in the UK, we only ever really get 2 flushes - the main June bust-out, maybe the odd blossom or so and then another round about the middle to end of August. Generally, for me at any rate, the autumn blooming is much more sporadic. I am finding the single blooming roses to actually be better value since the June show is tremendous and then there is no worrying about deadheading. Any roses which set heps have extra value. It took me a long time to come around to this decision (I do still order remontant roses but regard extra flushes as a nice surprise rather than an inevitable part of the summer tableaux). BTW, we hardly come across Knockout roses here but I surprised myself by looking very hard at 'Soft Knockout' a rather nice, semidouble pink.Sorry not to be a more specific help -am sure many forum members will chip in with ideas though. I do agree that peaonies are lovely - I also do landscape design and pay considerable more attention to foliage than flowers, these days - Siberian iris are good because, unlike the bearded types, the leaves do not look sordid later in the season. Also, it has taken me a long time to see the point of many grasses but now, I am truly hooked - such a fantastic foil for bulbs and summer flowers such as geums, scabious, echinacea, asters, daylilies and so on.

Hi Max

I would say that I get 3 flushes, but the second one is underwhelming, and the third incomparable to the first. With the terrible heat we've had this year, few roses have performed at their best. I have been disappointed with quite a few of the repeat-bloomers I'm trying, especially the reds

But I do have two new-to-me roses that have cranked out near-constant blooms: SdlM and Duchesse de Brabant. These were both planted last fall, and the Duchesse (from Hartwood Roses) is quickly becoming my new favorite. I am just now getting a good second flush on Belinda's Dream - lovely flowers on an ugly plant. Clair Matin is looking very promising, but is still to young to judge.

I had a wonderful specimen of Roserie de L'Hay that was killed by flooding from my neighbor's yard. I replaced it but the new one is not nearly as graceful as the one that died. I suspect it's Hansa? Do you grow that one?

Maureen

Earth Song can be a good rose for her. It really blooms continuously. For me it outblooms Knock Outs and Home Run (which I also grow). It is fragrant and flowers can be cut to bring in. It does get more BS than KO, but it has enough leaves not to look bad. My sister grows it w/o any spraying for 10+ years and I never saw it looking ugly.
Olga

Roserie de l'Hay blooms nearly continuously for me here, and simultaneously gets some hips which are attractive. Really good shrub rose, and very healthy. Therese Bugnet doesn't repeat well on the other hand.

Other good ones are Earth Song (I second Olga's recommendation), Heritage, and Jacques Cartier/Marchessa Boccella. These are roses that almost always have some blooms. I have other repeat bloomers that bloom more in distinctive flushes -- some 3-4 times per summer and others go dormant and only bloom again in the fall.

Most of the hybrid musks are fairly continuous and low maintenance, tho they might get too big for what you want.

Grs An Aachen has beautiful fragrant blooms and likes to bloom a lot. It's healthy and easy to care for if you just remember to hose it down hard fairly often with a water hose (to keep powdery mildew at bay and to chase away any aphids before they get a good start). We grew it organically here.

We had three new own root Grüss An Aachens last year, and had at least one bloom from these new plants to bring in the house almost every day for months, up through and past the first frost here. And that was growing them in much more shade than is ideal. You might want to combine it with some other roses with a stronger color too, in which case Grüss An Aachen's lighter colors will blend beautifully. (It's a little pinker in cooler weather.)

Best wishes,
Mary

Mary, I don't know your location, but here in MD GAA is not healthy at all. I LOVE this rose and tried to grow it many times.It needs spraying to stay healthy here :(
Olga

Hi Olga,

I actually remember that post, Olga, because it surprised me so much; your experiences there are the opposite of ours here.

We live in the Piedmont of NC in a location where we are the only owner to have ever done anything to the land. We had to cut down some native hardwood trees to make enough room to build our house and a vegetable garden. And the land has never had any poisonous chemicals of any kind applied to it, unless you consider something like Safer soap spray or Neem oil poisonous.

No Bayer, etc. kinds of products for the roses here to get babied with that might make a difference to the need for our plants to develop their own disease-fighting capabilities. Our roses are pretty much _forced_ to develop their own defenses. I've expected those natural plant defenses to have full force by the third year, but we only made it to year two with the bulk of them before Rose Rosette Disease spread like wildfire and we had to toss out once-healthy and beautiful roses in a big hurry. We've had to toss most of our roses, and will be mainly starting anew this fall. For sure we'll be ordering some more of the Grüss An Aachen variety; it does quite well in our yard and its looks were plenty acceptably healthy last year in its first year.

