I'm sorry but you're over reacting. Phytophthoras are everywhere. To have infection you need a susceptible host, a pathogen, AND a conducive environment. So - even if you have a phytophtora in your soil that can infect roses, and you plant roses, if your soil is well drained you are not likely to get disease in your roses, because phytophthoras require a waterlogged soil to be infective. There are estimated to be over 200 species of phytophthoras that can cause diseases in plants. Probably every soil has a few species. Pythiums are pretty much everywhere too, and also require a conducive environment to develop disease - wet soil, susceptible seedlings. Your lab results aren't very helpful! I'm not aware of much variety in resistance to root rotting pathogens such as phytophthoras in different cultivars of roses. Maybe among species roses. There are some species that like wet soil, believe it or not, and so would probably be more resistant to phytophthoras, which require waterlogging to develop disease. But these roses are not very pretty. Rosa gymnocarpa for one I know is native to northern California and likes wet soil. Not sure if it goes as far south as central CA. Not very pretty though, tiny little flowers briefly in spring. I know someone (UC I think) puts out lists of plants resistant and susceptible to oak root fungus (an armillaria, not a phytophthora) and to verticillium, another root rotting pathogen. Roses are susceptible to oak root fungus, which is a likely culprit in the old oak tree's death as it also likes wet soil, specifically soil that is wet in summer. California's native oak trees don't cope well with soil that is wet in summer, they require summer-dry soil or they get root rots and oak root fungus is very common. Was the oak tree itself diagnosed with phytophthora, or just its presence noted in the soil? the difference is critical. And in respect to sudden oak death, roses get a leaf blight when infected with that particular phytophthora, and they're not very easily infected with it anyway. I don't believe they die from it or even get particularly sick. The big concern there is that the roses or the potting soil they came in could carry the disease and spread it to other more susceptible plants, like oaks and rhododendrons. Anyway to cut a long story short (I can really go on and on when the subject is phytophthoras) go ahead and plant whatever roses you want, make sure the soil drains decently, don't overwater, and expect the best.

Thanks for the location of the bamboo nursery. That was going to be my next question. I want to view it before I consider planting any of it and bring some of my picture with me as well. I'm not a big fan of sea grape. I like them natural in the wild, but not in my yard. Its just me. I do like the tropical screen idea - sort of what I want - would love something that "flowers" - but again realize I may be limited due to the height requirement. I'll post another pic of the space between the back of the house and the fence shortly so you can see how wide it is (or rather, "isn't"..LOLOL...). I REALLY appreciate everyone's suggestions. I am struggling what to do here. It's a real gardening challenge. I'm downtown St. Pete so in a city sized cramped yard.

i have same problem like yours but mine is probably worse, Cuz im in between them and they do run the show in my neighborhood they got all my neighbors not to like me.And i live in my neighborhood for more than 2 decades and they are new in the neighborhood .I wave when they wave at me if they dont i dont.If they dont like me i dont care cuz they are not paying my bills but why destroying my property and i worked hard on my property i dont hire people to do my landscaping even my tree i cut my trees too but now everything is looking bad cuz they are spraying .I put cameras all over my house but it dont stop them. They are doing crazy things on my camera .I just ignore.it. I have no clue why they are doing it to me unless i got the nice yard in my neighborhood i keep my yard clean spotless.And one thing i was out of town and my son was the only one in my house they came to my backyard i guess my son showed them my backyard , i got nice backyard and i guess when they are in my patio one of the neighbor next to me said that "your mom is living in her own little world driving her cadillac" and i guess neighbor was all laughing .Im busy i keep myself busy in my house im a widowed and im doing everything in my house the maintenance and everything plus my daughter is a special need.I dont have the time to hang out with neighbor like them that they hangout almost everyday till midnight;, So what i did i invited them one time since they came to my house while i was out of town guess what nobody shows up ,And comes NEW YEARS EVE i always have party on New Years Eve cuz my late husband gave me a surprised party before he passed away so since then i have New Years Eve party , one of the neighbor texted me and invite themselves just the couple and next thing i know there will be 8 people so i said ok cuz the couple said they are also our neighbor , they came and in 10 minutes they left and only one couple say goodbye to me the rest they left without saying anything .I treid my BEST ....And i know for the fact if people are doing bad things to you theres something wrong with them. . one day theres a barbecue in the neighborhood and they invited me an hour before the barbecue , and i look at the window and some of the neighbors are bringing bowl of food. And so i said thanks but i will pass cuz i knew im not invited they cuz if they want to invite me they will invite me one week or whenever they did plan it.And besides im not going anyway even they did invite me cuz of ny daughter when shes home we stay home.And i told them thx but my daughter is home now and she is special needs and txt me back said just next time., Not only killing my trees and plants they are spraying my drivway and my garages door and the outside walls of my house thats why the paint is coming off my wall and my screen too.When i put the camera what he did he spraying my plants and tress thru his oranges tree. I can tell where it coming cuz u can see the hole his making to destroy my property my furniture on my patio , my heater , my barbecue island my pool deck everything outside my house., everytime i trimmed my plants or trees and if something fell in their yard i tried everything to clean it by using my rake while im sitting on top of the fence they do see me cleaning it . Everytime im doing something or somebody is working at my house they want to know.It likes i hired a guy to put motion light on jmy backyard suddenly im seeing them by my yard and when i walked out they walked away and i was wondering why till i put two things together.And when i confront her cuz i already see the damages on my yard and she told me that i was spying on them and i was surprised cuz i guess that one neighbor said i put camera which i only put motion light .. But now i do have camera now around my house but they are still doing it.

Toxcrusader, my exact sentiments, are you Canadian? Might have some Acadian in you. Aiden, I sure am glad I don't live in California. I don't agree that not talking to them is the thing to do. Ask them not to walk on the grass, including the Mailman. Kids are inconsiderate, I was a kid and I was as well until the nice man next door asked me to try and keep the noise down when my pals and I tuned our extremely loud dual exhaust hot rods when his wife, his elderly Mom and he were trying to listen to the BBC in the evening. No problem, we were kids, all he had to do is ask. The world revolved around us, we were 18, remember 18? Mom and Dad had a car each, both brothers had their beaters, I had a car, truck and bike. Our driveway was empty sometimes so the neighbourhood kids and us could play basketball. I worked shifts at 16, so did Dad and Mom as well, can you imagine moving all those vehicles at midnight after whomever was on 3 to 11 got home and someone had to be up at 5 AM and the rotation started all over again? So we parked on the street most of the time as the drive only held 3 cars anyway. My Mom told us not to until she was blue in the face. Thinking about it I cringe as to how the neighbours may have felt but as an adult understood the reason why some people park on the street and the driveway may have a space in it. We didn't rent, it wasn't a slum but it was a working class neighbourhood with kids, lots of kids. And many shift workers, maybe that's why no one complained about the parking, they understood what a pain to have 5 people in the home working 3 different shifts, 2 come, 2 leave, 1 is missing. Ask them nicely to not walk on the grass. By the way where is the precious grass that you remove to put up these bushes etc. going to end up? You are going to throw it out. It's more of an invasion of your property than damaging the grass. It's only grass. Only my opinion. This post was edited by SouthernCanuck on Mon, Aug 11, 14 at 5:57