Roses in the musk family seem to do this readily.

Jeri

All of my roses are in their first year, so it's hard to judge how scent wafting they are. However, I tend to notice it from cut blooms inside the house. Usually I notice it more from deeper, warmer scents...not necessarily the strongest either.

For example, Golden Celebration has a sweet scent to it, but with that touch of warm fruitiness to it that it can waft around. I have a feeling my new Abe Darby will be much of the same as it seems to lack the sweet portion, but is more powerful in the warm fruitiness area. Graham Thomas has a potent tea smell for me. Typically light tea scents don't travel much for me, but Graham Thomas's scent is potent enough that it can with it's deep tea scent. He would need many blooms though as the blooms are smaller than some of the other larger Austins. WS2000 could probably fill up a great area with it's wonderful scent, although I would imagine it would be better if it was planted in a group of 3 as WS2000 is a smaller rose. I'm sure there are many others with great suggestions though. At the Columbus Park of Roses, they have a large Paul Neyron that smells great to me from a short distance. Same goes for Reine de Violettes.

For me, the perfume of Souvenir de la Malmaison and Madame Issac Pierre simply filled the air like no other roses...but alas, neither was very happy in my Zone 8 PNW climate/no-spray garden :-(

Roses that waft fragrance around the garden on the breeze for me are:
Reine des Violettes
Golden Celebration (fantastic scent)
Marie Pavie
Marie Daly
Gruss an Aachen / Pink Gruss an Aachen - when conditions are right
Souvenir de la Malmaison - when conditions are right

Randy

I can second others that have already been mentioned:

Marie Pavie
Blush Noisette
Souvenir de la Malmaison
Reine des Violettes (still has not bloomed for me, but was surprised, one afternoon, to walk through a cloud of scent from the fragrant foliage--spicy/peppery/perfumey--hard to describe but really nice)

A couple of others not yet mentioned that have wafted for me:
La France (lemony damask)
Dainty Bess (clove-like)

I'm glad someone asked this cause I was wondering the same thing. I just got Comte De Chambord so I look forward to the wafting fragrance. I have heliotrope planted in a couple baskets above my double delights and perfume delight, but the heliotrope is the only thing I can smell, and it's fantastic.

CJ

Like Jeri says, plants with musk rose in their ancestry seem to be good at this. Wafting stars in my garden are the following:
R. moschata
'Cornelia' (Hybrid Musk)
'Moonlight' (Hybrid Musk)
'Felicia' (Hybrid Musk, not the greatest variety for health or beauty, but one of the best rose scents of them all)
'Mme. Plantier' (Alba? Noisette? FABULOUS fragrance, right up with 'Felicia')
'Blush Noisette' (Noisette)
'Jaune Desprez' (Noisette)
'Vanity' (Hybrid Musk. This has a sweet China kind of fragrance to my nose, it doesn't seem strong but I can smell it from some feet away.)
'Fruehlingsgold' (Pimpinellifolia Hybrid. This has a sweet/fat scent detectable from some feet away; very good!)
Good question.
Melissa

I have planted many rugosas for their intense fragrance, and the winter hips. Plus many not-fragrant landscaping roses because of their continuous bloom.
Thanks to this mix, there are always both color and fragrance from april to december.

If fragrance is very important to you, grow some trachelospermum jasminoides (looks like jasmine but is hardy and evergreen, and very carefree). You can smell it from the distance, it is wonderful. Just immagine a fence covered by it, your whole garden would intensely smell like jasmine.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:291799}}

I love fragrance. Have done WAY more reading on fragrant plants and shrubs than I have roses. Unfortunately, most of the really fragrant stuff in the shrub/tree family is not very attractive, so isn't planted often and is really hard to find.
What I've noticed about rose fragrance: My really fragrant roses don't release their scent. You have to put your nose in. But the noisettes, to me, are not fragrant when I smell them up close but add a wonderful fragrance to the garden as a whole. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's not the noisettes, but the overall fragrance of lots of roses. BUT there is a different scent to it that is not found in any of my roses, and that I always attribute to the noisettes.
Most particularly Mary Washington and Nastarana.
The strongest wafting scent in my 2 acres of fragrance is Michelia figo- the banana shrub.
Second strongest is sweet olives, Osmanthus fragrans.
Roses don't even enter into the list.

We don't see sweet olive here. I wonder why!
I've not actually seen it, but have read of it.
Another Texas shrub is Beautybush, which we don't see here in CA either.
I saw that growing in the cemetery where many of my folks are planted.

I've wondered how those shrubs would do in CA.

Jeri

Kathleen
Mme Plantier
Marie Pavié
Clair Matin

Yesterday, quite unexpectedly, and probably never again, 'Earth Song,' which is usually barely fragrant.

I can't recall any wafting of damask fragrance, which is so overwhelming at close range.

