Maybe 12 years ago, I wrote the article linked below. The 3. at the end is a foornote to the 3 after susceptibility. George Mander "has made arrangements with a wholesale rosegrower, Jan Verschuren, to graft his budwood on R. canina. Jan prefers R. canina currently. R. canina is what was used there before WW2. The original canina was notorious for suckering. There are new canina selections since then. R. canina cv. "Inermis" is the most widely used variety. Much less suckering takes place, but it still suckers. R. canina cv."Heinsohn's Rekord" is regarded as the very best for Hybrid Teas (Jan agrees out of experience). R. corymbifera cv. "Laxa" or R. dumetorum cv. "Laxa" is more and more being grown on Europe's mainland. It was always used as a rootstock for Great Britain only. Because it suckers little and is, therefore, a cheaper way of growing roses, the mainland now also grows more and more on Laxa. However, Laxa is not as winterhardy as R. canina. For treeroses, R. canina cv. "Pfander" is the best one (his family has a well established R. canina cv."Pfander" weeping treerose of The Fairy in their garden at home surviving at some -24 degrees C unprotected, its budunion up in the air). Cheap fast production for big box stores has opened a market for multiflora cutting rootstocks for treeroses in Holland, but they have little winterhardiness. He also points out that R. multiflora is softer and the grafts a little more likely to be weak during the first year (Brad had one of George's Canadian White Star break right at the bud union; it can happen in a strong wind). Multiflora is much faster in production, but has a shorter lifespan than canina. Brad's experience is roses grafted on R. canina suckered freely and didn't produce as many basal shoots as R. multiflora or own-root roses. However, Jan points out that multiflora was shipped to Sweden because they had guaranteed snow cover in their winters. All other parts never wanted multiflora because of its frost susceptibility 3. Obviously, there is great debate going on here concerning the relative merits of various rootstocks." "3. This has always been a hot topic for Jan. Another former local grower here lost his crop on multiflora when temperatures went down to minus 24 degrees C. "I should have put more straw on" was his thinking... Jan hills up his budunions in fall and sleeps easy, even with minus 24. In his opinion, multiflora is never as winterhardy as R. canina selections are. As his father mentioned when he said to him that all growers use multiflora in Canada. " What?! Are they backward there?" The name Verschuren is closely related to rosegrowing in Holland. They are rootstock specialists. They produce seed, stratify and produce rootstock (about 6,000,000/ yr); and are only a medium size rootstock grower! Combined with Germany and the huge rosegrowers, competition is immense. Out of the competition, the best emerges because of the scale in which things are done there. The scales are different in Canada: here, rose production is done on a hobbyfarm basis. Multiflora is easy to grow; that is why it is used here; that is Jan's conclusion. When he met Otto Palleck, the just retired Ontario rosegrower, Palleck said, "What? You grow on canina? That is the best rootstock there is, but we cannot get No.1 quality here...." That was most likely not his only problem, as seed germination with canina requires 2 years of stratifying. Brian Minter told Jan initially when he started out doubtfully here with canina rootstock, "Do the best you can and grow the best product possible, and you will succeed" Now, Jan has customers who are coming back raving to buy more. His treeroses did not blink their eyes at the cold last winter." Here is a link that might be useful: A Visit with B.C. Rosemen

After watching all the available videos, I learned how to grow tall Austins anywhere in my yard as long as I have one tall structure to grow them as column rose for each on. Crossing canes are Ok. They were destined to be SPed. Now I also get what all that fuss was about around Dec. between people who grew Teas and China's, advocating a non prune method and the others who grew roses who did not mind hard pruning (European roses). Now that I see the big picture, they were all right. Paul, thank you for simplifying all the challenges I faced growing tall Austins and pruning different variety of roses. Regards, FJ

Since this thread has popped back up I should say that DA did replace the damaged roses and the replacements are awesome. I haven't seen any of the DA body bag type roses at our Whole Foods lately or anywhere else. If I saw some I would probably get some even though I definitely don't need anymore DA roses this year lol. I went ahead and ordered Lady of Shallot from DA because I really wanted that one and hadn't found it elsewhere grafted.

agmss, Dad used to tell me that if he won the lottery he'd just keep farming until the money was gone. He was joking.....kind of. I've often said that in a perfect world I could make a living farming. I am strong, fiercely independent, truly love my animals and playing in the dirt. However, I spent 35 years stuck in a law office, because that would pay the bills, and gardening and helping Dad with the farm on weekends and taking vacation days to can. Dad always had a job outside the farm until he had that quadruple bypass, then a leg amputated and the doctors put him on disability. Now we don't make money farming, but we eat well and thank goodness for pensions! Makayla wants to set up a farm stand, sell vegetables and eggs and some jam and baked goods allowed under the Michigan Cottage Food Act. She might make some summer money, but only if I provide all the ingredients for the baking, LOL, and we don't eat too many. She can "earn" her vegetables by working in the garden. So, as a "summer job" for a young teenager, she can make a few bucks, but a family certainly could not be supported. I remember breaking down the costs to raise a turkey, and it was about $45 before any labor was added. Big Ag can produce a lot of food cheaply, but it's not particularly good food, it's just cheap. I can produce good food, organic food, but not as much and certainly not as cheaply. Some people can't afford anything except the cheap and chemical laden food, and some don't care. There are also the romantics, they think farming is all furry little animals and sunsets on the back porch and the smell of hay. They don't look far enough to see that furry little animals need food and care and fence and housing and that eventually they'll be big animals and there's a lot more smell of manure than of fresh hay, LOL. Their dreams never include standing on the back of a pickup at 20 below zero pumping water into drinking tanks because the well quit or trudging out every morning in the snow at -3 to give your favorite horse aspirin because of his laminitis and then doing it again in the evening, or spending 5 hours outside in the 30 MPH wind in January because that's when the processor can get to your beef. Oh, and no days off and no retirement benefits and no health insurance and no sick days... My roots to this piece of ground are deeper than any crop I've ever planted, and I can pretty much guarantee that I'll always grow something. But my old horse will die and I won't replace old cows so there will be no spring calves eventually. The garden will get smaller or someone else will step in to help with it, same with the chicken flock. And so I'll no longer be a farmer, eventually, but I'm hopeful that maybe Amanda and Dave will want to be, or Bud or one of Ashley's girls. Maybe, if they could just not lose too much money doing it, but it sure isn't going to be by selling beef. Maybe hops or chestnuts or asparagus or....and that's the nature of a farmer, there's got to be SOMETHING we can grow and make money on, LOL, even when there isn't. Annie