Dear Riku,

Thank you for making such a thorough reply, it makes it far me useful in understanding your situation. I'm pretty certain Anne is completely right about cold hardiness, and I'd always read that drying out in winter is a death sentence in cold zones, your experience seems to bear that out.

That's fascinating about Gertrude Jekyll, I believe it has a fair amount of Damask in it, do Damasks do better for you than other roses? If so, perhaps part of that is they do come from drier climates. I believe Albas have some percentage of Damask in them as well, but I could be conflating their parentage with Centifolias, that definitely do.

I've tried to think of something better for protection than peat for you to use, and can't come up with anything, unless it's some sort of fiber, but probably nothing is a thoroughly protective as the peat would be.

I also hadn't realized you were dealing with such alkaline soil! I have to say, I admire your determination, few people have as much as you, and you definitely deserve every success you've enjoyed.

--Ron

riku,
About alkaline soil and Laxa, I want to observe that I have alkaline clay soil and my numerous grafted roses are all on Laxa, and they do very well. I've used peat moss to amend soil at in certain situations, mainly in my propagating beds and when I was trying to grow acidophile plants (a total bust), but there I dug it in rather than leaving it on top, where I've heard does mat and prevent water entering. Otherwise, in our regular garden beds we just amend with hay and don't worry about extraordinary measures to correct ph. Dry soil in the winter and spring does sound like reason for concern.

Melissa

P.S. Of course there is the element of cost for roses grafted on Laxa. Ever thought of hunting for a source of plants for rootstock, and then grafting them yourself? This might be a ridiculous amount of work, but I offer the idea.

Gardening in Zone 3 is not for the fainthearted.

Where do you get roses on laxa? I'm not quite as alkaline as you are, 7.2 is very consistently the reading.

Hello Mad

I import under a 10 year, private, non-commercial (non-business) license from the Canadian government good for only one specific nursery in the Balkans. By blessed fluke or European common practise the nursery grafts nearly entirely on laxa according to the vendor - some own root - but definitely not multi-flora.

I do get losses at import and this years order of about 105 seems to have stablized at now about 10 roses lost or about 10% - only one Geschwind out of about 25 or so imported appears not to have made it.

Transport costs for ~105 roses by BA was about $850 for 48 hours delivery to the airport close by - paid directly to BA's broker - not the vendor.

I like this vendor as his charges are way below reasonable relative to Canada, and he has major exotic offerings relative to a Canadian market dominated by "hot" sellers that nurseries are required to carry to survive.

Shoot Ron,

Forgot your Damask question. After the first few years I kind of turned my back on the once blooming Damask ... due to poor performance of Mme Hardy for blooming.

Ignoring the survivors has lead to some surprises of late (last 4 years). The following are still alive and relative to zone 3 (all in north gardens) doing well but have their canes protected. But the real test is they actually bloom and some years well.

Hebe's Lip
Leda - Pink (from LC)
Mme Zoetmans
Blush Damask - maybe same rose as below - from Balkans
Pink Damask - (from LC)
Omar Khayyam
Rose of Castile

Portland damask are a no brainer up here and do well because they repeat. However I have weird thoughts about the rose du roi I get from a Canadian vendor versus the winter performance of its supposedly related Panach de Lyon. The latter always returns back "strongly" relative to RdR which has terrible, to feeble, winter performance and will usually give it up after winter 2 ... meaning I do not believe these two versions as named, and from same source bare any relationship to each other because of such diverse winter performance (IMOO). If I was to take a wag it must have some tea in it to be so weak.

I now have RDRFP from europe and will see how it performs relative to the other two if it makes it fully out of dormancy - real slow.

Riku,

I'm pretty sure the RdR from Canada are misnamed. If I'm not mistaken, one of their other portlands is the actual RdR (Vintage got a confirmation based upon a sport reversion, so that confirmed both roses). The real RdR is just fantastic, I love its colors, and for my area, the true portlands are totally disease-free. I'm not surprised Hebe's Lip survives, I believe it's closer to a wild rose.

Did I already ask you about Autumn Damask? That should be a good one for you, I think. I think Mme Hardy is not really a Damask, and that may explain the trouble you had with her, but it's a shame, because that is such a beautiful rose.