From spring to spring with all three of our Grüss An Aachens little own root plants, they grew like weeds and produced abundant beautiful blooms, even planted in too much shade. We did use some BioVam mycorrhiza fungi on the rose roots in planting them, and that is supposed to contribute to overall good health for roses and the many other plants it can be used with. I don't know for sure whether the BioVam did or didn't help. All I know for sure is that the Grüss An Aachens did really well.

When watering, we've only used a hose to water them--no worrying about getting the leaves wet and using drips. Overhead watering has worked well with our roses, as it has with other plants. (We do avoid watering when the direct sunlight is hitting them, though.) I've seen a Paul Zimmerman blog recently mentioning the possibility of washing off blackspot/fungus spores with overhead watering, and I kind of wonder whether our watering habits might not have contributed some to the good luck with roses. (Not including the point of coming down with RRD, of course...)

All our plants had an exceptionally heavy summer rainfall last year (for here, where we often do have droughts) and had no stress at all to have to overcome, so the Grüss An Aachens had a good year for getting started. For some reason, the sawflies that were such a nuisance with some of the roses either didn't like the varieties planted in the area of the Grüss An Aachens or were just too busy with the delights of the roses in other locations. The Grüss An Aachens were located in an elevated planting area on a slight slope with underground drainage added to the bottom of the slope, so that those roses could take any amount of watering, no matter how many days in a row we had heavy rainfall. We used no commercial fertilizers or disease killers of any kind, and those plants were a pure delight every day that we had them.

We've grown everything else successfully organically here for almost 40 years, so when starting with roses in early spring of 2009 we were not about to change any of that. My impression over the years of reading about organic gardening methods is that once you start in with ordinary kinds of chemicals to control for disease or even just for fertilizing, you can change the natural soil microbia in unexpected and potentially unwelcome ways--if you are thinking of the long haul in living with your plants without a bunch of extra worries. Most plants have evolved to live with and take advantage of natural soil microbia, so we just didn't want to change the natural balance too much with what we did. Of course, the soil "improvements" we made would have made some changes, but we haven't read anything about the potential for great harm there in a one-time organic soil amendment process (though there might be some).

Our native soil is heavy red clay, though in planting areas it has been amended with natural organic materials and even for the roses a little grittier sandy stuff was added for better drainage, even though those areas have also all been elevated. We also use only organic nutrients, like alfalfa, bonemeal, composted manure, and cottonseed meal on the roses and in the planting holes. And we use lots of mulches. We never remove any mulch material, but regularly add to it on top as the mulch decomposes and slowly adds its nutrients to the soil.

When we do water our yard, the water is well water and is likely low in potential unwelcome additions. I heard from an arborist here the Charlotte city water is PH 9.x! I'd guess that our well water would very likely have a much lower PH than that. Your roses might be struggling with some unknown problem like your city water PH? But you've had better luck with most of your roses than with Grüss An Aachen, right?

The one thing I know in general about growing things organically, is that many plants do have some native abilities to fight off diseases. You can't expect perfection at any time, but plants will learn to fight diseases on their own if you don't remove the need for them to do what's necessary internally to fight diseases naturally. It's important not to jump in with help with products like Bayer, etc.--because as soon as the Bayer wears off, you'll probably have to keep doing it and will likely pronounce the rose variety as one that won't survive on its own, even if it has the genetic potential to form its own disease-fighting abilities. Our feelings are that if a particular rose or any other plant variety can't survive on its own here without a bunch of poisons, then we don't want it.

Anyway, a natural disease fighting ability for many of the plants we want to grow is the theory we've gone by from long experience with other plants. They don't all make it on their own, but most do. If they don't or can't, we don't keep going with the same weak variety when making replacement choices.

I doubt that it is more humid in Maryland than here; it is extraordinarily humid here, even during the drought times. So I can't account for your experiences in your situation, Olga. All I know is that we've had really good luck with growing that variety organically here in our all-organic yard, and I'd recommend that others who like its looks at least give it a try in their own yards too.

Best wishes,
Mary

So when Gruss crashes and burns (yes, it did here too), it sounds like you have a good, strong shovel and know what to do with it.

BTW, it is a recognized phenomenon that blackspot can take a while to find a new garden. It sounds like that is what is happening here.

>So when Gruss crashes and burns (yes, it did here too), it sounds like you have a good, strong shovel and know what to do with it.
BTW, it is a recognized phenomenon that blackspot can take a while to find a new garden. It sounds like that is what is happening here.

Yes, we know what to do with a shovel if necessary, but I'll cross my fingers that the roses we choose--all chosen with disease resistance as the first and most important consideration--will make shovel pruning mostly unnecessary.

