Couldn't agree more. Although it shows that different roses work for different people. If I could only have one rose, Rose de Rescht would be on my shortlist. I think it's about the perfect landscape rose.

Most of my Austins are going or gone. Jubilee Celebration--ugly bush, not my favorite color. Teasing Georgia--health problems and an octopus. One down, one to go. Falstaff--after the last wimpy bud opens, it's hitting the compost pile.

Golden Buddha was given a couple of years to be some color other than an insipid orange. It's gone on to someone who might be able to walk by it without commenting on how disappointed they are in the color.

Lavender Delight turned brown and ghastly fushcia after a couple of days--out of here!

Fragrant Plum was neither very frangrant nor very plum. Souvenir de la Malmaison had one blossom, which balled, then it gave up the ghost. If Out of the Night doesn't stop balling, it's going to be going, too.

Along with ordering new roses, I've started babies from seeds for the first time this year. My first bud, on a Scarlet Moss seedling, should be opening soon. A James Mason seedling is growing like a little weed, and I think every seed from Frau Dagmar Hastrup sprouted.

I just went on a mini shopping spree too this weekend, not as bad as the first ones this season (first 15, then 6, then 8...)
I'm currently waiting for

Belle Story
Bride's Dream
Lavaglut
Table Mountain.

My bands have been growing like crazy since they got here, one set in april, one in july. I was having second thoughts about Lilian Austin, but she put out two beautiful blooms just last week, so she stays for sure.
Good luck with all the newbies!

Thats the beauty of everyones gardens being different. A rose I love might not be liked by someone else and vice versa. I have learned the look I like thru trial and error. I have moved so many roses each spring the first few years into roses that sometimes it felt like I had to move the entire garden.

Plus not everthing that left here is gone because I did not like the looks of it. I liked the flowers on Falstaff and Golden Celebration just fine. Falstaff was a very stingey bloomer and those long canes, yikes, not for me. I don't raise roses on pillers and I don't pin longs canes to the ground. The rose itself has be willing to stay a reasonable size with my prunning and be willing to bloom profusely grown like that. It doesn't work on every rose. I just try to avoid those.

Now basicly these needs are for my main rose beds. Around the garage in the backyard I am creating a garden with roses that grow larger. Still my idea of larger is still not a really BIG rose. No monster roses need apply here, no room for them.

maele- I don't know the others but Lavaglut is such a stunner of a rose. Easily kept short and it has strong thick canes. I don't know how big it would get if unprunned as I cut mine back very strongly each spring and also some cutting back after the first flush. I get three strong full flushes from them and sometimes some forth flowers. I love this rose.

I have Lavaglut and even with pruning, after a couple of years it was getting up to 4 feet tall... not good for the front of the border here... next spring I'm gonna really chop it down...

Falstaff went a long long time ago, it's famous for being an octopus...

I have three roses that are more wide than high, WS2000, Country Dancer and Eureka... so what I did was move them to places where they could sprawl and moved everything away from them. A pain to learn these lessons, but all in all the end result is all that matters...

For the past 10 years, shovel pruning is a large part of the creation of the garden... My pot ghetto has really shrunk over the past two years between shovel pruning and tossing the pots that don't bloom the way I want them too. Either the wrong color or the wrong form... My neighbor is gaining a pot ghetto of my rejects too...

When roses get too tall they either get moved to the climber fence or hit the road... Chicago Peace got moved to the fence... Peace hit the road... it's all a matter of preference, and how long the blooms last etc...

Quietness got replaced by Home and Garden, Heaven on Earth got replaced by Nancy Reagan, and so on... There is always a better rose out there...

Well sometimes... Distant drums had to go because of blackspot and I still haven't found a replacement for that color... I have Irish Creme there now but it just isn't the same...

Hmmmm... I put my new Falstaff in a large pot and gave it compost tea and fish compost and it has lots of blooms all perfectly formed (like clones) and a nice and upright shape. Quite like it. Time will tell if it becomes ugly or stingy. Then I can always get a new rose. But so far it's great!! Although I'm in a cooler zone than you. Days haven't got hotter than 22C

But I agree, I have no problem with ditching roses that I don't like! :)

Carol

My thinking is that there are way too many good roses out there to plant in my gardens than to put up with a rose that doesn't please me. I have a sharp prunig shovel and am not afraid to use it when necessary. This past Spring I SP'd a record 23 roses that just didn't please me for one reason or another. Mostly they don't bloom right or are just "Poor Doers" in general.
"Outrageous" was one that got the shovel prune this Spring for me as well. It was a terrible disappointment. Terribly low vigor and small ugly blooms. "Laura Bush" was another floribunda that was a pure disappointment too. She got the shovel at the same time as "Outrageous".
John

I really like floribundas as I prefer large sprays of roses to the HT look of one on a stem usually. Even the cluster flowered HTs wouldn't have as many blooms as a floribunda. I am sure there are exceptions but I just don't have that many HTs and don't plan to.

But LAURA BUSH was one I never bought, I just could not figgure out from the pictures if the unusual coloring of the blooms would be striking or ugly. Now I am just as glad that I never tried her.

I used to love only floribundas, but I started coveting HT's when I saw single blooms coming up through other plants in others' gardens. Now I have a bunch, and they are stunners, especially Olympiad... and I never thought I was a red HT type of person. Plus my best performer has got to be St. Patrick, no shrivelled little blooms when the temps hit the 90's at all. So I agree that trial and error will eventually produce the perfect garden in the eye of its beholder.
On a sadder note, I was informed by RVR that they were out of Lavaglut, so I'll have to find it somewhere else.