It's an ownroot from Ashdown, that's why I'm a little surprised that it doesn't seem to be more vigorous then it is. I know it takes at least the first 3 years to see some more growth, but I wonder sometimes about whether I actually have William Baffin! When he blooms soon I'll take a pic or two. Maybe I'm just being impatient again? He was only planted last year afterall. But, I wonder because even my Westerland has lots more growth on and that was planted only a week earlier than WB. My Westerland though was purchased at Heirloom roses.

Agreed: its Cercospora, a fungal disease that the Kordesii hybrids are prone to getting. It is unlikely to cause anything more than a few lost leaves here and there. Not worth treating in most cases. We live with it when it happens.

No black spot, or signs of any other kind of fungal disease, like powdery mildew, downy mildew, rust, etc? My Canadian Explorers seem susceptible to anthracnose, which looks a little like black spot, except the spots have yellow around them and eventually a pinhole in the middle. If there is absolutely no signs of disease, I have no idea why it's dropping its leaves. Now is not the time to prune it, because it will encourage the rose to put out new growth too late in the season. Wm Baffin is extremely hardy, but I wouldn't want even him going into the winter with new canes. Wait til next spring and prune him hard, thinning out a lot of the canes and pruning back any growth that you don't want.

I finally got around to looking at it and it's fine and pumping out lots of new growth which is red. I guess the brown colour really threw me and two of the shoots seemed flaccid. (Maybe it was just the heat that caused it). When I touched the thorns and found them soft, I recalled what people here had been discussing with RRD and panicked! Many thanks for all the reassurance :) Linda