose as the jasmine does not re-bloom. Nasturtium. The hummingbirds love 'Empress of India', a red nasturtium. Forget-me-nots, I plant them on the sides of rosebushes where they only get half a days sun, and need less water that way. Average water: Scabiosa, there's a mauve form and a purple form that are very pretty. Violets and Parma violets give winter interest, Parma violets are water wise plants when grown in partial shade. Pelagoniums, I grew up calling them Geraniums, I have 'Roxanne' and 'Electric Blue'. Lilys. I prefer the scented Oriental lilys to the scentless Asian hybrids. I had to move all my 'Casablanca' lilies to a pot on a pedestal because snails ate an entire bed of my lilies. Water Wise, (Not quite drought tolerant, need to be watered twice a month in summer here) Lavender. I water French Lavender 2-3 times during a summer and Spanish lavender once a month. I find the shorter forms of lavender need watering more often so I don't grow them anymore. I plant any of my largest rosebushes which don't need support furthest out from the faucet, because they get watered only once a month in summer, and rarely in the other seasons because we do get some rain (usually) the rest of the year. Large self-supporting rosebushes: spray 'Cecille Brunner' I've seen this grown so it has one large basal cane and been pruned: -Into a large balloon shaped shrub. -into a hedge. Each plant makes a wonderfully fragrant hedge with good re-bloom, c. 8 feet long, by 3-4 feet tall, depending on how tall the person wanted it. My neighbor grows hers on the side of a shed. Mme. Alfred Carriere, this is drought tolerant when mature, in our climate. I only watered it twice this summer. I keep it to c. 6 feet tall by c. 5 feet wide, by shearing it 2-3 times back, each summer. Monsieur Tillier, can reach 10 feet tall by nearly as wide. In general the larger the canopy of a large rosebush, the deeper the roots grow, and are able to access levels of water that shorter rosebushes cannot. Susan Louise' a marvelous Hybrid Gigantea that blooms from February through December locally. Produces large roses in profusion that are a fresh hue of pink. Can be grown as a self supporting shrub, c. 18' tall by 9' across, which has the sillouette of an apple tree if limbed, I've also seen it grown as a 25 foot long climber on a 4 foot tall fence. A nice but light fragrance. - since your sister loves Lady Hillingdon, perhaps she'd like 'Anna Olivier' a shapely honey hued Tea rose with an intense fragrance, it's more richly hued sport is called 'Lady Roberts' and I envy her having such a sublime rose given her name. -Mrs. B.R.Cant' big pink roses on a big plant. I water this only half as often as I do my smaller rosebushes, such as my Hybrid Teas, and it doesn't seem to mind. Clematis; I plant them on the North side of the house so they get shade, and therefore need less watering. c. jackmanni is easy to grow. Best wishes Luxrosa

Anita, Poulsen's Pearl is gorgeous! I'd love to give her a try. Someone in Georgia grows it, but no one in Florida seems to grow her. Thanks for mentioning this rose. She'll go on my wish list unless someone has some bad news to offer. Speaking of bad news, then there's Michaelg offering a little break in the cloudy sky that he drags along with him. :)) (Just kidding. Reality bites. I know this well.) Mme Butterfly is lovely but appears to be both a double and semi-double, and I'm confused. There were a couple photos with ruffled petals & stamens on HMF. I liked them better than the regular HT-looking pics. Thanks, Michael. Sherry