Anyway, I like hearing about your experiences, it teaches me a lot!

--Ron

riku,

Who's your Balkan vendor? The Balkans aren't far away. I believe there's a nursery in Slovenia that a good many Italian rose fans buy from.
I think a lot of European nurseries graft on Laxa: all the ones I've bought from, in Italy and Germany, have done so, and I think it's used in Great Britain as well. I don't know about cupshaped roses' part of the world, as I believe he has acid soil; I don't know what the alternative rootstock(s) would be.

Melissa

Hi Ron and Melissa,

Yes I do have Autumn Damask as labeled from Pickering and it has been a good performer when I managed in try 2 to get a robust one. An original from 2001 plant was weak and transplanted a few times to get it going ... the point I would be making is even though it was a low grade rating it made it without succumbing to zone 3 (still looks feeble). The replacements have been good performers.

I am a fan of two classes of roses that being the Portlands and Bourbons so any Portland news is of interest to me.

So as an aside ,you might find this interesting in terms of our own root discussion. To be honest in my own right the best Portland for winter comeback and survival has been - you ready for this ? - an own root Duchess of Portland purchased from Brentwood Bay Nurseries on Vancouver Island and according to my records planted in 2002 in the Portland bed. Never an issue returning from this winter and to this day a second one that showed up in the bed I have not managed to remember whether it was a personal cutting I grew in the basement or she migrated - to worried about digging down to find out - (following the "if it works, don't touch fear" I believe).

Finally from European I managed to get Pergolese, Rose Du Roi A Fleurs Pourpres and Delambre. Also have obtained a rose labeled only as Glendora and have been assuming it to be the found Portland though it shows up as an HP. Delambre has been a Don Quixotic endeavor as it has been ordered a couple of times from an NA source and both times I have ended up with Belle d' Crecy.

Melissa the European vendor I patronize is Petrovic Roses owned by Radoslav Petrovic from Serbia. If you get copy of Rosa Mundi from last year (don't remember the issue) you will see an article by him on his OGR/antique rose collecting efforts for his Serbia gardens. Great story how he got into collecting OGRs and the excitement as he managed to acquire new roses for his collection and hurdles he had to overcome to actually get them in the country ... very similar to what most of us, and no doubt yourself, who collect, have experienced with each prized acquisition. Petrovic Roses has been a fortuitous find for me to acquire roses I have heard of but can not get here ... and to boot grafted and grown on R. laxa.

So you are getting them from Europe. Nice. I should at least figure out if I have enough roseless space to fulfill the quarantine requirements. At the very least, I'll have to clear out some multiflora, but moving moyesii and setigera are a different matter.

Learning to graft may be a better way around the problem. I've tried to bud, and not succeeded. Given what grows around here, though, I should be able to find somebody who is willing to teach me how to propagate either apples or grapes. So long as I don't tell them I really want to propagate roses, that should be good enough. Then I just have to get some canina, which shouldn't be too hard.

riku,
Thanks for your response. Petrovic is in fact the nursery that some Italians on the forum I frequent have ordered from, evidently with considerable satisfaction. So it's in Serbia? I had been thinking Slovenia--Balkans, anyway. It's a small world! I need to take a look at his catalog: after all, import costs are considerably lower here in Italy than they would be in Canada.
There was something I was wondering about. I certainly get the impression that you're acquiring roses that no one else in your part of the world has--or you wouldn't have to order them from so far away--do you have any idea of linking up with a nursery so that your varieties can find a wider audience, or do you just share cuttings informally the way gardeners do? Is there too low a level of interest in unusual varieties in Canada for nurseries to want to carry these roses? I know that, for myself, once I get a rose that's wonderful for conditions in Italy, I want other gardeners to have it, too.
As a collector, I'm still taking baby steps, but the rose collection is coming along. My propagation the last couple of years hasn't been too satisfactory: I need to improve my methods. And finding a satisfactory placement for the roses, from the point of view of good garden design, is always a trial. But things are coming along. I have an easy life as a rose grower: you instead are heroic.
Melissa

Hi Riku,

Your Duchess of Portland "extra" very well could be a sucker. That one suckers more than any other Portland in my experience, it spreads like a Gallica. The flowers, growth habits, etc., make me think of Portlands as being repeat-blooming Gallicas. I don't think I have Delambre, the ones I have are: Duchess of Portland, Indigo, Rose du Roi (original), Pickering Four Seasons Rose, Duchesse de Rohan, Blanc de Vibert, Bernard, Marbrée, and Celina Dubos. I think Glendora is really a Hybrid Perpetual more than it is a Portland, especially since it grows quite tall (here and in Fresno they top 8').

