Hi, Jeanne - I love your pinata. A neighbor of mine planted one of the the south side of her house and I can see it when I walk out of my garage door. Her garden is no-spray as well. When I walk out of my garage door I see that pinata just showing off. It is a stunning rose. I thought it was JC, until I walked over one day to take a look up close and she told me that it was pinata. It is so pretty and the colors are so vibrant. The blooms seem to last for days too, b/c when it's blooming, my eyes go directly there every time I set foot in my garage. Hers hasn't started blooming yet this year, but I'm looking forward to the show. I've got to get one for my yard. Thanks for enabling me. Hope

While I agree that there are better climbers than Joseph's Coat, I feel obligated to defend it. Most of the clones on sale are suffering from RMV. A healthy clone is a vigorous rose and no more BS prone than any other modern rose. I have one purchased from Heirloom Roses (RMV free) and in its second season it is over the top of the arch and has bloomed at least some continuously - even in the heat and JB invasion. It will need spraying for BS, but it has all its leaves while a few modern roses in my garden, do not despite my spraying. I've not had any winter dieback either on an ownroot RMV free clone of the plant. It sure does garner the attention from my neighbors - the colors are spectacular.

I think I found a possible explanation for what I've observed often enough to keep bringing up that I don't strip on the first sign of leaf infection. If this does explain it (or if it's a good theory anyway), then it does seem to have to do with my choice of roses or the aggressiveness (lesion expansion rates) of the local strains of BS here. From http://www.rosehybridizers.org/Fall_2012_Zlesak_long_version.pdf "...We have blackspot resistance field data for the roses that are designated Earth-Kindî in the South Central US. As we correlate the mean lesion size in the lab with the percentage of defoliation due to blackspot in the field, r=0.62...So in this case there is a pretty strong trend that as lesion size goes up for a rose in the lab, the more defoliation we see for that rose in the field. Since different isolates of different races can be more aggressive and lead to different lesion expansion rates, it is very promising to see such a strong correlation in the midst of that variability. As more blackspot resistance data are collected from other ongoing Earth-Kindî trials involving some of these 70+ roses, it will be interesting to revisit the correlation between the laboratory and field data...." And the RHS has seen what I'm talking about, so at least I don't feel so crazy ;) http://apps.rhs.org.uk/advicesearch/Profile.aspx?PID=270 "Typically, a rapidly enlarging purplish or black patch appears on the upper leaf surface, with diffuse and radiating strands of the fungus sometimes just visible. Leaf tissues may turn yellow around the spots and the leaf often drops, even though other parts are as yet unaffected. At other times, the yellow colour does not appear, but infected leaves still drop. Sometimes, the spots remain relatively small and the leaf does not drop. [!]" I'm not trying to tell anyone how to do anything if it goes counter to their local experience, of course. I guess I'm saying that folks might wait a bit and see what happens if they don't strip leaves if the plant will be very defoliated if they did strip so many leaves that don't look too bad. See what happens, perhaps. Or not :) Here is a link that might be useful: Strategies and resources for breeding blackspot resistant roses, DAVID C. ZLESAK

wow, It certainly loves the spot its in.Its a real beauty and has so many different faces on it.Mine took off last year,like crazy and threw out piles of blooms, then the canes suddenly died,and now it has shot up about 6 or 8 little cames from the b ud union and about 2 ft high now,so maybe I will have more blooms later.Sure hope so. Jean