Fair Bianca - opinions please

20 years ago

Hi all,

Any info on the good and the bad and experiences, tips you have. Is it a worthwhile rose to have?

Had one in a pot for years and it's either going to get thrown in the bin or planted. The scent was the only reason why I originally bought it. The flower seems nice enough. It's a sad bush at the moment and needs care.

Thanks again,

varmi

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Comments (8)

cimmaron
20 years ago
Mine has never performed-I have moved it twice but it doesn't seem to like it at my place.It just sits there sulking.
I will move it once more and then give up I think.
regards
sandie
yvonne_a
20 years ago
I've always been a bit disappointed with my Fair Bianca, especially when it shares the same bed as Madam Hardy the rose it seems to try and copy. Give MH anyday...

Here is a link that might be useful: Mme Hardy
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Hi - I got mine from Hortico several years ago. I just saw it listed from Peter Schneider under the Custom Propagation section. http://www.combinedroselist.com/freedom-gardens.html I know that Palatine Roses in Canada offered Fair Bianca a few weeks ago when it had a special sale of discontinued David Austin roses. You might contact them to find out when their next sale is. I believe their FB is grafted on multiflora rootstock which does well for me in 9b. Ann
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I think David Austin's best white has to be ROSE-MARIE, the white sport of HERITAGE. It is a good bloomer, vigorous, and forms a graceful shrub. The vase life of the bloom is shorter and the color is more of a creamy white, but still a very beautiful bloom. BTW, if you are going to get any vase life out of the rose you must cut the bloom while it is still in bud. Don't worry if the bud hasn't cracked yet. As long as one or two sepals are down you should be fine. I didn't like GLAMIS CASTLE because the myrrh fragrance was obnoxious (the blooms also shatter easily). As you folks have guessed "myrrh" can vary quite a bit. With Fair Bianca the fragrance is acceptable because of a subtle vanilla-like base note, which is why the rose marries so well with the annual Heliotrope. Tamora has a delicious myrrh fragrance because of a fruity top note. CLAIR AUSTIN is the hot new English white right now but I haven't had a chance to grow it yet. I'm dying to try BOULE DE NEIGE, a white Bourbon hybridized by Francois Lacharme in 1867. I have its pinkish-white sister COQUETTE DES BLANCHES growing in my mother's zone 7b garden and it is an exceptionally beautiful plant. The blooms are small but are blessed with perfect OGR flower form and appear in lovely sprays on a graceful (and healthy) shrub. CdB has a very strong, sweet fragrance that must be smelled to be believed. Of course no white rose can compare in beauty to the classic Damask MADAME HARDY (1832). I've searched my whole life as a rosarian for a repeat blooming substitute and have yet to find it. That is why I like Fair Bianca so much. The bloom is similar. Alas the fragrance isn't as fine, the chartreuse button eye doesn't have as much visual punch as Mme. Hardy's emerald green pip, and the plant ... well it's a joke to even try comparing the two for vigor and graceful growth habit. SOMBREUIL is a gorgeous white climber but the blooms are more of a flattened rosette verses Mme. Hardy's silky white quartered perfection. Sigh...
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Growing roses from cuttings is a fine addiction and yours look very healthy. You spoke of rose sports and I have a Moon Shadow that is gorgeous but won't propagate at any method. I finally found a healthy rooting sucker or sport that is growing well but still small with thin canes but we'll see. My question for you is, I've kept my roses tall this year five plus because something is eating all the lower leaves, up to two ft, of the tops. It breaks my heart to see empty canes or flowers that were just ready to open totally gone. The backyard is at the base of a mountain covered with trees. In the front of the house all my roses are tall and flourishing .I'm always experimenting and in the kitchen windowsill have the base of a stalk of celery, some carrots and green onions all rooting well and begging to go outside in the dirt. Now if I put these in a large container close to the roses next to the gazebo which are being eaten, would you think the animals would get into the veggies instead of harming my roses. Poisons, systemics,animal be gone junk, electric devices, sour milk and Tabasco, nothing is working. These aren't big animals, just rats under my gazebo which love to thrive on poison and sometimes squirrels and rabbits.
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I have 2 of them, and they are both very small, fragile, do not bloom a lot, but......I would not want to be without them! The bloom is so exquisite, sweet and beautifully formed, purest of whites....yes, in my opinion, well worth having.
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tom_pariz
20 years ago
Varmi, Fair Bianca is a great rose. If she's stuggling in your garden, put her in a pot; large enough of course. Many Austins like pots and I'm sure it will perform better. Prepare pot and potting mix carefully: rocks on the bottom then straw, layers of potting mix with suitable feritiliser and I'm sure Fair Bianca will be all new rose in just two months!
Before you plant, give her a nice haircut -- trim the damaged roots, trim the foilage a little bit and all dead wood. This is how I saved my neighbours' 10 roses -- they're all great now and it seems they want to reach the sky! :-)
I gave the same treatment to one little Scepter'd Isle I found at local nursery .. and now, several months later, it looks like a darn Kraken! :-)
-Tom
tom_pariz
20 years ago
Sorry Varmi, I just saw -- you already have it in pot.
Try changing the potting mix every year (July/August) , add new food and make sure pot is large enough (40cm pot is a minimum).
- Tom
cimmaron
20 years ago
Thanks for the tip Tom-I will put her in a pot and see how she goes.
regards
sandie
plaur
20 years ago
Should be called Unfair Bianca.She showed great promise 3 years ago when planted,40 blooms in her first flush,must have been exhausting,I don't think I've seen 40 leaves since that time and maybe a few lacklustre flowers.I'll put the spade next to her,and pot her or something more permanent!From memory,her flowers were really beautiful.Perhaps she would fare better in a less humid climate.
Pam.
tom_pariz
20 years ago
Pam, if your Fair Bianca doesn't want to go any more, maybe you can consider Scepter'd Isle. It has a very similar myrrh fragrance, but more powerful and with less other spicy overtones. Mine is about 5.5 ft tall, has many branches, grows in one extra large terracota pot and wants to be a climber. And when a chilly breeze swirls through the evening, that beautiful fragrance spreads all around. It's magical. In my local nursery Scepter'd Isle seems to be not very popular Austin rose (who can understand people? they're only mad about candy but scentless HTs) so I plan to get some more of those jewels!! Yeah!
-Tom
plaur
20 years ago
Thank you Tom,for that inspired and enthusiastic statement of enablement....I needed it like a hole in the head!!!My garden is a suburban block which is bursting at the seams with roses and a frightening number of large pots.
I suppose Unfair Bianca and Scepter'd Isle would make the pot numbers more rounded and its easier to mumble 30 rather than 28,but no!!!!!!!!!!!.
Pam.

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Fair Bianca - opinions please

Comments (8)

cimmaron

yvonne_a

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