Where should I place my order?

16 years ago

Among the roses I'm eyeing for spring, I'm sure I will be ordering 3 Mrs. John Laings and 2 Elinas. I can get both roses at Roses Unlimited (own root, potted 1 gal.--maybe virus-free?) or at Pickering (grafted on what? #1 grade)--at least I think those are fairly accurate descriptions--please correct me if I'm wrong.

The question is, from which place should I order--what are the pluses and minuses? For non-rose reasons, I would like these roses to get as fast and strong a start as possible, which is why I am considering Pickering's grafted roses, but then I worry about how virus-free they will be, so then I revert to Roses Unlimited which has sent me wonderful roses in the past.

Would I be taking too much of a chance (virus-wise) ordering from Pickering?

Thanks,

Kate

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Comments (5)

ceterum
16 years ago
Grafted roses will grow much faster than own roots for sure.

I have Elina from Pickering because I was told that all Elinas in the US are virused and several people told me that Pickering's Elina is RMV free. I have Elina for 4 or 5 years by now and I saw no sign of RMV. MichaleG had the same experience with his Elina from Pickering as opposed to a few Elinas he tried from US vendors.

By now there are a few US own root nurseries in that got virus free budwood of Elina but I would not get Elina in the US from anyone except if s/he specifies that their budwood is from UC Davis or from a reliable nursery from Europe (where RMV is around 1% as opposed to the US where RMV is, as far as I know, is still over 50 or 60%).

Also, I ordered my Mrs. John Laing from Pickering and I got very good quality plant. Considering the exceptional drought the plant is doing well - she even started blooming now when we got a small amount of rain.

Pickering uses multiflora seedlings to graft their roses onto so the probability of RMV is much less than any own root rose in the US if they started their collection from a plant grafted on dr. Huey in the past.

However, if you soil is highly alkaline you may need to lower your pH with sulfur to accommodate the multiflora rootstock.
dublinbay z6 (KS)
Original Author
16 years ago
Thank you, ceterum, for that info. Now I'm wondering how to find out if my soil is highly alkaline. Yesterday I was searching that topic online, but could find no info. Probably using the wrong search words or something. Probably my soil is not highly alkaline or you'd think I'd have heard about it in the 20+ years I've gardened perennials, then roses. Guess I could call my county extension agent.

For those who want a geography lesson, I think I've heard that western Kansas is alkaline. However, I live in the extreme southeast corner of Kansas--nearly in Missouri, ARkansas, and Oklahoma--Ozarks country. So I think our soils are very different than western Kansas. Must check this out.

Kate
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ceterum
16 years ago
Well, you can buy a pH meter at Lowe's for under $20. (Probably Home Depot also sells it, so does every Farmer's supply store). I wasn't sure that this cheapo pH meter worked so I postponed buying it but after MichaelG said (and if I remember Mike Rivers confirmed) that this cheap stuff worked well, I did buy one. It is useful because even in the same garden there are spots that could be different. My soil is about average 6.5 but in one spot I measured under 6, to be exact, 5.5 and in another spot around 7. The second spot I guessed to be high - I tried to grow Mediterranean herbs there and I limed that area heavily.

In any case, I had someone coming over with a very fancy and very expensive professional pH meter; I asked him to test the same areas and he got the same reading. So this cheap pH meter works, you just have to make a bit of mud where you measure the soil.

One more thing. We planted multiflora grafted roses from Pickering in a garden where the soil was 6.9, so close to neutral (7.00) and they performed beautifully. Just in case we sprinkled a bit of sulfur around, so by now the soil is 6.6 but the roses did extremely well even before the sulfur had a chance "to work". So IMHO, you do not need very acidic soil for multiflora to work, it just may cause problem if your soil is very alkaline (I guess, over 8, or 8.5 - southern California gardeners can tell you better than I can what is the 'cutting' point for multiflora).
gnabonnand
16 years ago
Kate, just out of curiosity, how far from Coffeyville are you?

Randy
dublinbay z6 (KS)
Original Author
16 years ago
Randy, maybe 1.5 hour drive from Coffeyville. Haven't driven it in some time, so can't quite remember for sure--usually head north to Kansas City where my daughter lives. Why? Are you from Coffeyville, famed for the demise of the Dalton Gang?

My corner of the state is in the same zone as Coffeyville, but it gets a lot drier as you drive Coffeyville/Wichita direction.

Kate