I'm glad you're able to get Petrovic Roses, I really enjoyed his article in Rosa Mundi and the photos of his place. Quite beautiful!

--Ron

Multiflora roses produce an extremely large root system in our soil. I just moved a Pickering RdR planted in 2006--one of the roots was over 6 feet long. For practicality, I cut most of them down to 2 or 3 feet long. I've seen the same when I moved Apothecary's rose and Rosa Mundi--lots of very long vigorous roots.

That's of interest to me for roses - out of zone - I remove rarely have a root exceeding 2 feet as a length on the outside and that is after more than 2 years.

Very interesting to read these longterm perspectives :-)

Laxa is one of the most hardy root stocks there is only beaten by some canina varieties in tests. These test are numerous over the years some dating back to the 40's and to the extent they have been compared and are comparable they give mostly consistent results, regardless if they are done in Germany, France, Denmark, England or USA.

Most of these tests are done by commercial propagators and plant size at the time of harvesting is of importance. Laxa, multiflora and canina inermis gives comparable sizes of roses at harvest time, while under some circumstances other rootstocks have advantages. I think Canina Smith's Ideal is the most winter hardy but gives smaller plants. In some tests canina pfanders have showed advantages on some varities, especially HP's and climbers, but also takes most roses very well.

I cannot remeber exactly which canina variety, but one canina and one rugosa type gave largest and best plants in dry soil. Some did best when the growing temperatures were warm, wile canina grew best in colder periods. Canina is by far the rootstock that adjust best to different ph in the soil, both alkaline and acid. I have heard some speculation that laxa grows best in the type if soil it was first grown and grafted on, but no real testprogram on that subject.

Here in Europe a lot of different rootstocks are used, but laxa and multiflora are the most common, and some nurseries prefer some canina varieties especially on some type of roses. Laxa have the reputation of giving large plants with very large roots but when planted it is the rootstock that most often give plants that will not develop and grow as expected. Most nurseries have just decided that one type of rootstock is practical and laxa seems to be a very easy choice.

Some of these tests give data on roses grown in fields for as long as 6 years and even if some canina varieties gave smaller selling plants they showed to have less mortality rate and after three years they often gave about the same bloom as multiflora and laxa. Unfortunately most of these tests include only on modern roses like hybrid teas, floribudas and popular shrubvarieties.

This is interesting, Riku. Over ten years ago, I bought some grafted roses from a nursery in Maine that used to be talked about a lot here. I think it's gone out of business. All of them have walked off their rootstock now except except one. I was sitting here wondering what the rootstock was when I remembered Madame Hardy. I never planted her deep enough and rosa multiflora comes up every year along with her. Charles de Mills is toast this year. It hasn't bloomed in three years but has thrown out suckers all around it.
I'm doing much better with own roots but it takes some patience. Three years, generally. I have given up the idea of growing them in pots. The little bands go right in the ground. Next year, something comes up. The following year, they take off. Of course, I'm not fooling around with teas. However, most plants are only rated to zone 5, so if you worried about that, you wouldn't have anything to plant at all.

Hi again Riku

I have heard several gardeners complaining that peatmoss do not keep moisture well enough. If you can get cowmanure compost even the one mixed with peat is very different. It will change your soil completely. Cowmanure is slightly acid too, around ph 6 I believe. I have sandy soil and have for the last 8 years (some areas of the garden longer than others) used cowmanure and seaweed meal and the soil now is very different from what it was when I started.

I will be very interesting to see how longlived your roses are on laxa. Here canina seems to give the longest lived roses, but it is a very debatable subject.

