I have Burning Bush I can dig up and send. Are you interested in that? I have tried rose clippings and never have any luck so am wanting to try rooted starts. Thank you Sharon Cash~Gold Trader (on PlantSwap) Zone 7

Kim, I hear what you are saying, but really it has not been a problem. These 2 roses have been on our house for over 20 years. During that time, once they fell down in a 100 MPH+ wind storm, and once we cut them down to about 7 ft high so that the house could be painted. In the first instance, we just (I say "we" - hah! It certainly helps to have a DH who is a contractor and owns 35 ft ladders!) put them back up, and the next Spring they bloomed more than ever. In the second instance, it took them only about 18 months to grow back to the roof - happy as clams. I am not one who thinks of squirrels as a problem - I like them. Who really uses these roses are the birds - I never let my DH prune or re-tie them up except in the late Fall when we are sure that all of the babies have fledged. Our climate is warm and dry in the summers, so the roses have not caused any sort rot type problems, and I think they actually provide some insulation against the sun. They are of course full of water, which is better than our wooden shingles which dry out. As to "massive amounts of dirt and debris" - no. My DH gets up there on his ladders once a year, takes out some of the weight, ties up the newer canes we are keeping, etc. However, (again, perhaps it is our climate - it gets very windy here in the winter storms) he has not found any debris except a few birds nests. The stuff he generates from his labor is almost all rose clippings, and almost all alive and green for that matter. When we had our house painted, he told me that on this side of the house the shingles were in much better shape than another side where there are no roses - that entire wall baked in the sun and had to be re-shingled (I immediately started to grow a tall rose bush on it to be helpful!). So, my experience is evidently different than yours - just wanted folks to know, hope you don't mind. Jackie

>I do grow Fortuniana (on purpose, as a rose bush not a root stock) and Yellow Lady Banks (banksie lutea), although not Lady Banks White. I believe that the growth pattern of the yellow and the white banksies are similar. My Fortuniana is tiny, mostly because the deer have been chomping it continually. I finally put it in a tomato cage, and it is getting bigger. As I recall, I also caged the banksie lutea when it was small. It is not bothered by deer at all now, as it is huge, and the canes below deer height are 2-3 inches in diameter. Jackie, thanks so much for this information. I for sure will not put the Fortuniana rose (still in its pot from the ARE nursery) outside the fenced-in area where the deer can get to them then. What I'm trying to do is to avoid even a single nibble from the deer. I strongly suspect our deer were the vectors for Rose Rosette Disease starting up in this yard last fall. The deer range over many miles around here... and I know from experience that their favorite roses are those with RRD growth tips. Regarding Lady Banks White and deer nibbles, I'm still a little uncertain. Theoretically, they might eat the yellow kind and not the white, since the white has more fragrance in its bloom--and fragrance is something that deer will avoid when other food choices are available. But that fragrance relates to blooms, not the entire plant, and most of the time, it's not blooming, so I don't know why the deer might avoid it, if they do indeed dislike it. I did notice that Antique Rose Emporium made no claims about deer avoiding the yellow Lady Banks, which gives me some hope. They only said that about Lady Banks White. On the other hand, the fragrance of the blooms of fortuniana is supposed to be similar to that of Lady Banks' White. So if they, indeed, do not eat Lady Banks' White, their avoidance might have nothing to do with bloom fragrance, or perhaps fragrance at all. It's so hard to predict! I've read a book on deer, a really good book. It mentioned that deer, like humans, vary in what they like to eat and not eat, even those within the same deer variety and even deer living within the same general area. That's my little worry in doing too much extrapulating to the specific deer population that we have here from a very limited number of experiences elsewhere. The RRD problem here led me to have to toss more roses than I care to think about now. And I'm not sure enough about those roses still awaiting planting at this point to risk getting RRD started up again in a part of the yard that the deer roam through looking for food. But the alternative is to situate them inside the fenced-in area of the yard that is already largely landscaped. There's really only room for a few more roses there. I hate to give up that room to once-blooming roses that were originally ordered for places outside the fenced-in area. I probably can find a place for Fortuniana and Madame Plantier within the fenced area, but I can't imagine letting Lady Banks White loose in that part of the yard! I doubt that I'd have ordered any once-bloomers this spring if not thinking about all the room we theoretically have available in non-fenced areas. The once-bloomers will be blooming during periods when all our rhododendrons, azaleas, and peonies will be blooming, so we really don't need any once-bloomers inside the fenced area, where the landscaping is largely done. We mainly need bloomers for later in the spring, summer, and early fall when other flowering plants aren't blooming. On the other hand, I think I'd love Lady Banks White, and can imagine using all those tiny fragrant blooms to good advantage in bowls of flowers that are mostly much larger. That's one of the reasons I ordered it to begin with. I'm not anxious to toss the rose, but... Decisions, decisions... Thanks so much for your input! Best wishes, Mary

Jeri, Oh My! If I had not seen the mature L.B. across the street, I would run horrified in fear that mine would become 1/4 the size of that one...that L.B. is gigantic!! Unless my husband digs the hole to plant it in the ground, or asks the gardeners to plant it, L.B. will likely remain in its large pot, which is another strike as far as I am concerned because I have not been able to grow anything in a pot long term. I do enjoy its floriferous spring bloom. Lynn This post was edited by desertgarden561 on Tue, Nov 12, 13 at 23:10