Hi Jerijen, I have looked at the VCRS site. I also got some good advice from Otto and Sons in Fillmore. I guess if a rose can stand the heat in Fillmore, it will grow here! I am more to the north, close to the San Fernando Valley. My neighborhood is a strange little rural pocket just north of the 118 near Tapo Canyon. Are you in the Heights? I didn't know that roses with many petals did not open well. So much to learn. I am a bit embarrassed to say that I am still enchanted by red roses with white baby's breath. I grow little white daisies with Showbiz roses in one bed. Wouldn't it be spectacular to grow Fourth of July on the fence behind that bed? Any pink climbers that might not grow too big that you would recommend for this climate? I fear New Dawn might be too dense for that arbor. Renee

Sorry - didn't realize grafted is your preference. You might search for Liv Tyler also under its alternate name, Comtesse de Provence. Pam at Angel Garden lists Liv Tyler as a grafted bareroot & may still have one - http://www.angelgardens.com/rosesforpickuponly.html It's distributed by Star Roses so you may be able to find a potted one locally. If you search Liv Tyler from Star Roses' home page, you can search by your zip code. www.starrosesandplants.com/  Looks like an enchanting rose - good luck!

Wow.. thank you so much everyone. !!! So far the only rose that i have purchased myself is Mercury Rising. I do like to. I've had all my roses safely moved away from NN.. into containers. This year I hope yo but the saucers to go under the containers and a drip system to connect them.. lugging water is no fun. Also hoping to dig up a path to them. I'll need lots of prayers for that feat! I buy those $1 throw away roses because it's a I can afford, but the failure rate it exorbitant! Egads... I keep hoping to find local people to share with but not a soul here cares for gardening much less roses: (

All the plants have buds and Munstead Wood is the first to bloom-- 9 flowers have opened and 9 more developing. I gave them water and nothing else for weeks, then as they started getting bigger, sprinklings of bloodmeal and half-doses of fish emulsion. At some point I tried giving them a bit of diluted potassium with indeterminate results. (Maybe because I got muriate of potash instead of the potassium chloride, sulfide or whatever it is that's supposed to be better?) Once I gave them water left over from cooking beans (no salt) and they seemed to like it fine. Sorry I don't have any pictures of the whole plants yet, but they do seem like they are taking off. Though Munstead Wood, Lady of Shallot, and Jude the Obscure are growing with big open spaces between canes-- I don't know if these are the reported David Austin octopus arms, or pest damage to terminal shoots that would otherwise fill out the center of the bush, or particular growth habit in Houston, TX weather, or if it's just something it'll grow out of after a year and some pruning. The other, younger two plants that I've messed with the least, Lady Emma Hamilton and Brother Cadfael, have much more attractive foliage and look more bushy/shrubby. LEH has sixteen buds already and is nicely rounded, while BC, who has been growing tall thick canes and took the longest to leaf out and bud, looks more like a sturdy column shape. They are all at least two to three and a half feet off the soil level. So far the scent on MW is very sweet, like berry candy and rosewater (rather than dried rose petals), and seems stronger after a fish emulsion feeding. Can't wait for the others! Thanks to everyone for being present on this forum. I've been going through a lot of posts and learning a bunch!