I have noted your experience with Gertrude Jekyll own root and I shall make a cutting this summer :-)

Taoseeker,

Thanks for the information on the European history with long term use of their most common rootstocks. I find it interesting and very useful and hope for long term good results - more vigorous root growth translating into more resilient bushes. I do remember seeing a number of times R. laxa use mentioned in the hybridizing experiments by the Canadian pioneer prairie hybridizer. One of the Skinners I have is apparently a cross with it and a pimpinefollia - sorry have not taken the time to check if it is Haidee
Suzanne Butterball or all. Makes me wonder if that was the influence of their European ancestry, availability or factual superior hardiness - don't know but in 5 years I should. By the way very pleased to see very good cane survival for the first year on my Portland named Marie Jean I got from Lynnette last year when she gave up on it.

Melissa,

There is a gentleman in British Columbia I met through Lynnette who has made it a mission to collect and save Geschwinds. I need to let him know what I received and get him some cuttings. The two Canadian nurseries that I would be happy to share cuttings (gratis) that graft I have not approached as it gets too close to commercial for me and I would have to be absolutely sure that the roses are out of patent before even contact (most are over 100 years old so I am probably safe). However I sense both of them have absolutely the strictest of QA controls and would do it on their own so as to be sure of providence and disease free stock - if they survive winter and prosper I may contact them to guage their interest ... they both export to the States.

Kaylah

Hi, I was fortunate my Charles de Mills that I cover and is in the south gardens has 3 foot canes and lots of them ... problem is blooms are usually in short supply and last year I think I got 3. I leave it as it always grows well and takes to protection well. All my other dark gallicas are history except for the many exmaples of Belle d'Crecy I got as delambre - it also seems to survive well if covered ... but too much damage and the blooms are gone. All my cardinal Richelieu departed voluntarily over the years (3).

Me I fool around with teas but only in pots and bring them in in October ... got a couple new ones this year. My FMkruger ... is a monster in zone 3 (hahhaha) and I think I must of got the most vigorous clone of this tea via Quebec. Kids you not take a cutting - stick in earth in the house and it takes like in February when I accidentally snapped a branch off ... now I got two with the younger being already at least foot high in 4 months and has gone through one bloom cycle. But the one I really miss is Mrs Schwartz ... almost as reliable as Mlle Franz Krueger (sp) ... forgot to take a cutting and over wintered her in the garage and she and all the other ones died - fortunately had cuttings for 3 of them in the basement to replace them - there as tall in two 365 day a year growing seasons as the originals.

Ooops to be technically correct I believe the name is Marie de St Jean that did well, Jeune Henri, a like wise warm climate punted gift from Lynnette, is still a question mark ... can't find it yet.

What a coincidence. This year I also have planted Marie de St Jean too. It has taken me several years to get it. Every spring the last years I expected to get it but either the oculation did not take or I got the wrong plant. It is oculated on canina pfanders and planted just last week or so. I have never had bareroots this late, ususally get them early in april. It has four canes, looks healthy. I think it originally came from Vintage Gardens in San Francisco, this small rose has really been traveling ! (a friend if mine are totally in to roses). Roses very rarely comes from USA ! For me they are usually from Germany, Denmark or France, the largest and most commonly used producers. One should think that a cutting or a plant would be available somewhat closer but...lol. It took several years to find any who had the plant and it took some tries before the ocultaiton was successful. The strange thing is that now I know of several who grows it or rosariums that have it. Here in Norway not many are oculating roses.

I also got two Geschwind roses, Antonie Schurz,a Hybrid Perpetual, also small plants. Roses propagated here are often smaller then further south.

I remember an interesting thing that differed from rootstock to rootstock. Some types prepared for dormancy better than others, some grew and flowered until frost set a stopper fro the season. The type of rootstock that prepared for dormancy in autumn had less winter damages and lower death rate. Though this is something that is differs in different zones and climates.

So you have seen dormancy times differ depending on rootstock? Interesting. I've seen it vary widely by variety, and agree that roses that prepare early tend to survive better. It seems to be a big issue with Knock Out. It doesn't want to go dormant, and suffers damage as a result.

