I've have a 'Sombreuil' for about 5 yrs. It's about 12'x12' and gets little, if any, winter dieback. It's a good bloomer, too.

This, to me, is an interesting post, as I am also considering teas (and noisettes, for that matter), though not nearly to the same extent. Planning on Duchesse de Brabant & Clementina Carbonieri for next year (and also Jaune Desprez & Crepuscule) - we'll see how it goes.

As for Sombreuil - I also have and it is growing well (though I believe there is some conjecture on whether that should properly be classifed as a tea, or is perhaps a wichurana).

I have Graham Thomas' book on old roses, which includes a map of Europe zoned in accordance with USDA hardiness zones. If I recall correctly only the northernmost part of Scotland is zone 6. Everything else in Great Britain is zones 7-9.

(Granted, the summers are usually rather cool, but that only means Great Britain's climate is more or less akin to the Pacific Northwest - mild & wet in the winter, yet cool in the summer.)

Ah, yes, tea noisetts. But that's what jaune desprez & crepuscule are? Hopefully going with own root will help; my understanding there on a (the?) problem would be winter/spring wild temperature fluctuations - hardiness issue; perhaps with own root if significant dieback would bounceback?

In my experience I could grow any Tea here. Some balled and most got a lot of BS, but hardiness wasn't an issue, provided you spray to keep them healthy. Left unspraysed, they can't put much growth and gradually decline until one of the winters kills them.
Tea Nosettes, didn't survive in my garden. I tried Jaune Desprez, Crepuscule and Celine Forrestier. All three were not hardy for me. Crepuscule was the most hardy, it survived three winters.

Olga

Yeah, thanks Olga - that's my thought/worry; still I feel I need to try & let the chips fall where they may.

And, whatever doesn't work, perhaps then an Austin (or whatever professes to be disease resistant & fragrant at the time).

My zone 7 is the extremes, very hot 100+ F summers and moderately cold, windy winters, can get down into the teens and below for several days at a stretch.
Tea-noisettes: I have tried twice with Crepuscle, both failed. Jaune Desprez does well here in a very protected spot. Celine Forestier has survived, but looks bad, chlorotic, canes yellowish and sickly. Lamarque is looking really good in its fourth year. Pilarcitos gets a lot of dieback, but lovely blossoms and intensely fragrant. Reve d'or is looking good in its second year, I think will be my favorite T-N. Mlle. de Sombreuil aka "La Biche" has some dieback here, adapts well to an obelisk/pillar or as a large shrub. "Sombreuil" climber, aka Colonial White does not work well in my zone 7, is progressively dying away. Mme. Alfred Carierre is huge, beautiful, little to no dieback.

Noisettes do well here, healthy and hardy. My very fav is Natchitoches Noisette.

Teas, the best in my garden are Mons. Tillier and Le Pactole. I cannot recommend Le Pactole enough, a perpetual blooming machine, healthy and hardy. Ducher (sometimes classified as a china) is a gorgeous rose, some dieback, but takes well to pruning and grows on. Spice has little to no dieback, very healthy. My teas are in an area with only a wide-spaced picket fence to protect from the wind whipping from across open fields.

The tea roses along my rambler fence have a mixed-bag of success, based on last winter's cold. All plants were two years old, planted in the ground the previous spring after spending a year in pots.

Huntington Tea, Mrs. Dudley Cross, Bon Silene, and Isabella Sprunt were killed to the ground. Huntington Tea re-emerged from the roots, and is now about a foot-or-so tall. There's no sign of the others.

Comtesse Riza du Parc, La Sylphide, Rock Hill Peach Tea, and Rubens survived the winter with some damage, and are growing well. They're okay.

Mme. Lombard, Msr. Tillier, Mme. Antoine Mari (my fav!), Mrs. B. R. Cant, Angel's Camp Tea (my other fav!), Souvenir d'Un Ami fared the best. These had some winter die-back, which I trimmed off, and they grew and bloomed all summer.

I still have a bed of Tea Noisettes planned for the south-facing brick wall on the side of my house. As of now, it will contain Reve d'Or, Alistair Stella Gray, Phil Edinger's Noisette, and (maybe) Marechal Niel. Crepuscule lives on my fence by the Rose Field, and it's fine ... as is Georgetown Gateside Yellow and Pleasant Hill Cemetery. Comtesse du Cayla and Single Pink China, in the same area as Crepuscule, were killed completely last winter. My China/Teas (Ducher, Jean Bach Sisley, Napoleon, Reuter China, Camellia Rose, etc.) were fine.

If you are game for a little bit of experimentation, and have the spot for them, you will get continual flowers from the Teas all summer long. People visited the garden in July and August (when many other roses were 'resting') and commented on how beautiful the Teas (and Chinas and Polyanthas) were, and how surprised they were to see so many flowers when the humans were melting in the heat.

Connie

Here is a link that might be useful: blog

As far as teas, cramoisi superieur is intriguing (china tea?), but what would it's hardiness be on the east coast? Also ducher...I guess these 2 would be on my backup list.

I need to consider (pure) noisettes more.

Thankfully space is becoming limited. I tend to not dispose of roses (exception-some invasive species roses, and am reconsidering some rugosas), so future additions may be limited (besides, have to have some space for berry bushes & (most recently) herbs).

cramoisi superieur - I haven't come to a firm conclusion. This was a strange season for me in that some really good roses didn't do much in our cold, rainy spring but came to life this fall and are still going strong. CS is one of these. I've had it for 2 seasons. I may also be to blame, I discovered the brass coupling on the sprinkler was rubbing against the crown.

So far, it's a keeper.