In HMsk, it may the multiflora rather than the much slighter musk heritage that leads to wafting. Wild multiflora fragrance can fill the air on a May evening.

Marie Pavie
Golden Celebration
Heritage
Champney Pink Cluster
Blush Noisette
Jaune Desprez
Felicia
SGMC
SDLM
But the very best, Madame Issac Pierre

But out here in the West, Mme. Isaac Pereire rusts like blue blazes. She can mildew, but it's the rust that's the biggest problem.
If you want to grow her, here, you must be meticulous about spray.

Jeri

Well everyone, I'm jealous.

Here on the coast near San Francisco it's cold and foggy, almost drizzling today and usually most of the summer. It takes warmth for fragrance to waft through the air so there's not many days when it's warm enough to really get going. Very often I need to cut a rose and bring it in the house to warm up before I get it's full fragrance.

But today I walked in the gate and did get a whiff of the Austin Harlow Carr from a few feet away. And some evenings my crimson flowering Nicotiana has a lovely fragrance pouring out.

Diane

cweathersby,
That rose fragrance that you can smell at a distance but not up close is probably the musk rose fragrance I and others have talked about here. The Noisette class had its origins in a musk rose-China cross, and many of the earlier Noisettes have this musk fragrance: 'Blush Noisette' and its offspring 'Jaune Desprez' for example. Graham Thomas mentions that many members of the Synstilae group have this ability to waft scent, and I imagine this is what michaelg is talking about in the case of the Hybrid Musks: that they got their wafting sweet scent from the R. multiflora, another member of the Synstylae, in their ancestry rather than from the bit of musk rose there as well. In any case, what a gift to the garden this scent is.
I love tea olives too, though my success rate with them is lower than I could wish. Then there's daphne, of course, and also sarcacocca is fragrant in late winter, though the scent is not entirely agreeable--mostly, though. I've heard that box is fragrant in flower, but have never detected any scent.
Melissa

I planted a sweet olive and could get almost no fragrance from it. Don't know if it was the plant or my nose.

My picks for wafting fragrance are Gloire des Rosomanes, Secret Garden Musk Climber, and Crested Moss. Eglantine's scented foliage carries a long distance, too, especially so after rain or in the morning.

My sense of smell really varies depending on my allergies, alas.
Anita

Thank you everyone, so very much. All these suggestions are FAB! I have noted down Blush Noisette, Reine des Violettes, Moonlight, Felicia, Mme. Plantier, Clair Matin, Marie Pavié, Secret Garden Musk Climber as strong contenders for places in my garden. I really must look into the roses with a musk background and the noisettes, as Jeri and Melissa have mentioned. I also made note of trachelospermum jasminoides as well.

I was visiting someone and in her garden I caught a strong honey scent in the air. I thought it was her Marchesa Boccella, but it turned out to be a buddleia davidii. It seems a great addition to mix with wafting roses. Thanks again everyone for all the help.

Juliet

I planted a sweet olive and could get almost no fragrance from it. Don't know if it was the plant or my nose.

*** How disappointing!
And I have to admit -- my own allergies have really interfered with my perception of fragrance.
The Musk scents -- those I can almost always smell, and the heavy Damasks.
But a LOT of other things, I admit, I cannot smell.
:-(

JEri

Our garden should be redolent of Honeysuckle, with hints of powdery New Dawn and fruity Serendipity. Unfortunately, all we can smell is the Herbicide that the white trash, whose property abuts ours, sprayed this morning. We can't even go outside.

Generally, every time the evil moron sprays, he ends up in the hospital for a week. We get splitting headaches and extreme thirst. And our house is not very close to the shared fence. The 'aroma' of the herbicide persists for well over a month. Another reason to give up and leave the South....

Sorry to hear that, posh! Have you had a chat with the neighbor about this? It sounds awful.

Posh, perhaps if you approach the neighbor without tension and condescension, he would understand that it is the chemical he is using that is affecting his and your health adversely.

However, having said that, he might be trying to combat wild honeysuckle if, as you say yours is very fragrant, as all fragrant honeysuckle is quite invasive and hard to control.

As an aside, let me know where you got the aromatic New Dawn, as none of mine have ever had any fragrance, albeit beautiful in bloom.

What Patricia said.

Also, what is he using and what is he using it FOR? Perhaps once you've helped him make the connection between the chemicals and his health, you could suggest some more eco/health friendly alternatives.

Surprised DARLOW'S ENIGMA is not mentioned. My biggest wafter and when it only has a few blooms on it during the summer, I usually tell not be seeing them but by getting a wiff of a sweet floral scent a good 20 feet away or so and then I think, DARLOW is in bloom and when I go to investigate, sure enough a cluster or two of blooms is open. Hardy, disease resistant, vigorous.
Jim

What Patricia said.

Also, what is he using and what is he using it FOR? Perhaps once you've helped him make the connection between the chemicals and his health, you could suggest some more eco/health friendly alternatives.

