I have rose hips that should be fully ripe in about another week. Are you able to wait? If you are, I'd be interested in trading hips for butterfly columbine, if you're not, please post how the tea turns out anyway. I've always thought about making rose hip tea, (my roses get such nice rose hips) but I've never done it. Just call me chicken.

They don't need to be dried, they do need to be scrubbed clean of any pulp from the fruit. And will benefit from a moist chill too.... Druse- Rosa: Sow outdoors barely covered, some light may be beneficial to germination. Or moist chill 90 days, followed by sow at 55F. Germination may be erratic depending on the rose, 30 to as long as 365 days.

My Carefree Beauty came from Chambless and my neighbor's came from Heirloom. Mine is 3-4 years older than hers and they are now about the same size if I let mine go. She is growing hers on a tripod thing and pruning it in such a way to keep its canes loose and growing like a mini climber, while mine is a real shrub. I keep mine at about 5-6 feet tall and about that wide. Hers is more narrow but probably 8-feet tall. It is a very nice rose and a constant bloomer.

No, I don't know anything about the white one. Never even heard of it before. But I did use to grow the regular one. It was a perfect bush. Wish all roses could be that healthy and nicely shaped. Yes, her blooms lasted a nano-second, but they looked nice and had large petals. I had to remove her long ago because she quickly outgrew the limited space I had for her ... way back then I didn't know you couldn't trust the sizes stated by the vendors when you live in the south. I still grow a smaller sized descendant of Carefree Beauty ... 'Thomas Affleck', hybridized by the Michael Shoup organization at The Antique Rose Emporium. Carefree Beauty was a good momma, imparting much of her toughness to her offspring. Randy