I don't think I've ever seen a real live knockout. All they sell near me is iceberg and more iceberg. My sister and I have a game- when we're driving around town and see one we have to say " Hi Iceberg! " They sure are everywhere but I have to say now that fall is here, they look really good.

There's lots of knockouts in my area stores, too. Why? I'd hazard a guess: they are mostly a marketing phenomenon. They don't really LOOK like roses, being fairly flat, having relatively few petals, and their scent is too subtle to really appreciate. Disease resistance - apparently a key selling point - only speaks to rose-knowledgeable folks. Unfortunately, those folks (us!) know there are so much better alternatives.

I expect knockout roses to go the way of Cabbage Patch dolls and other short-lived fads.

Rick

According to some of my nearly rose-illiterate neighbors, the main attractions of Knock Outs are their continuous neon bright color and their overall shrub size. I was told that I should plant a couple KOs so I could have some roses in my yard and so they could enjoy the bright colors from across the street. I guess my 53 roses just can't compete with one Knock Out--at least, the neighbors didn't seem to know there were any roses in my back yard.

Kate

I have to admit I kind of like the 2 pink knockouts I planted last year as foundation roses in the front of my house. They provide a practically continous shot of pink color all summer long in a rounded 3 feet tall disease free bush. They do not match the exquisiteness of my other roses, nor the wonderful fragrance and beauty. But it is the reliable and continuous color I was going for that in that particular location. This is their second year and I still haven't found a good reason to dig them up to replace them. They just do too well there. I baby all my other roses. I have to do very little to my Knockouts.

{{gwi:336464}}

Pete:

Where we live there are no box stores. That's a good thing. However if Walmart were closer to us I would probably run right out and buy a whole bunch of them. My knowledge base about real roses is so small still that if I could grow six more knockouts in one of my flower beds next year while I continue to inform myself about traditional roses I would be happy.

I know KO's are anathema to growers who prefer the real mccoy. But if you just want something pretty and easy to grow they are fun. They may indeed prove to be a fad and I for one am comfortable with that:)

Kate

Last fall about 30 Knockouts were planted in front of the arboretum - suggesting to local residents this is the way to go. Tuesday evening our garden club had a meeting in the arboretum and since I had a little extra time I looked around outside the auditorium. Half of the Knockouts were missing - either died o taken out; the remaining ones were sorry looking sparse foliage and naked legs - like any other rose in drought and during or after heavy spider mite infestation.

So, what's the point to plant them?

There are much better roses in this climate that would do better even in extreme circumstances. Arethusa and Perle d'Or (in my yard) didn't look so bad even during the worst days of this summer.
There has been a lot of money to promote Knockout while no independent nursery can afford to put that much cash into advertising good older roses, or some new ones - other than Knockout- as KO promoters did and do.

Paul Z. of Ashdown was very optimistic that the success of KOs would lead to re-discovery of older disease resistant roses. I don't see that this would be the case. I wish Paul were right.

Let me hasten to say that despite my lament above, I also own 2 Knock Outs--that is, 2 Double Knock Outs. They are still small--first season--and I got them for the same reason many other dedicated rosers do--because its nice to have a couple of bright, easy-care spots in the garden while I am angst-ing (I made up that word!) over my favorite Austin or my Eden climber or my new hybrid musk that is too wimpy or non-blooming or blackspotting, etc.

I enjoy the Knock Outs in my yard and other people's yards. What I don't enjoy is seeing them everywhere I go. Like enough--even of a good thing--is enough!

Kate

Last fall about 30 Knockouts were planted in front of the arboretum - suggesting to local residents this is the way to go.

*** But look at it this way:
The fact that they in fact FAILED to be the disease-free salvation of the rose world may end up demonstrating that they
really are NOT the way to go.

Jeri

Jerry, yes, I also tried to look at the scene this way but it isn't easy. If one visits the smaller independent nurseries, s/he can see that they also sell mostly KOs. I tried to talk to some of them suggesting at least trying to carry a few OGRs; they pretend to listen, then they order the newest HTs and Knockouts. It is silly because they cannot even compete with the box stores in selling these because they cannot sell their products that cheap.

