Mine is the climbing sport. This is her at the end of her Spring show. I am in south Louisiana and she is my absolute favorite of all my roses. I don’t care if she balls. There are SO many blooms that don’t that it doesn’t matter if some do. I adore this rose. She has few thorns and laughs at pests and diseases and her canes are dainty. shes not like New Dawn. She’s very pliable. I just love her. A happy easy going floriferous old fashioned cabbage rose who doesn’t quit. Her foliage is a lovely green too.

Even if you decide to air layer, I would still try to root a few cuttings. You can use a styrofoam cup with holes punched in the bottom, but I'm using some really small clay pots now (they don't blow over). I purchased the Jiffy brand seed starting mix to root mine in. I take a fresh cutting, pencil thickness if you have it, nick the outer skin near the base of the cutting, dip it in some rooting hormone, and place it in a hole that you form with a pencil, firm it up with your fingers, and keep moistened. There are several articles on the ARS website on how to root roses. Everyone has a favorite method that works well for them. It's fun. Personally, I don't have much luck with the baggie method, they rot on me. I root mine in full morning sun, late afternoon shade, and mist them several times a day with my garden hose turned to the mist setting. Eventually, we'll set up some automatic misting heads to an irrigation zone. I am having a fairly high success rate, and I am a brand new newbie at rooting. It can take 4 to 6 weeks before they root. It's been thrilling watching the first ones I rooted bloom. Sandy

I had never heard the theory that roses live shorter lives in warm climates - interesting. Perhaps they were talking about grafted HTs? (For some reason, I have noticed that some folks in the last 50-60 years said things about "roses" when what they were really talking about were HT roses.) The really old roses I have are chinas or teas (or hybrids thereof like LV), or polyanthas. They are all on their own roots, or at least they are by now. I have never seen a "sucker" on any of them. Maybe they are closer genetically to the roses that are native to warm climates than whatever ones that theory applies to, and so of course they are happier in warm climates. Just guessing... Re shedding leaves, I have not paid much attention, but I have the vague idea that the old beat up leaves do fall off as the new growth emerges, whether that is in the Fall/Winter or especially the Spring. When I said 12 month growing season I did not mean to imply that the roses bloom as much in the Winter, it's just that they never altogether stop (I can remember one winter 20 years ago when they did stop - it was below 20 degrees F here for 2 weeks, day and night, without stopping. Lost several plants, but none of the roses, even the chinas or teas.) I love discovering rose "conventional wisdom" that turns out to be wrong-does anyone remember a source for the "roses do not live as long in warm climates" theory? Jackie

Hmm, maybe your PdO does have windburn/sunburn with some canker thrown in. I just don’t think it would be cold damage on that one. Having the perfect height and wafting scent, PdO would be a beautiful rose for either side of a gate. I put crape myrtles on either side of our pasture gate years ago, and now REALLY wish I had gone with fragrant roses instead…but once you have an established crape myrtle, you have it for life…not easy to move or kill. Would be a shame to move your PdO, but it doesn’t look happy. You have one on the other side that has the same type cane damage? Maybe pot them up for this year in a more protected spot to see if they recover. You could then move the pots back to either side of the gate next year to see how they do before replanting. That would give you an idea of whether it is the location PdO doesn’t like or if yours were just weaklings that needed some extra care at first. Hard to tell from the picture, but your DdB doesn’t look too bad to me…small, but still a good bit of healthy cane once you prune off the bad? My DdB seems to be more cold tender than most of my other teas and slower to recover from it. Mine really shot up last year, though, after barely growing at all the year before and starting last season off as a one foot stick. If yours is healthy, you may want to give it another season there to see what it does.