I've read that blackspot theory too. Only time will tell whether it will apply to our own spot here, of course. One thing to consider: our woodsy natural soil site has had plentiful fungus disease of all types for all our other plants, thus far, and that was true from the get-go for them all. It's not like a typical builder's site where all the good woods dirt with its fungi and everything else has been scraped away. In that situation, I can well imagine that many of the naturally occurring native fungi have to get blown in or brought in from somewhere else.

We've had plenty of experience with the fungus diseases that rhododendrons get. The particular fungi that bother rhododendrons aren't minutely identical for roses, of course, but they are in the same families and have been present from the get-go with rhododendrons; I'm certain they were already present in our woods dirt and would have been present in the free dirt we got from the ditch-cleaning road maintainers working for the county here too, as well as some of the sandy loam soil we bought that was collected from farms in South Carolina.

Wild multiflora roses were growing on this property when we bought it, so I also suspect our property has seen some typical rose fungi blowing around that might have done a little reproducing on the multiflora roses here during rainy times. Anyway, much of our property is covered in the leaves from our hardwood trees, not with grass, and in reasonably rainy times all those leaves are all very moist all the time. As I read about fungi of all types, that sounds like an open invitation for wintering over and reproducing. We don't try to kill fungi here--that would be impossible anyway!--but to live with them peacefully.

The most noticeable fungus problem for roses here is with cercospora, and I've seen it on both the rhododendrons in a wet year and on the Cornelia right next to the Grüss An Aachens during our relatively wet fall last year. It wasn't bad enough to worry about in any case, but the Grüss An Aachens didn't get the problem with cercospora, even with the canes intermingling with the somewhat infected Cornelia (that was still acceptably healthy in our opinion). And those were growing in a too-shady situation in a wet year. My own best guess is that our Grüss An Aachens had plenty of exposure to rose fungi here.

Of course, our own criteria for "healthy" might be different than those of someone who competes in rose shows and is looking for absolute perfection in order to win a ribbon. We aren't looking for that, but have been extremely pleased with the health of most of our plants, including roses (except for Rose Rosette Disease with the roses, of course).

Anyway, we are for sure going to be ordering more Grüss An Aachens, and we'll see how they do in future years. If I should change my mind about recommending that variety for no-spray organic growers, I'll of course post my revised opinion then.

In any case, thanks very much for posting your information here too!

Best wishes,
Mary

P.S. We removed all the multiflora here, as soon as I read about the RRD dangers associated with it (shortly after the initial rose plants went into the ground). Ours weren't infected and looked really healty overall, but they didn't bloom well here where Nature had planted them. So tossing them wasn't a huge loss.

I would join Grüss An Aachen being prone to disease camp. Over here it stays miserable, gets tons of bs and I haven't seen a plant anywhere, neither organically, neither chemically grown that would not look miserable. On top of that, a lot of modern roses outperform it, Maria Mathilda, Whiter Shade of Pale, Forever series, to name a few.

I should warn you that most (if not all) Hybrid Rugosas are hideously thorny. I can't stress this enough. On the plus side they are superb for security hedges. I really don't like the doubles in this class because they lack symmetry. Think strips of tissue thin paper wired together by a 7 year old. B-U-T, the singles are truly lovely. My favorites are the white R. rugosa alba (for a large shrub) and the pink Fru Dagmar Hastrup (for a shorter, more mannerly shrub). Both are nicely fragrant. The foliage has good, natural disease resistance. Speaking of the leaves, they turn shades of gold and red in the autumn. The shrubs also produce bountiful hips that are higher in vitamin C content than those produced by roses in other classes. Rugosas prefer sandy soil and have to be grown no spray (chemicals cause leaf burn/drop).

A good Old Garden Rose for the Mid-Atlantic is JACQUES CARTIER/MARCHESA BOCCELLA (Portland, 1840). This lovely rose has everything you are asking for. She does get some black spot but nothing like what you will find among the Bourbons and Hybrid Perpetuals (which for the most part are black spot disasters in Maryland).

BTW, if Olga says a rose is disease resistant, then it REALLY is because she has a low tolerance for black spot. Speaking of Olga, she highly recommends the red Hybrid Kordesii QUADRA for Maryland. The rich red flowers are very full in the Old Garden Rose style. Alas no or little fragrance, but the foliage on the climbing shrub has been clean in her garden. You may want to ask her to post a list of her most resistant roses. Please note that most will be once bloomers.

Frankly, I've been disappointed by the repeat bloom of the winter hardy remontant Old Garden Roses (esp. Bourbons and Hybrid Perpetuals). Same goes for the English Roses - not all of them repeat well. I will only grow the tried and true cultivars that have proven their ability to bloom all season long. SOUVENIR DE LA MALMAISON (Bourbon) and MOLINEUX (English) are good examples. Both give me good, reliable repeat.

