Suebelle, did you decide to pick up any of these Kordes' roses? Summer Romance & Savannah arrived from Chamblee's a year ago. Potted on several times & pinched for shaping, they've bloomed once this season & are budding up again. (Unusually cool, cloudy & wet weather delayed the Spring flush in general.) With great fragrance, charming blooms & spotless foliage in this hot & humid no spray garden, both are throwing new basals & giving a good showing for such young roses here in the Upper South. Savannah is one of the Sunbelt Collection. http://newflora.com/kordes-roses/sunbelt-rose-collection/ Another of that group here a year from Chamblee's is Polar Express. Treated like the other two, it managed to slip several flushes by me last year in its eagerness to bloom. Haven't nipped any buds this year & it's swelling new buds as others are opening without pause. Good solid fragrance. Another I can highly recommend. Parfumas Summer Romance & First Crush in bud & bloom arrived at the local Lowe's in 2-gallon pots the 1st of April. Jam packed onto a long table, could only inspect some along the edges to find them grafted. After own roots, admired the enticing perfume of their generous bloom, but left them be, hoping own root examples would follow. Flowers of First Crush were not as pale as I'd thought from photos, a very appealing clear blush pink. A week later during a heat spike sans rain, visited again to find the half remaining in depressingly pitiful condition - dry & wilting from lack of watering, canes snapped & dying, likely from attempts to separate each from its neighbors for purchase in that overcrowded display. Found an own root First Crush in salvageable condition & put it in my cart, remarking to my husband I needed to speak to the manager. To hurry me along (lol), he took the rose, found & spoke to the manager & came back followed by an employee armed with a watering wand. Showing me the manager discounted the rose by half & he'd already paid for it, we left. First Crush cleaned up nicely. Watered well & left to soak overnight in a filled plant saucer, it drank every bit & looked gratefully relieved by morning. Parked in high shade & given simple care, managed to replace lost leaves & began to bud again. Nipped the first set of buds, but allowed it to bloom a few weeks later as it appeared fully recovered. In the meantime, I'd "rescued" another First Crush & a pair of Summer Romances, all own root 2-gallons, from a sale table at Lowe's that at least was exposed to plentiful rain. All rebounded with the same treatment. More Kordes own roots arrived at Lowe's a month ago, this time as 1-gallons in Forever & Ever branded pots. Very well grown, in bud & bloom priced @ $13, picked up trios of Eleganza hybrid teas Sunny Sky & Heart Song. Not actively searching for these two (unlike some others), found them very appealing in person & their fragrance nose-to-rose sealed the deal. Both repeat bloom rapidly so far even as youngsters. Sunny Sky shows apricot buds that open to a pastel yellow heart backed in apricot with buttercream edges. Heart Song is a lovely clear red without orange or blue tints. Both hold their color without fading till petal drop in temps of low 90's. (Kolorscape Lemon Fizz as the same brand & price merritted another trio, thanks to you, Patty, for your reports & photos! Lemon Fizz closes its petals in the evening, like some of the early singles & semidoubles, another charming aspect of its personality.) Greatly enjoying each of these unique personalities & finding them all "happy" roses - eager to grow & flower, humming right along. Very easy to grow, healthy, reliable roses.

The surest way to get the construction guys to show up early is to plant something there. It's such a small area, I would tend to lay down some compost and cover it with cardboard to keep it weed free. Then after the construction is done you will have a wonderfully prepared bed for whatever it is that you plan to do with it. Yes, of course you could start some seeds. But I would gather up enough supplies in the way of potting mix and pots to take them up at a moments notice just in case the guys show up and their new spots aren't ready.

Gray leaf spot is a disease that affects rye grass, particularly rye grass in the first couple of years of establishment. Hot humid weather with extended periods of leaf wetness aide in the development of gray leaf spot. Disease development is one of the problems with deep and infrequent watering in the summer with cool season grasses in the mid atlantic. I would not run irrigation for two hours on one zone in July on a cool season grass. You a just asking for trouble.

Reporting back after an eventful summer -- Harvey evacuation and all! (We fared much better than most, returning to find our home high and dry.) After two applications of Spinosad (spaced ~ two weeks apart), it appeared I had the chilli thrips situation under control. The roses seemed to breathe a sigh of relief as they put out new leaf growth and flowered here and there. At one point in late July, I fertilized lightly with Rose-tone. And in early August, I applied some fish fertilizer (diluted per container instructions). I hadn't planted anything in this area for a couple of years, and felt the need to amend the soil a bit. Despite my attempts, these two plants never thrived and progressively just worsened. Taking advantage of Home Depot's one-year guarantee, I exchanged them for a different variety: Double Pink KOs. These two new plants were in the yard (still in pots) for about a week, when I noticed: (sawfly larvae, right?) Holes bored clear through several of the buds -- did I just not notice these at time of purchase?! ..and newer leaves starting to pucker. I saw a couple of thrips crawling on the underside of these leaves, but couldn't discern if they were chilli thrips or the standard variety (if there's such a thing). A couple of the unopened buds also had aphids covering them. I didn't want to go crazy with any insecticide just yet; so I clipped the buds that had been bored through, as well as the leaf with the larvae hatchlings. Tossed all of this, along with the caterpillar, into the garbage. I blasted the aphids off with a hose. I thought I'd given each plant a pretty good once-over before I plopped them into my cart. After my failures with the Sunny KOs, I wanted to pick out the most healthy Double Pinks of the group. So, I don't think (?) I brought all these critters home from HD. I'm going to give this another go...wish me luck. :) A question about location, as I don't know if this perhaps contributed to the Sunny KOs' demise: The yellow circles are where the Sunnys were planted, and where I was going to place the new Double Pinks. Right up against the fence in the neighbor's yard are a rogue hackberry tree (~ 18-20' - red box) and a crepe myrtle (blue box). Will my roses struggle, being planted essentially at the base of these two trees?