Audrey - be sure to let MIP build up well before you prune the laterals back to about 3 - leaves/eyes. That will produce new blooming laterals. It can become a huge rose - but I like to train it more - twisting the long canes around the about 24 inch in diameter metal support. It makes it produce many more blooming laterals - traning it this way. Growing naturally it will produce a big mound and it can send out 10 feet canes - first year these will only bloom at the tips - but next they will produce many blooming laterals/sideshoots. This is why I think that growing this rose with some kind of support - like training the long shoots horizontally on a trellis/fence/arbor produces the best results. Most freestanding MIPs I have seen look messy - huge thorny canes whipping all over - or the flowers are so high up that we can't smell them. The picture is 2 year old (plant 5 year old) and it only had a little mildew/very little rust at the time(I just sprayed and removed the infected leaves - and the summer pruning together with spraying kept it pretty clean. This year it has more rust and after picking the infected leaves/spraying it has lost about 20-25 percent of the leaves but looks pretty good now. Later in the season it also gets a little blackspot - but mildew and rust are worst here. So it is not an easy rose - but for those who are willing to put up with this work/care/spraying - they can choose if they think it is worth it. I love ultra fragrant roses - and will not live without it. I hope Nadia is up for a challenge. If all roses were this much work - I would not have time to grow many.

OOH!! That's awesome, Rita..*momentarily goes green with jealousy!* it sounds really pretty.. (I've seen your yard projects in other posts-it must be awesome to be surrounded by so much visual prettiness!) .. I"m only 10 mins away from the Whitestone Bridge, basically and yes. I didn't figure anything overwintered b/c we have had a LOT of snow and almost all my daylilies are above ground, so when it's cold.. they're COLD!.. that's why I kind of freaked at the leaf streak. I'm pretty sure I know which place I got it from, because I was clueless about rust last year and had no idea what it was, but in retrospect, I remember seeing it on just one of about 30 plants to start with and just figured it was okay, so at least in that case, I can sort of isolate where to not buy from. Cruddies dont' even bother me so much.. I'm usually pretty easygoing. I guess I was just afraid of having to throw things away and spend all this extra time/money on maintenance after convincing my husband so much that it made sense to spend all my hard earned income on lots of daylilies and the containers to hold them.LOL

Spearmint: looks like thrip larva or mite scarring, some kind of pest is eating on it. Mojito mint: I dunno, it doesn't look like mint rust, mint rust is almost like 3D rusty bumps on the plant. Also the stem doesn't seem effected. What are you growing the plant in? How dense is your soil & how often do you water it?

Several types of fungi cause spots on hydrangea. Powdery mildew affects the underside of leaves with light gray mold; the leaves turn brown in spots and the upper leaf either stays green or turns purple/brown. Rust causes -of course- rust or brownish postules on the underside of the leaves. Cercospora leaf spot starts as small brown/purple spots whose centers turn tan or light gray in time. Strong sun and heat causes the breakdown of chlorophyll in the leaf. Damaged areas in leaves appear as pale, bleached/yellowed or faded. Luis