I've enjoyed reading this.
My wet year hypothesis may get a further work out this year.
The past three years in the rose garden have been dry well into early winter. Winter losses have been minimal. Mostly very small plants. (Last spring's severe freeze at the beginning of first bloom did damage the moderns deeply and they are still recovering or dead, but the damage last year on them was a smorgesbord of lethality.)
Now we are getting rains. And lots of spring cane growth, UNpushed by modern fertilizer. I had forgotten that spring growth can come that way, we've been so dry.

On an almost "how wet is it" joke level, it's been so wet that there was no abandonment of the ends of R. roxburghii. Moist and alive out to the tips.

So, many of the roses look good again. Now we'll either get a wet summer or a dry one and see what winter brings.

Finally, a comment on Riku's experiment and seeing grafted going own root, only to loose the own roots to winter.
Is it that the feeder roots can't take the shattering freezes of winter and that the potential down stem has been abandoned?
A friend in Asheville imported the Princess Diana rose, planted it in quarantine, and he photographed it after he dug it up to move it. It was on laxa, and the original roots were still functioning as were the rootlets coming off of PD.
Another question: grafted versus budded. I've seen some sections of the budded roses from the 30s and the contortions of the conduting tissues were major. I can see those budded roses abandoning the grafted rootstock more readily than I can see a nice,smoothly transitional cleft grafted rootstock.
(This would not apply to grafted areas that look massive like the ones from CA on Dr. Huey (I got a 2 year old passalong from CA that had a graft union the size of a Christmas fruit basket grapefruit) or some of the Fortuniana grafts of similar size. But in cold areas, I doubt that the graft areas ever get that large???)

More theorizing with small samples.

A fair amount of the roses we bought from Mike Lowe years ago were grafted, most onto multiflora. In general, they have never done that well. Roses budded onto multiflora from other sources have done fine, but there is a certain amount of evidence that they ran off the multiflora very, very fast. So yes, based on a sample of less than 6 roses, I'd say cleft grafted roses may very well leave the rootstock much slower than budded roses.

Etna seems to have come back from the dead in the last two years. It may very well have finally decided to go own-root.

mad gallica

I'm sorry I did not make it clear. The differing dormancy in rootstock is not my own observation, but something I read in an old book I found that involved testing out rosevarieties and rootstocks in Denmark and Norway. Some rootstocks gave larger plants and more flowers even after several years than others. The test lasted several years. I can look it up and give it to you more detailed, if it is anything of interest. One thing I discovered is that the rootstocks that is most widely used today have been used for a very long time, and it is the same type of rootstocks that have been tried and tested 60 years ago, some more than 100 years.

I have a friend that has propagated and sold roses for many years. Some years she imported extra for sale in spring, and when she imported from Eastern Europe she found that they often use the wild species that grow locally, not multiflora, laxa or canina inermis. That is 15-20 years ago, thing could be different now.

In my own experience I have not come to no definite conclusion of what is the best rootstock here. I have found that canina does better in very compact soil than multiflora, and canina is better for the albas and HP's. When we have old roses bought from UK they are all ways on laxa and they often just don't grow and develop here. I don't know why that is, it might be that they have been grown from seed in a alkaline soil and that they don't like the transition to a slightly acid soil. Laxa really should do well here and mostly do.

Interesting thread. Not far from Mad Gallica's garden and my soil is vey acid so multiflora is the rootstock of choice. And here we have wet falls - no problem about soil dryness in winter.
Certainly agree that unless the variety is very vigorous, grafted plants are much better for a cold climate than own root. Too many varieties are slow on their own roots and can't develop enough to survive the winters.
In our area, where multiflora is an invasive weed, plants on that rootstock develop enormous root systems. Remember when my sister decided to move a Chianti on multiflora - she abandoned the attempt to save most of the roots after the hole got four feet deep and main roots were still heading to the interior of Earth.
Incidentally, Pickering's Four Seasons - at least the one they sold under that name for many, many years - was a Portland. It bore little resemblance to the true Four Seasons which is a rough, thorny shrub with a very crowded inflorescence of pink, semi-double flowers. Grayish foliage. The true Four Seasons has not been that hardy for me though I still have it after 40 plus years.