hi - well, the verdict is in. trish/ashdown is clearly vindicated; was there really any doubt? the buds and thorns still don't really resemble the above pics, but the rose is le vesuve. i must have been confident as i placed it in a prime location. one that is very difficult to access - and fortunately, there it will stay, hopefully, to bloom and bloom and then bloom some more. jeri - you know, i feel sort of foolish. i didn't make the connection between your screen name and uncommon rose's hybrid musk introduction. to have a rose named after you is a singular honour and high compliment. it is my understanding that this tribute is well deserved. hopefully, i will add this rose to my gardens next year. one of the best, and the worst, aspects of rose gardening, is that there is always next year. and a new rose to welcome. christie

Jackie, I have no experience with OLD roses, and my Le Vesuve is a mere baby in comparison to yours, but I have wanted to post on this rose since recently observing the way mine is growing. I'm afraid anyone who has ever seen RRD would be petrified to look at my bush. I was amazed to see new growth that looked like the witch's brooms of RRD. Now this is different in that it matures into normal growth, but that new growth was coming out of the end of older canes every whichaway and was voluminous. The bush is truly becoming a tangled mess. I wanted to ask someone if it would be wise to trim out some of that new growth to keep the bush from becoming so entangled (maybe pulling it off at the growth point the way you do rootstock suckers) OR would that just promote more growth as is typical with Chinas. Now that you mention yours growing "around in circles and intertwining with each other", I can see the beginnings of that on my bush. I can barely reach into the bush because the growth is so dense. I can see where the soft new growth could easily and often bump into another branch and be forced another way - through, in between and around older growth, creating curls and circles. Does anyone have an answer to this possibly destructive growth habit? Or should I just stand back and let him be? My plant has not achieved symmetry yet (I think the neighbors must be wondering why I don't shape him up, but he's almost there), but about 75% of him does overlap the edges of his 6' round bed, and he's at least 4' tall now. I was also wondering if you shouldn't also cut out a few of the oldest canes on your bushes (not just the dead stuff). Do you think he'd put out new basal growth like a climber and thereby rejuvenate himself? Sherry

I have, at various times, had 4 different plants of Le Vesuve. They all were own root, and I live in the SF Bay Area in No Calif. All of them grew rapidly until they reached a size of about 7-8 feet tall and 7-8 feet wide and about 6 feet deep. For some reason Houzz has decided today not to let me post any pictures, otherwise I would. Jackie

Etoile de Lyon blooms are always yellow, and look just like AO blooms when it is in its yellow mood. That's how, IMO, they got mixed up in commerce. "Bermuda AO" is really EdL. According to Vintage Gardens, they also had the wrong rose as AO. My ancient AO in my garden was IDd because I took some blooms to a Celebration of Old Roses and put them on the mystery table, and by chance the Australian tea rose ladies were visiting, and were able to ID those blooms, as the correct AO was still in commerce in Australia. Then Vintage Gardens re-introduced the correct AO back into commerce in North America, from cuttings of my rose. They sent it all over to old rose nurseries - they told me they did not want it to get lost. So fun! The pics above are from a bush which I grew from a cutting of my old ancient one, which we think was at least 100 yrs old when it finally died a few years ago. Jackie