It's not only possible, but it's done all the time.

Who has produced a plant with clusters of miniature blooms around a large one? If this was possible, and done all the time, we would be seeing lots of them on the market.
I Tampa.... means yes, you can cross a large rose with a miniature one.
The blooms would be one size, and most likely intermediate between the miniature rose and the large one.
I don't know how easy it would be to get a take, because these roses are of different types.
Rose experts?

A great deal of hybridizing is being done between mini and other types of roses. The results are variable but, as Sparaxis states, resulting plants will only bear one type of roses; not some large, some small, of varying colors and shapes on the same plant.

Some roses are better male parents (having fertile pollen) and some are better mother plants (capable of producing seeds that will germinate), with varying ability to pass on desireable traits. But this primarily depends on the variety, not the type.

It takes 3 or more months to ripen hips (heps), the seedpods. So, if you are interested in learning to hybridize, plan on studying up during the winter months and be ready to go when the roses bloom again.

Do some browsing and ask questions in the Garden Web rose forum on propagation, check out the American Rose Society site, and go to www.olyrose.org, where you will find some interesting articles.

I will be glad to answer any further questions you might have.

glenda

Traditionally, miniturism has the dominant trait. That means if you crossed Don Juan with lets say Black Jade, most likely you will have minis. Infact, many mini roses has climbers for parents such as New Dawn, Dortmond, Golden Glow, etc.,. Scarlet Moss has the massive Dortmound twice as grandparents, and it only grows about a foot high. Pacific Seranade is removed from many generation away from its miniture parent, and has a whole lot more large roses in its parentage.

Yes, the Mini trait tends to dominate, but that means most Minis carry non-Mini as a recessive. I've grown seedlings from Micro-Minis and got non-Mini Chinas. Polyanthas are possible from some others.

In fact, it's not a bad idea to use Minis for breeding non-Minis -- since you can keep more varieties in a smaller place. 'Winter Magic' would be very nice for breeding fragrant mauve varieties, for example.

I crossed 'Blush Noisette' x 'Popcorn' (very Mini) and got a very nice, and very fragrant non-Mini variety. The leaves are glossy and dark, and the flowers are white, like 'Popcorn'. But the plant is similar to 'Blush Noisette' in size, but hardier (it's thriving in Iowa, I'm told). The fragrance is better than either parent.

http://www.geocities.com/kingke.geo/Roses/SWEETIME.JPG

Karl

Karl, that is a very lovely plant. I saw it last summer in the San Jose Guadalupe Heritage Rose Gardens. Although I couldn't smell the fragrance as I had allergies. I think it was a gentleman who pointed it out and told me the name. I saw the pic before, but where? But the plant I saw was a bit more pink in color.

I have a Don Juan which has been planted for 8 yrs this May - last year I planted a Nearly Wild Rose (Rosa x 'Nearly Wild')in the same flowerbed @ 20 feet away. This year I thought my Don Juan was dying - it had light pink roses blooming on it. I just realized yesterday that the 2 bushes have combined and I have been trying to find info on this. The Don Juan bush has large, full red roses and clusters of tiny pink roses the same shade as the Nearly Wild Rose on the same bush. The wild rose has a depth of one petal & the pink ones on the Don Juan have a depth of 3 or 4 petals?? So not sure if same flower or not. I need to take pictures of this wild wonder.

Anyone have any idea if this will continue next year or just a fluke of nature this year?

Allison

Would it be possible (feasable?) then, for a rose with mini flowers to produce a sport which had larger flowers?

Sparaxis Vic Aust wrote:

"Would it be possible (feasable?) then, for a rose with mini flowers to produce a sport which had larger flowers?"

Sure! 'Popcorn' (Mini) sported to the much larger 'Gourmet Popcorn' (Polyantha).

As for GloryBee's original question, it may be possible to breed for a large bloom surrounded by smaller blooms. 'Tropicana', for example, sometimes produces a few smaller buds around the large central bloom. And some Floribundas produce a central bloom that is distinctly larger than the rest of the blooms in the cluster. By removing the smaller buds, gardeners can persuade such plants to produce larger flowers than usual. Or, if the central bud is nipped out the cluster can be made more uniform.

It would not be a simple matter of crossing this with that and getting the perfect variety you want. But if you start with several varieties that already show the tendency, cross among them and select the offspring that give the neatest seperation of large and small blooms, you might get what you have in mind after a few generations of selection.

Karl

Here is a link that might be useful: Bulb 'n' Rose

ROFLOL-HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAH--YOUR WRONG GENETICS DOESN'T WORK THAT WAY!!!!!!!!

I've been wondering what, exactly, is being taught in high schools these days. Spelling, punctuation, common courtesy, and intelligent discourse obviously are being ignored in favor of ... the above.

If you could clarify your objections I might be able to explain where your biology teacher went wrong. For one thing, Mendel did not provide the final answer to all aspects of heredity. He had no opportunity to study the inheritance of phenotypic plasticity, which is what I was discussing.

How do you suppose flower size and cluster formation are inherited? The synstyle species (R. multiflora, wichuraiana, setigera, moschata, etc.) have large clusters of small flowers -- all the flowers are roughly the same size. Tea roses and some of the Tea-Noisettes have one or a few large flowers. So, how does it happen that some of the Hybrid Teas, Tropicana is a well-known example, produce one large flower surrounded by a few smaller ones?

Dominance is not as simple as textbook writers would have us believe. A given "gene" may have a dominant effect in one part of an organism, or at one stage of development, and yet be suppressed in other parts or stages. That is to say, the tendency to produce large blooms may be dominant in the center of the cluster, but recessive otherwise.

Have you ever seen a yellow Tea or Hybrid Tea with red leaves? The "gene for red" is dominant as the shoot develops, but becomes recessive as the flower forms. Other roses have red flowers with little or no visible red pigment in the leaves and cane. In these cases the "gene for red" is recessive until the flowers start to form.

Close the textbook for a while, and open your eyes. Heredity is far more interesting than Mendel imagined.

Karl