Hi Caroll, this is from Carol! :) I'm surprised Molineux had come back for you (even protected against the house). Had it lost any vigor? Mine survived in a raised area over one winter, but it was obviously not suited to its environemnt. It only regained two canes and had one flower. On the other hand, these should do very well for you. 1. Brother Cadfael - great if you have dry summers (you probably don't). It got tons of buds which were beautiful and large. The bush got up to 3 1/2 feet for me. It was quite floriferous!!! Only problem was that it balled quite a bit in the 3 summers before I moved. We had 3 years of tons of rain. With protection and in an exposed area it had about 1 1/2 feet of green cane for me. Although, under your eaves, it probably wouldn't get too much rain. In that case this would be a fantastic rose for you to get!! Can't remember if there's fragrance. I think there was. This is a great rose! 2. L.D Braithwaite - wonderful fragrance. Gorgeous flowers. Tons of flowers. Same area as Brother Cadfael. This one doesn't ball. The blooms last FOREVER. Get this rose!! My fav. 3. Eglantyne - very hardy - can't say much about it because I planted it in the fall, then it overwintered (really well) and then we moved. 4. Golden Celebration - my only rose to get a little bit of BS. But I love this rose!!! I bought it again for this house because the shape of the plant is arching - great for pots which I'm now using. Gorgeous flower, scent. Lots of blooms. Wow!! About 1/2 foot of green cane in an exposed area, but winter protected. 5. Mary Rose got about 6" of live cane - but very exposed area - planted in a huge raised bed right against the wall. It didn't get many flowers. I think it needed more time and a better location. 6. A Shropshire Lad. - survived its first winter with about 2 1/2 inches of live cane. Didn't even get to see a flower since we moved. But it did get large. 7. Abraham Darby - progressively got smaller and smaller after every winter until it didn't come back. But heavenly scent and gorgeous roses!!! But IMHO, if Molineux has good vigor for you, year after year - then you could try any Austin. Good luck!! I love pushing the zones too! Carol

For what it's worth, here's what I do to my vegetable garden. I don't bring anything from elsewhere, I use what I have in my own yard. I don't use deep mulch anywhere, as I also agree it would get in the way. Every time I mow my lawn during the growing season, I spread the clippings between my vegetables and some of my flower beds. If I'm in the mood , I sometimes add a thin layer of my chopped leaves saved from the previous year and then water a bit to keep them from blowing away. The grass clippings have kept the weeds down and appear to hold moisture even during the hottest times. As soon as one crop is finished and pulled, I start composting my kitchen scraps directly in the vegetable garden. As each crop is finished, I start my trench composting in that area also. Each time I add something, I use a garden fork to stir it around a bit, and then make sure it's buried. To heck with putting all my stuff in the compost bin, waiting, and then having to shovel it onto the garden anyway. This saves me a step. Just to make sure it was working, I dug up some of it in September, about a month after burying it, and there were no visible pieces. Once fall comes along, and there's dry leaves all over the place, I mow my lawn, dump the bag into a row, mow over it to chop the leaves more, dump, and mow again until the leaves are finely chopped. I throw a thin layer all over the lawn and then I dump most of the remainder on my garden and basically semi double dig the garden to incorporate my mixture into my clay soil. The next time I mow, it's primarily dry leaves, so I chop them up in the same manner, and dump a thin layer all over the garden and flower beds. I keep 2-3 big garbage bags full of dry chopped leaves to use in the spring and summer of the following year. My clay soil is easier to dig than last year and I have no reason not to believe it'll be better year after year :) I'm confident that as I age I'll be digging less and less. Keep in mind that I have the time to do all this and it may seem like a lot of work. Good luck with whatever method/methods you choose to experiment with.

WooHoo! I received my box from Melinda today. It was packed full of wonderful goodies. She sent chocolate covered peanuts chocolate peanut clusters a garden puzzle to keep me occupied until spring brown paper bags to collect seeds in a package of floral note cards a journal for gardening a windowsill greenhouse plastic seed envelopes jiffy peat pellets sharpie ultra fine point markers a package of address labels a package of bubble envelopes two adorable bunnies for my garden a packet of gardeners hand therapy and the following abundance of seeds: Jacob Cline monarda cosmos picotee pony tails stipa grass marigold citrus mix cambridge blue sage black prince snapdragon royal bride snapdragon calendula bon bon mix cereinth shrimp plant sidaldea rosanna salvia east friesland malva bibor felho dianthus siberian blues chianti sunflower limonium latifolium sea lavender liatris floristan white phlox david nasturtium moonlight nasturtium scarlet gleam nemesia shooting stars nasturtium dwarf cherry rose nasturtium empress of india delphinium blue duet mix oneothera pink petti coats nasturtium night and day columbine dorothy rose columbine rose and ivory helenium mardi gras columbine cardinal columbine winky blue and white rudbeckia cherry brandy rudbeckia goldilocks rudbeckia kelvedon star Melinda you rock! I love everything! There were so many seeds from my want list and I can't wait to try all of the others too. I'm playing hookie from school today to wait for the man to come and install the phone and new internet so this was a wonderful surprise for me. I was sad because I had the day off and nothing to wintersow but you made my day. Thank you so much! You did a wonderful job! Becky

I finaly looked up the ZD rose, It sounds much like the Peggy Martin except the color looks a little deeper and it may not have the multi-flora bunches of blooms. i can't wait to get one. i've found that the Peggy Martin roots best if layered in the ground in the fall. I don't cut them loose from the mother plant until spring and I wait a few weeks before potting up the baby plants. they tend to go into shock when moved but usually recover nicely in a couple of weeks. Once they are established - look out! They grow like crazy! Here is a link that might be useful: garden tips