Some great looking plants Brady. I tried 10 hardwood cuttings and got zero, zilch to grow. I will try again next year, not sure what I did wrong. It's interesting to see the leaves on your plants versus mine...west to east. Maybe it just the way the photo was taken but your leaves look slightly larger on average than mine do. A local grower was telling me he measured the average leaf size on a plants on the west side (Oregon) and found they are about 30% larger on average for same plant variety. This kind of makes sense when you think about the heat we have on this side versus where you are at. A smaller leaf surface would help conserve water. I think the berries on your Chippewa look bigger than those I had last year....mine were really tiny and way too many of them on one plant. The Chippewa grows like a dense shrub whereas the Reka, Bluecrop, etc. are more spindly. I thinned out my Chippewas this past winter by probably 50% and it has lots of new shoots coming up and wants to be a shrub again. Here's one of my Reka, this plant is 4 1/2 feet tall or so. Then here's a Chippewa which is maybe three feet tall growing right next to the Reka:

Well, we're way off topic anyway sort of, so about the humidity: It REALLY bothers ME. I'm not so certain that it is so much of an issue for the roses. In spring, the chilly humidity seems to encourage mildew on susceptible plants like a perennial bedding salvia which sometimes takes on a "creamy variegation" - that's what I tell the uninformed visitor anyway, lol. In the summer when it is both humid and hot, they don't seem to notice. In fact, I'd swear that some of my roses are in their "happy place," or maybe comatose, but their leaves are usually fine then. Whenever I've been in a greenhouse/glasshouse, the humidity levels always feel above average or definitely greater than the outdoor level - and plants in general seem to flourish in greenhouses, don't they? We in Florida also get our share, or more, of rain at night. The roses don't seem to complain about that a bit. As is oft repeated here: roses like water. If one reads up on the tomato forum, there is/was/has been presented there that tomatoes have a biological high temperature "cut-off" sensor which shuts down their blooms and therefore their tomato production. I think some roses have this too, but I gots NO PROOF or I'd reference the documentation. In conclusion, whereas for ME the adage, "it ain't the heat, it's the humidity" is true; for the roses I suspect that it ain't the humidity, it's the heat. Again: a conclusion based on observation here only. And to the question: "How...do you keep roses going in the humidity of Florida?" My answer is the stuff I wrote already plus I only add VDR (very disease resistant) roses to the garden.

esh - the other leaves are False Indigo. About the Baptisia, do think I could propagate it? I've never tried, but I could. Acording to Dave's, "Propagation Methods: From seed; direct sow outdoors in fall From seed; winter sow in vented containers, coldframe or unheated greenhouse From seed; stratify if sowing indoors From seed; germinate in a damp paper towel Scarify seed before sowing" But I don't recall seeing seed pods.... I guess I need to pay closer attention. In the meantime, I could put a stem in water and see what happens.

I surprise no one is growing Orange Strawberry. It's heart shape and gave lots of fruit for me last year. **** Lots and lots of folks grow Orange Strawberry, me included. And if you do a search at the bottom of this page for heart shaped varieties you'll find several threads devoted to hearts alone. Orange Strawberry first appeared as a stray seed in a commercial pack of Pineapple seeds as found by Majorie Morris of IN. It's also from Marjorie that I got German Red Strawberry, a family heirloom, and I made both of them avaialable initially by listing them in the SSE YEarbook from whence they got distributed to a lot of retail places. I also send the best of my varieties each year to Sandhill Preservation and TGS, and more of late to Mike at Victory Seeds, but for Glenn at Sandhill and Linda at TGS I've been doing it for many years. And I also have been doing a seed offer each year of varieties new to all or most. Damon is a fellow heart lover, which endears him to my heart shaped heart. LOL Just ask him where he got the seeds for Anna Maria's Heart, Danko and Serdtse Buivola, and some others. LOL Carolyn