Depending on the cultivar most of my roses bloom in either three distinct flushes or in a continuous stream after the first initial spring flush. All of them must be watered and feed on a regular basis to support their bloom cycles. And they MUST be sprayed with Mancozeb every 2-3 weeks to control black spot. Strong fragrance and repeat bloom is the killer. You can't have both without sacrificing some disease resistance. At least not here in Black Spot Hell.

A few personal favorites suitable for the novice gardener:

BELINDA'S DREAM (Shrub)
HERITAGE & ROSE-MARIE (English)
MOLINEUX (English)
SHARIFA ASMA (English)
SOMBREUIL (Large Flowered Climber)
SOUVENIR DE LA MALMAISON (Bourbon)
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE 2000 (English)
VIKING QUEEN (Large Flowered Climber)

Quadra is the only red repeat-bloomer I've tried that hasn't been a complete disappointment.

For me, seconding those above that are more informed than I, Earth Song & Heritage repeat well. As does Country Dancer. I also have sporadic flushes from Lafter, Lyda Rose, Abraham Darby & Compassion. And I'm anticipating a fall flush from Reine des Violettes. And am having some flushes from (first year rose, for me) William Shakespeare 2000. Some repeat from Illusion.

My Marchesa Bocella is healthy, but for me its basically a springtime rose. Slightly more of a flush on Sombreuil.

I do sometimes wonder what Viking Queen & New Dawn would be like for me.

Alas no or little fragrance

Of course! It's a Kordes rose (i.e., beautiful and disease resistant, but stinkless).

:(

geo, New Dawn can be a lovely rose but it gets going rather later than many roses and, for me in the UK, it only really has the one good late June flush. I imagine if I was a bit more punctilious about deaheading (it sets lots of heps) it might repeat better but it is a prickly job and, as I have it over an arch, a painful one when it lashes about the top of my head. There are better ones, I think.

Thanks, campanula; I can cross that off my list (not that I really need any more roses, anyway).

With New Dawn it kind of depends what summer and autumn you get. I grew it in z5 as a tall shrub an it had only one real flush, but a very long one, lasting almost to mid August - when weather turn autumnish over there anyway.

I grow it here also and since we live close to the sea and get very long mild autumn up to end of October, it usually has 2 good flushes and some scattered bloom in between.

The drawback of New Dawn is though that the blooms do not last very long, also not good as cut flowers.

NEW DAWN also has vicious thorns and the repeat bloom is not good. VIKING QUEEN is a better choice. Bigger and better formed flowers, stronger fragrance, and just as disease resistant. She too has some mean thorns but at least she makes it worth the trouble.

I personally Love New Dawn and repeat is great for me. I love flowers of ND more than VK. ND flowers has some porceline quality, the color has certain depth that is really nice. I also love its fragrance, to me it is very fresh apple scent.
Olga

I do not grow VQ, but I also like New Dawn, it indeed has the porcelain feel to the blooms, also I don't find the thorns to be that bad, half of the roses I have are as thorny and some modern HTs even worse.

I never got good repeat from either AWAKENING or NEW DAWN, and the fragrance was never more than moderate in strength. Most of time I couldn't smell a thing. The VIKING QUEEN I gave my MIL repeat bloomed the first year as a tiny own root band. Last year my MIL sprayed VQ once a month and the glossy, deep green foliage remained spotless. This year she hasn't sprayed at all and the gorgeous climbing rose is still clean as a whistle. The fragrance IS consistently stronger. My MIL lives in MD, USDA Zone 6a.

As for which rose is more beautiful, judge for yourself. Here is an image posted by Zeffyrose on the "Your favorite climber for a pergola" thread back in June, 2010. VIKING QUEEN is on the left, and NEW DAWN is on the right.

{{gwi:225553}}

I've never grown Viking Queen, but both New Dawn and Awakening repeat fairly well for me. I smell a moderate apple scent. I agree they do have some fierce prickles, so wear heavy duty gauntlet gloves when training or pruning.

i do like ND cos it has a prime spot in my garden but I would LOVE it if the blooms lasted longer than 3 weeks and I got a couple of flushes instead of one. Thorns are bad but would concur with elemire that they are certainly no worse than many others. So, this is, sadly, its last year in my garden since I am planning big changes. Cuttings strike easily though and there are a couple in my greenhouse for my allotment.

I live inside the DC beltway in Maryland, and can recommend Mutabilis, if she's game for a single. I've had it for about 15 years so can vouch that it thrives through whatever miserable weather we get--hot, cold, dry, wet, doesn't matter, it's always a battle with Old Blush to see which will bloom first (Old Blush wins 9 times out of ten, but it's usually just by a day or two), it goes all summer long, has no blackspot, and although it can get pretty big, I've whacked it back in the middle of the summer and it never seems to mind. No fragrance.