Buford, I couldn't bring up the pictures...

Later today will take a picture of my Cramoisi, which is next to Mutabilis. Just too hot out there, now, and I'm a total wimp.

Love the pictures! The statues were just amazing.

Lovely, Buford. I don't have CS, but I do have Louis Phillipe and they are supposed to be similar in size. LP gets quite large, tall and wide. Mine were about six tall by eight wide before TS Debbie. They were significantly damaged, and I had to cut them back.

FWIW . . .

My (SoCal) Louis Phillipe is way over my head (6.5 ft? 7 ft?) and easily that wide.

My CS has remained a dainty thing, rather upright, and I don't think it's made 4 ft.

Jeri

Really, Jeri? I had read they were similar in size. I have climbing CS on order and am anxious to see the difference in the to blooms.

Maybe they are, everywhere but here. I can only speak to the plants I have.

FWIW, I was surprised, myself.

Jeri

My bush Cramoisi Superieur is also a mannerly shorty like Jeri's. Climbing CS is way more vigorous. Both regularly repeat bloom through the summer when the teas are sulking in the heat.

I have a young Cl. CS. Interestingly, some of the blooms are just like the bush form, Some, to my surprise, are single! Maybe this will change, but I think it's interesting.

Jeri

For us (Lakeland Florida), CS grows to be large as Chinas go, but nowhere near the size of 'Mutabilis'. Maybe ultimately 6' tall by 8' wide? 'Mutabilis' will go 8' tall by perhaps 15' wide, if unpruned. It also grows quite differently from 'Louis Philippe' -- LP is taller than wide, and CS is noticeably wider than tall.

"'Mutabilis' will go 8' tall by perhaps 15' wide, if unpruned."

*** Which explains how we killed our first 'Mutabilis.'

No one told me.

We planted it as tho it was a Hybrid Tea, and spent the next few years regularly chopping the poor thing back. (Yes, you CAN kill a rose that way, trust me on this.)
Our current 'Mutabilis' is down at the bottom of the garden, its closest neighbor 'Fortuniana.'
It can grow as big as it wants to

Jeri

In middle GA (95 miles south of ATL) my Cramoisi Sup is about 4ft. tall and about 3.5 ft. wide (5 yrs old). My Climbing C is my favorite (3rd season now) and is about 14-16 ft. The blooms on my climber seem to be a little larger than the shrub.

I have both Louis Phillipe and Cramoisi Superior, both from Vintage. LP is between 5 and 6 feet tall. CS is between 2 and 3 feet tall. The blooms are very similar, and both bloom well, but for me in my garden, LP is the superior bush.

kay

This is a really interesting thread. I've been following it and reading the replies to discover what gardeners on the forum have to say about these two roses. Climate can make such a difference in terms of shrub size and growth patterns; flower color, size, and petal count; remontancy; etc. I've always been completely peplexed when attempting to distinguish between Cramoisi and Louis P. If you show me a small plant of each, I couldn't ID one or the other to save my life. White streaks or centers? Both at times. Size and petal count? Heck if I know!

Jeri, your experience with Cramoisi and Louis P are the opposite of what I'd read or been told in TX, and Organic Kitten's experience is similar to yours. For you both, Louis P is a larger shrub. Mike Shoup and Liz Druitt suggest that Cramoisi will grow up to 6 feet tall and 4 feet wide or so in that region. The Antique Rose Emporium site states that Louis P will grow to about 3'-5' and Druitt says around 4'. In PDX, I chose to grow Cramoisi because I assumed (maybe correctly, maybe not) that a red china would remain a bit smaller here, and I'd always believed Cramoisi to be the larger shrub of the two.

If you all keep writing, I'm going to keep reading and learning.

Carol

But, Carol, my conditions are diametrically opposed to conditions at ARE (or ANY part of TX).

So, perhaps the difference is as simple as:
THIS is what the rose does HERE.
THAT is what the rose does THERE.

It is, in the end, location, location, location.

Jeri

That sounds absolutely right on, Jeri! I find it fascinating that two roses can reverse roles, so to speak, as these two red Chinas do in varous climates. Most of my experience with them occurred in TX. Wish I'd grown both in PDX when I had the room to do so. I'd like to compare them here. I don't know any PDX gardeners that grow them. How does anyone ever ID these old roses? You folks are good...really, really good!

Carol

So it looks like my closest neighbors (organic kitten and Magnum) have CS at 3-4 feet wide and 3 feet wide, which is smaller than what I was thinking. But that's good. I will keep the BIG spot for Mutabilis and I am thinking of putting CS in the hummingbird/butterfly garden. The Hummers love red, not that they will get any nectar from a rose. Now I just have to learn how to pronounce the names. I was corrected a few times at the cemetery outing (Rose people can be such snobs!, LOL)

Aww, Buford, tell 'em to put a sock in it. REALLY!

(I got laughed at, at the Water Board meeting, when I mis-pronounced "potable" water! Ours really isn't.)

But there's a nifty little book about pronouncing French rose names. Shelve it right next to the one on Gardener's Latin. :-)

As for identification ... Truth is, a lot of these Chinas were distributed as seed. So you have a jillion Red and Pink Chinas that aren't QUITE a known cultivar -- but close. And, gee, if I was a bride heading out for a place hundreds of miles from home, I might just take along "papers" of seeds: Mama's sweet peas, Gramma's red China Rose, and maybe Auntie's old Damask Rose.

What you'd get from seeds that actually germinated and grew, wouldn't be QUITE what the old rose at home was, but close. And a hundred and fifty years later, you'd have all these roses you couldn't quite identify.

Jeri

That explains a lot, Jeri, and it lets me off the hook, ID-wise. Buford, if I could just learn to speak French without my resilient Texas drawl rearing its head, I'd sound like a real high falootin' rosarian. Maybe you and I can take language lessons together. Or, alternately, we could carry lots of socks!

Carol

Buford also asked about disease resistance. I don't grow Cramoisi, but Pat Henry of RU considers it bulletproof, and the climate at GSP is very similar to that of ATL.

It's odd, but here in Asheville teas and chinas seem to get a lot more blackspot than they do in the middle and lower South.

My Korbel Canyon Red China that I got from Vintage finally is taking off like a bat out of heck. I also have a nice LP and Korbel Canyon is blowing it out of the water with vigorous growth. The leaves on it are already as big as the leaves on a seven foot tall Mutabilis and it is only just under three feet tall.