This rose should come with a warning label. I have seen it big as a VW bus. Canes that took a chain saw to cut through and have known people to use mature Mermaids instead of razor wire to deter vandals. Thorns worse than anything I have ever seen - big ones, small ones - HUGE ones.

Jim:

Your post got me curious so I checked it out on HMF> Look at this picture. Appears to be just what rozannadanna described. The size is stated as 15' to 20' high and 20' wide. Yikes!

Kate

Here is a link that might be useful: Sweet little 'Mermaid'

If that is one rose, you get a lot for your money. I immediately started thinking about where I have room for something like that.

Randy at Sherando Roses tried for two or three years to keep Mermaid and grow her up a tree, and it croaked each winter. From what I've read of Mermaid, she attains those gigantic proportions only in warmer zones.

Connie
(who loves big roses but wouldn't touch this one with a ten-foot pole.)

It is one of the most beautiful roses ever created. If that means anything . . . :)

Best wishes
Jon

Jim.

Just one thing has me worried for your zone and that is it is listed as being Zone 8 - 9. I checked Antique Rose Emporiums page and the concur. Just a thought.

Kate

Here is a link that might be useful: Mermaid at ARE

Well I hit a wrong key, I don't know which one, and it wiped all that I wrote. Pity that you can't save your post as you are part way through.

Anyway, Kate, it might be risky to try Mermaid based on hardiness. DK says 6, Botanica says 4-11 (really helpfull), Hortico says 4! and what did HMF say 8-9?. I find them really off the wall on hardiness as practically any rose except a rugosa is like 7 or higher.

Fragrance is also really up for grabs as one sayd fragrant and another says slight. Are we talking about the same rose? Now there is something listed as Little Mermaid perhaps that is in this confusion as well.

Well I think I'll try it, own root as suggested by DK so if it freezes chances are it will grow back with vigor. And won't get so out of hand. I love singles and one that holds onto its' stamens without getting ugly brown sounds like a winner.

Jim, I have no experience with Mermaid (yet... since I planted two of them only a month ago).
But, when I did my homework on the Mermaid, I found there is a miniature version of this monster - it's sport named 'Happenstance'.
I bought this one, too. Please take a look.

Marina

Here is a link that might be useful: Happenstance @ HMF

I put a small own-root plant of Mermaid on my back fence and in one season it went up and over the 6 foot fence and grew laterally to cover 20 feet of fence THE FIRST YEAR! I grew it in z8 North Texas. The good stuff was true for me-- everblooming, very large flowers, and self cleaning. I wore a leather jacket and gauntlets when I went anywhere near it. I sold that house and the neighbors on the other side and probably still cursing me!!! I had a white Lady Banks nearby and Fortune's Double Yellow on the other side and I swear at night you could hear them growing..astonishing. Would I have it again? OOOOHHHHH YES!

There is someone on the Carolina forum who lives in the mountains in zone 6 and reported that he had a Mermaid, so it sounds like it's possible. Mine has survived 0 temps a couple of times with no problems.

So if it can take your cold, it is as good as it sounds. :)

Hahahahaha...

I have mine planted in a clearing where it can mound up and get as big as it wants and I'll never have to touch it (at least that is the plan). Can it compete against the elm roots? Stay tuned for the next installment!

Melissa

I've always wanted Mermaid because of its big, yellow, single blooms (and it was Claude Monet's favourite rose), but everything I've ever read suggests it's extremely frost sensitive. Give it a go, Jim, and if you can grow it, it will certainly survive here in the lower Great Lakes.
Steve.

It seems there are few growers of Mermaid, well those that have had it for awhile.

Anyone out there!

I tried it - it is not winter hardy in zone 5 and probably won't do well in zone 6 either as it is a once bloomer, flowering on old wood. This is a rose for warm climates only and there it can be magnificient. Horrible thorns, rampant growth and flowers over a fairly long period.
I saw it in Virginia some years back and also at the Royal National Headquarters Building when they had their headquarters in their garden.
One of those we northerners can admire but can't grow.
Jim, you might try Elegance if you like yellow climbers.

