My favorite three old roses that I am loving for a long time are Zephirine Drouhin, Rose de Rescht, and Cl. Cecile Brunner. I bought Zephirine Drouhin the first time around 10 years ago by accident (at that point I didn't even know that she was an old rose), when I was still living in Germany and growing roses on a roof top terrace. I love her for a gorgeous, very strong wafting fragrance and for the loosely-double, slightly tussled, pink blooms that occur in abundance on this rose in spring. I have seen this rose re-blooming well in Germany, and it seems to be the case that a colder climate helps with that, whereas in a very warm climate she seems to be a little bit stingy with the repeat. The color of the flowers vary in intensities from clear to a light soft pink depending on the age of the blooms, which makes this rose even more charming in my eyes. I am very happy that I am able to growing ZD here in San Diego, again. She is getting into her third year this spring and has grown quite a bit and I am expecting great things of her. Rose de Rescht was also already with me ten years ago in Germany, and I bought her already twice in California again, once in the Bay Area and now in San Diego. Besides that this rose has very cute crimson pompom like flowers, which are nestled deeply into the beautiful gray green foliage, it has an awesome, strong, warm, old rose fragrance, which makes it even more adorable. I also appreciate that the rose is making a nice round shrub by herself, which looks very pretty in the landscape. To me it is very fascinating that she is so adaptable to very different climates. She was doing really well for me in Germany. In the Bay Area in CA she became a really nice big bush. Here in San Diego my RdR is not even a year old so it is too early to judge about her, but I got some very nice blooms from her last year already! Cecile Brunner, Climbing. This rose stood out for me when I came to California 6 years ago. I saw her everywhere in CA, sometimes gigantic specimen always producing an absolutely spectacular spring flush of small blush pink flowers. The rose is relatively floriferous year round. The sheer vigor and will to live of this rose has impressed me tremendously. I also love the dainty, cute flowers and the fragrance is also not bad. Even though it is a very common rose here in CA I get never tired seeing this beautiful rose! Christina

Oh my. What is a passionate rose lover like you doing in that glacial hell hole? Reading about your endeavors has exhausted me and I haven't even lifted a shovel. I admire your grit and determination, but would love to see you rewarded with thousands of blooms on your rose bushes for all your hard work. I bet they could use engineers in zones 7 to 10!

Wow is that cold! I grow several David Austin roses. I love the look of them, but they seem prone to a lot of problems. Fungus seems to be a major issue with them. If I buy any more roses I think I will branch out into the hardier sorts (other than DA) that are disease resistant. I think I was once at Northland, but it was many years ago. I have seen them at the Garden Expo though. They were selling some own-root roses. They were still pretty small, and a little overpriced. But if they are healthy and grow well here I suppose one can't complain. You will have to let me know how the Rugosas do if you get some. Have you ever been to the Garden Expo, at the Spokane Community College? It doesn't have as much as it did in years past. My favorite sale is the one at Manito Park. Such a wonderful selection; they have so much that I hardly ever go to nurseries any more. Have you ever been? There is a Fall sale comming up on Aug. 29th. It is open to the public around 10am I think. It is so great to talk with someone from Eastern Washington! I have only found a few other people on GW from this side of the state. If you would like to chat more about roses and such you can send me an e-mail. Just click on the 'My Page' part on my post and there will be a button to send me an e-mail. If you want to that is. ;-) Happy Gardening! Christin (CMK)

Marianne, yes -- it's alfalfa. China's population growth long ago outstripped its sustainable water supply, so, ironically, we in California have been shipping our water (in the form of hay) to China, even as our own supply falls short. subk3, the article you cite deserves more than a little refutation. Victor Davis Hanson, sitting down there on his raisin farm in Fresno and wishing to suck up cheap, taxpayer-subsidized Northern California water for his personal gain, finds maintenance of the salmon fisheries offensive. This Northern Californian (four generations, both sides), with family involved in ranching, dairy, and commercial fishing, takes exception to that. It is NOT a matter of 'favoring fish over people" and "pet salmon" (good grief, what an idiotic phrase), but allowing fisheries (which also provide jobs, by the way) and all the ecosystems upon which our lives depend to survive and function. I see no compelling reason to blight and destroy our lands in order to make Hanson wealthy. The dams that were torpedoed would have been destructive of both fisheries (dams on the Klamath especially!) and other natural resources that support life here (not to mention the one, Auburn Dam, that was brilliantly planned to be built on a major earthquake fault...), "Wasted" water flowing through natural systems has the added benefit of diluting the toxic run-off from Central Valley agricultural fields and keeping my drinking water from being shut off because of salt water intrusion making it up to the pumps that pull fresh water out of the Delta. By the way, despite Hanson's claims, a dam that can be effective and useful for "flood control", (the pretense that allowed federal funding of California's dam projects) cannot also be storing water and, not so surprisingly, dams like the Coyote Dam on the Russian River, which the Army Corps of Engineers in the 1950s assured us would end the flooding on that river forever, have done nothing of the sort, since they are always kept as full as they can be, storing water. Mr. Hanson seems to live in the past by a century or so, when agriculture was the "premier industry" of the state. No more. It is, at best, 2 to 3% of California's economy. Are we to continue squandering 80% of utilized water (40% of all fresh water available in California) to support that 2 or 3% of the economy (much of which now involves making big bucks by sending our water, in the form of commodities, to other countries, not "feeding our nation" as is often and disingenuously claimed). Market forces will eventually sort this out, not the "environmental activists".