Posh--I'm sorry to hear about your neighbor----Years ago we had a neighbor who hired a Co.to spray--The smell was horrible---I called the Co. who did the spraying--they would call us the day they were spraying so WE could stay inside on that day----Thank goodness the people moved.

Paul's Himmalayan Musk----Albertine----both ramblers perfume our garden..

Clair Matin has already been mentioned.---

Lyda Rose and Zephirine Drouhin both lovely.

For a wonderful bush---Korean Spice Viburnum is not a rose but the fragrance is wonderful

Florence

For those in warmer zones, Sweet Almond verbena (Aloysia) has a fantastic fragrance that will drift thru the air, making one smile.
Molly

Thanks, Melissa, Patricia, Bellegallica, and Florence! It's nice to be able to vent.

We are plain-spoken people and dare not broach the subject with the neighbor. In fact, we just wave politely, and otherwise avoid. We are trying very hard to be good, and not start a feud. What's a few nights in a hotel, compared to an escalating conflict? For people here, reality is a matter of consensus. If 'most people' think that chemical sensitivity is just 'liberal nonsense' then that's their 'reality'. We've learned to keep our mouths shut.

The Honeysuckle is nowhere near our problem neighbor's property. He sprays the fencelines, his foundation lines, and then anything else he can think of. Last year, he sprayed a fencerow shared with another neighbor, killing a large Muscadine vine. The dead vine is still there (very visibly dead), 15 feet high, and running thirty feet down his property line. Lovely. We were weed-eating his side of the shared fence (luckily it's only four feet high), thinking that would be neighborly, and hoping he would get the message and not spray there. No such luck. Normally, he waits for a really windy day to spray, which has resulted in swaths of dead grass on our side, as well as injury to the screen of Cryptomeria trees I planted.

Zeffyrose, our (10) New Dawns came from Chamblee's (and so could well be mis-labeled, although I think it is the only everblooming Wichuriana rambler. Plus, it smells like the parent it sported from; Dr. W. VanFleet). Our subsoil is red clay, which may have contributed nutrients your soil could be lacking. Maybe that could affect the aroma, in the same way that soils contribute to the bouquet of wines. But fragrance is in the nose of the beholder. I can't smell our Don Juans, and they're supposed to have a heavy fragrance. And I can't smell violets, either.

Korean Spice Viburnum is now on our fall planting list. Thanks! I presume it prefers a bit of shade? So glad for you that your toxic neighbors moved.

Thanks for more great suggestions everyone. I appreciate it.

Plan9fromposhmadison, so sorry you neighbors are reckless and inconsiderate about the way they maintain their property. A garden should always be welcoming and not a place where your health is threatened by thoughtless people you live by. I would be very upset if I had to deal with a neighbor like that. I hope things work themselves out and get better for you.

1)Russell's Cottage Rose
2)Fantin Latour

Without question 'Evangeline' is the best rose in my gardens at filling the air with fragrance.

It's funny you should say this, but I was out deadheading the other day and was almost knocked out by a gorgeous waft of fragrance from a couple of CdC blooms. I was almost 10 feet away!

It's funny, but I think Graham Thomas smells like ketchup!

Glad to see Clair Martin mentioned here...been eyeing that one lately.
My Darlow's Enigma is the rose that wafts the most for me. It draws bees from miles around and buzzes with life all summer. In the winter the birds visit and nibble at the hips.
~Melissa

Melissa, (timetogrowthegarden), I can honestly say that Clair Matin is my most prolific rose throughout the year. Many may have a bigger spring show than Clair but at the end of the season, I know who has bloomed consistently and well throughout and I always look forward to Clair Matin's blooms almost every single day in season.

I posted on another thread that my Clair Matin has been in constant bloom since around May 5 except for a couple of days. She is about to start a decent flush that will overlap with remnants of the previous. The unusual fresh fragrance does often carry on the air. My good girl!

michaelg, you said damasks don't waft, but mine have caught me off guard a couple of times. My patio is 15' wide with a Chrysler Imperial in a pot on each corner. Walking between them to the screen door, I've been stopped in the middle by the sensation of fragrance and turned around to figure out what I was smelling. Then it dawned on me what it was. The curious thing is that I reacted the same way when it happened again. I guess I have a forgetful olfactory system.

Another surprise happened when I was walking past Louis Philippe who was about 5' tall (below shoulder height on me). I was probably 2'-3' away and definitely got a whiff of that cherry candy smell. Hmm, so nice.

Sweet Olive is nice and strong here, too, but every time I've seen it the bush is way less than well foliated. I've had it in a previous yard, and it was yummy to walk past.

Sherry

Sharifa Asma and Mister Lincoln should not be overlooked as wafters!

Becky

This Clair Matin has been getting good word of mouth on this forum for awhile. Gonna have to give it good consideration. :)