Jim:

If you decide that Mermaid isn't a good candidate after all you might think about Paul's Himalayan Musk. Similar attributes with a pink flower. Zones 4 - 9. Link below for you.

Kate

Here is a link that might be useful: Paul's Himalayan Musk at HMF

It's only $20 bucks or so, so why not try it and get it off your mind! And besides that first year you can at least enjoy those first blooms!

I have an own root Mermaid still in the pot I bought from Chamblees. I am going to plant it across the road from my home on the 4 acres I bought - its all in woods, I plan to plant it trained up the trees on the edge of the lot so I can watch it safely from across the road. It can sprawl or do whatever it wants - it will have 4 acres to spread out! I look forward to seeing all the beautiful white blooms without having to deal with it. Plan to plant it as we start getting a bit more rain so it can fend for itself.
Judith

Please don't hurt me, but I've said it before and I'll say it again. For me at least Mermaid never had enough flowers at once to make me think of it as a beautiful rose, never mind about its formidable armature. If a rose flower is very double and has a lovely color then a few scattered blooms might not be a problem. In Mermaid's case, the negatives outweigh the positives. I've only seen one photograph where Mermaid was beautiful and that was taken in England, so it's entirely possible that location has something to do with it. My Mermaid's leaves were a sort of yellowish-green and so didn't provide a good contrast with the color of the flowers.

Ingrid

Growing Mermaid in the way shown in the linked picture is to create wildlife habitat. Here, that would be rat habitat. If that isn't your cuppa, you need to be prepared to train the rose.

There was a Mermaid at Windrush Gardens, outside Baton Rouge, it grew in solitary splendor in a small clearing. From a distance, it looked like an old-fashioned haystack. If you had the space, it would be spectacular.
But for myself, I think if I wanted something huge and viciously thorny, I would plant Alba Odorata for its incredibly lovely foliage, and blooms that look rather like Gardenias.

Here is a link that might be useful: Alba Odorata

Maybe its' a bad idea! Lacking any great enthusiasm from warm places except England it might not do well here even if it survived winter.

I'll have to settle for such big roses as my already growing Baltimore Belle and new Long John Silver or Dr. W. van Fleet that is also quite big.

Perhaps a nice big yellow like Golden Wings.

I can't let the beautiful Mermaid go unpraised.
We're in I think, Zone 7 and she's fabulous. Grafted, about three years in the ground growing with Lamarque on two obelisks (one was not sufficient). I've never seen a photo that captures the drama of her blooms. They are so big, so yellow, so fragrant!!Absolutely trouble-free, so there's no need to get too close to the prickles.
The best attribute is the crown of golden stamens left behind after the petals fall.
If it wasn't very dark here I'd go out and get a picture for you.
Grow her, you deserve the experience>

Sue

There's one that grown in Hollywood cemetery Richmond Va- zone 7, and the groundskeepers keep chopping away at it- still manages to keep growing.

Golden Wings, yes!!! she had little or no dieback for me in Ohio, repeats very well-- I planted a trio of them with r. rubrifolia 'Carmenetta' behind them. The latter (aka r. glauca) for foliage and hips. You might also check out Autumn Sunset, Alchymist, and Elegance--they were all cane-hardy for me in Ohio. Of these 3, Autumn Sunset would be the best repeater, then Elegance, then once-blooming Alchymist. Jim, your best bet is a climber that will bloom on both old and new wood. Another very hardy large shrub which should cover a trellis for you "Weiss Aus Sparrieshoop"--semi-double, elegant white blooms. Jim, I think about these roses all the time, longingly, because most would not grow well HERE!!!

Well, if Jim really wants to try Golden Wings, he's welcome to take one of my two clunkers off my hands. I really should get rid of at least one of them, and possibly both.

Autumn Sunset isn't cane hardy here.

The good big yellows are the early once bloomers. Those do extremely well here.

This is a much tougher climate on roses than Ohio.