Or, another example. One lady who came to the garden club meetings occasionally (they just moved down here and bought about 20 acres) alleged that she wanted to do a rose garden around their house but, she said, she loved only 'old fashioned roses' and asked help. I was ready to pull out Jean's list and tell her which roses on that list work in our coastal inferno (not everything is disease free here in the coast that is clean for Jean) and which nurseries she could get her roses from. She then emailed me last winter that her project would be urgent because her daughter wanted to have her wedding in the mother's 'rose garden in July. So I was about to visit her and make recommendations and even planned to call a few nurseries on her behalf asking if they had a few more mature roses. In the last minute she decided to buy Knockouts because one of the local nurseries or chain stores (or our local rose society is heavily promoting one of the chain stores) told her that only those would be problem free for her.

The club has three plant sales a year. As to roses, people come and ask if we have KOs! No, we don't. I usually have a few OGRs rooted and so far those who bought them come back for others. But I am not a nursery and I do not even have that many OGRs. Very few is willing to go online and order roses though I offer to provide a list of good nurseries for them.

DH told me that the university also installed a lot of KOs "but those looked awful and were not even blackspot free". The ritziest neighborhood in town has mass plantings of KOs in the common areas. What do you think the millionaire homeowners ask landscapers to plant in their private yards? Knockouts - mass planted. BORING! BORING!

I am sorry for the outburst, I do not mean to insult anyone who plants KOs but if one would see the bleak landscape in this town, s/he would understand my resentment. Of course, the situation is not much better in the area of perennials either.

In time it will change but I will not be alive to see that.

No, don't be sorry. I understand how you feel, and I feel your frustration.
Been there, worn that hair shirt.

Jeri

Wait until those people who have mass planted a gozillion Knockouts have to prune them. Been there, done that, was shredded for weeks, and still have light scars. They are gone, gone, gone. It took a chainsaw and some strong men to get them out. They complained that their leather work gloves had to be thrown out. Nasty stuff.

Disease and work free? I should say not! If not cared for they look like a badly grown modern hybrid tea - half naked, with the other half ugly foliage. What a bunch of marketing hype and lies.

A couple of Knockouts, well cared for, CAN create a nice splash of color.

Would I ever buy another? Heck NO!!!!

I love OGRs! (A few of the modern roses are nice too).

Sandy

I have KO's in my front as foundation plants and I kind of like them.

The roses that get the most comments are the three Valentines I have planted by the mail box. I have OGR's in my back which are kind of visible and I'm starting to get comments from neighbors wanting to know what I have back there. The only way I know how to fight the KO syndrome is to be visible about OGR's and hope to get someone interested. I'm hoping to work with some others in the local rose club at a local cemetery in planting some OGR's and to do something about what passes for a rose garden at the local botanical gardens, but I think what I do in my own yard is important too just as a silent way to showing there is something else.

Jeri, I hope that what you said is true:

**The fact that they in fact FAILED to be the disease-free salvation of the rose world may end up demonstrating that they really are NOT the way to go.**

What I'm afraid of is that if the KO's bomb, people will give up on roses entirely instead of wanting to know what else MIGHT be out there after people get tired of seeing KO's. Roses have this hybrid tea reputation, you know, which is a cat we've skinned numerous times so there's no use discussing that again.

If not cared for they look like a badly grown modern hybrid tea - half naked, with the other half ugly foliage.

Sandy, I agree except that some of those hybrid teas at least have nice shape, color and/or fragrance; each of these elements offer more than KO's features altogether.

What I'm afraid of is that if the KO's bomb, people will give up on roses entirely instead of wanting to know what else MIGHT be out there

*** I know.
I'm just trying very, VERY hard to look at the doughnut, rather than the hole."

"As you wander on through life, brother,
What ever be your goal,
Keep your eye upon the doughnut,
And not upon the hole."
--Anon.

Jeri

I'm just trying very, VERY hard to look at the doughnut, rather than the hole.

I like this one!

Guys, I love my KOs. I have mass planted them as foundation plants but I also weave in purple dahlias, daylilies, turf lilies, pillar roses, buck roses, a Japanese maple, and perennial grasses as part of my landscape border. I adore the riot of continuous color and the size these shrubs have grown during their 3 years since I planted them has astounded me. I have the red (not double) and the regular pink with a total of 10 rose plants. Maybe it's because the garish red color has always been one of my favorite colors .. if they had a car that color, I would drive it. Oh, well. Just a different point of view from a KO enthusiast.

No Knock OFF's for me!

I'm with Ceterum: BORING, BORING!