Cramoisi Superieur does get a lot of die back each winter, but gradually increases its size, provided it is sprayed. It is not really that BS resistant here.
olga

I think heat gain is a big issue with these roses..those of you in the east just get warmer faster. I took soil temps one year and it amazed me how long it took for my soil to warm up past 60 degrees and you dont get much nitrogen activity below 70. My old once bloomers get going and grow set buds..they dont seem to need that warm boost but the Asian based roses are so slow to get going. Even my Noisettes are really late summer and fall roses. This all has the merit of givng me impressively long blooms on my once bloomers since they keep putting on new buds for several weeks as night temps drop to 50 degrees all through June. I do have one Tea and I wish I knew what it was but the Stellars Jays seem to get a kick out of removing labels-viewing it as a challange. It is the last of a group I got from Chamblees. Some day I will figure out for sure...but still after several years it is not even waist high.

patricia

the Asian based roses are so slow to get going. Even my Noisettes are really late summer and fall roses

I also have noticed this about the comments regarding Teas & Chinas. Having read a little about them in Graham Thomas' book on antique roses (& also a very little bit elsewhere), I'm not really surprised. The wild roses those Asians were bred from are native to the semi-tropics of southern China & northern India (more or less), plus nearby areas that also are semi-tropical. That means these rose varieties come from wild roses adapted to climates with mild winters and long, hot, sticky summers.

The only one I've seen so far that intrigues me is Duchesse de Brabant, and that's because there's info. on this forum & on HelpMeFind indicating it grows successfully, to full size, on Long Island (which has a climate warmer than mine, but otherwise similar). The rest of the Asian roses are highly likely to only be runts for me. Typically I only get "hot weather" (in the the high 80's or 90's) for a couple of weeks in July or August. Other than that, it's in the 70's or 80's here during "warm weather". It's humid, but not "hot". Therefore, by & large I expect the Teas & Chinas (& Noisettes) to really struggle for me if I were to try to grow them, especially considering the really cold snaps here can get to -15 degrees (F) at night, and only 10-15 during the day.

Mirandy ?

I have bought Mr. Lincolns (one of my aromatic favorites) three rimes during the past five or six years. All of them died before the summer ended, (Zone 7 - Denton, Texas). Sun in morning, shade during day, sun in evening evening. Never had a problem with them before we moved to Denton. I also like Chrysler Imperial. Any suggestions will be appreciated.

'Mirandy', 'Mr. Lincoln', and 'Chrysler Imperial' are Hybrid Teas, not Teas.

:-)

~Christopher

The climber Sombrieuil is not a tea. It's really Colonial White. The tea is Mademoiselle Sombrieuil. I'm not sure if the tea is hardy, but the climber is.

I am in zone 7 and I have teas and they do well. HOWEVER, in the winter of 2013, when we had the polar vortex, the temps got to zero twice. That zapped all the above ground growth on most of my teas. They were own root and well established, so they did come back. But something to keep in mind. The ones that did not die back (or not that badly were, Lady Hillingdon, Comtessa du Cayla (which is technically a china), Clementine Carbonieri, Duchesse du Brabant, Madame Lambard. The ones that did die back, Mrs. BR Cant, Mlle Franziska Kruger (that one did not come back) Crepescule, Marie d'Orleans. So zone 7 means you don't get below 10 degrees. I think anything below that you risk a lot of dieback.

Yes, Sombreuil / aka Colonial White is your best bet on that list, because it is NOT a tea rose - it is a modern LFC, of winchurana descent, which should make it very cold hardy. HMF says it is OK to zone 6b, and I have heard of it growing in colder zones. It has the most gorgeous, lovely, blooms. It grows amazingly large here, but perhaps a colder climate would keep it in check. Mine grows from a bed up and over a large arch, and then up our house to the roof, which is three stories high.

Jackie

I'll go with Hartwood's summary, tho I am farther inland and higher elevation (and I haven't amended my soil as well as she has). I have winters ranging from 5b to 7. My Tea-Noisettes are the most fragile. Crepuscle has now had several near-death experiences, tho she has always come back. By&large, once the Teas get established, they do fine--minimal die-back. The only ones I lost were planted in late summer/fall from bands and didn't winter over. But larger root systems and spring planted do fine. Both my Chinas and the Noisettes stand up to the winters, as well. Mine are all own-root.

Like most folks on this thread, I'll have to echo that teas (something separate from Hybrid Teas of course) don't necessarily thrive the further you get from zone 7. It's like anything else - you have to pick and choose among teas, and even then it may depend on local conditions like catsrose says from zone 6. I have had Madame Alfred Carriere for many years, and have planted some other noisettes or tea-noisettes recently (Blush Noisette comes to mind), and so far they've survived fine but are not cane hardy. The problem is that these seem to only bloom on old wood, so while MAC has absolutely massive healthy canes trying to eat my house every year, I've only had one year of bloom out of them in the past 6 years (a very mild winter where most roses had surviving cane). The same goes for many of my Bourbons and Hybrid Perpetuals, including Mme. Isaac Periere.

As for teas, I've got some 6-7 year old ones that do fine for me and a few new ones planted. Some teas have died a miserable death (Monsieur Tillier comes to mind) and all of these are in a virtual zone 6 side of my house. The longest surviving ones are Mme. Antoine Mari, Mrs. BR Cant, Maman Cochet, and Duchesse de Brabant. Georgetown Tea was also good until it succumbed to user error. I wouldn't say any of these thrive in the ways expected for warm zone teas, but they make nice modest sized blooming bushes and recover reasonably well from being pruned to the ground even after all the protection I can give them.

Bottom line is that zones 7 and to some extent 6 are probably the limits of where teas are likely to survive long-term, but they do need summer heat (we have plenty of that), rather than murky summer gloom like some regions can experience. I'm a bit of an anomaly in zone 5 and I'm fully aware that I'm zone pushing the teas. Nothing like a challenge though.

Cynthia