THANK YOU, Buford, on the tip of direct sunlight on the base for basal breaks. This past zone 5a winter, my roses with the most sunlight hitting the base got the most basal breaks. The ones with gloomy northern exposure got none. I'm illiterate in pruning - my harsh winter and the chipmunks & bunnies do the pruning for me. David Austin catalog has a good section on pruning, and how much to take off for climber: "Climbers: the previous year's flowering shoots should be reduced to 3 or 4 buds, or about 4-6" and the strong, new stems tied in, cutting out older ones as necessary."

Ah yes, Buff Orpingtons, Kitty. Well.........maybe, in the (distant) future. We had them at the allotment and they were fun to have around.....as long as they didn't escape.....and therein lies the dilemma - Mr Fox is perpetually lurking and chickens, unlike a lot of birds, were not terribly smart. Cath, I love the thoughtful info you impart - it is worth reading twice, especially since you are mentioning plants which I am utterly unfamilar with. Even now, shrubs have not popped up in my brain - still playing with perennials. Way back in the day, when I first started gardening, it all began with a particularly colourful flowering shrub (lavatera) and, thrilled with the success and ease of having colour and structure, I followed the well-known novice route of rapidly buying several more (philadelphus, weigela, the usual stuff)....and, of course, roses. I ran out of room in the first year! Anyway, apart from a few deutzias and philadelphus, those shrubs are long gone from my garden and also from my brain - so thank you for reminding me about a huge class of stalwart plants. I do recall checking out lindera and fothergilla and concluding they wanted a more acididc soil than I could provide (I had a brief flirtation with autumn colour) but I have always been crazy about heps and berries (I might have to risk a few of the better behaved cotoneasters) and I love the sound of your holly(although I have been looking at non-prickly types such as J.C.Van Tol). Also, I now have room to indulge in some of the less familiar fruits such as aronias, japanese wineberries (and indeed, rubus of various winter colours and good white spring flowers). I feel a bit faint when I consider the massive shuffling around this autumn, moving roses and perennials, so I may have to reach into my purse (deep pockets and short arms syndrome) and spend a bit of cash on a few statement bushes, for the sheer ease of straightforward planting (as opposed to cutting back, digging up and moving ).

Jackie and ordphien, thanks for your posts, I have found them most interesting and informative... and I apologise if anyone thinks I'm putting them on the spot here, but Jackie, if I may take your case in point, and I think you have illustrated to me just what I'm getting at, that when you say your location in particular is a great place to grow roses, and your garden is always superbly presented, but it seems with the proviso that you have to irrigate most of the year... ...I think I read that the Sacramento Cemetery garden irrigates once a week, and maybe this is why Descanso dug out their old roses... ...so the question should be, where are the best places in the States to live to grow roses...? where you've got to irrigate or else the whole place would dry up? or areas where you don't..? I think that's an important question in this day and age..

I grow Madame Alfred Carriere here in my virtual zone 6 and it has survived at least 6 winters fairly easily there. I find that mine only blooms if it has surviving cane from the previous year, and that only happens about one in three years for me. Even if it dies to the ground it gets big and bushy and floppy, so you'll need to plan some supports. I let mine grow horizontally under my bay window and use one of those grow through grids to hold it up off the ground. I'd say the canes get to 10-12' even if it dies to the ground. If I get blooms, it's mostly only once in a season, but it can be pretty impressive if the conditions are right. Bottom line is that it might indeed die back to the ground, but you need to count on it getting BIG over the season. Hope that helps. Cynthia