Not exactly a book about growing roses, but I have a book of Redoute Plates of Roses. When I first moved into this house 12 years ago, I bought two pictures at Home Depot of roses. I didn't realize that they were Redoute plates. I didn't even know who Redoute was and I didn't have any roses at that time. Well fast forward a few years, I have over a 100 roses and of course the rose Redoute. I became obsessed with Redoute plates and googled them and found some for sale on ebay. I did buy a few, but I'm not good with online auctions. So I went back to google and found this used book for sale: The Roses: The Complete Plates (Taschen 25th Anniversary) I did have dreams (or maybe delusions!) of taking the book apart and framing some of the plates, but I haven't done that yet. Still, it's an amazing book.

Two things: your fertilizer number amounts of nitrogen (1st number on bag) might be too high & its encouraging foliage instead of blooms. I garden organically and use monthly during the growing season of roses Espoma Rose Tone (lower nitrogen and higher phosphorus to encourage buds & blooms). I used to have 'Graham Thomas' which looked great initially in the late spring but by summer's end had tons of blackspot! I used to call it my 'indicator rose'. I eventually removed it and the yellow rose now in my garden is 'Julia Child' which is more disease resistant.

The very first question is: are the roses on rootstock that thrive in your soil? If your soil is shallow, or if the roots only thrive in a shallow cone of 'good' soil, then you're not going to get height, regardless of your zone. When the original poster buys a rose, he's buying a rose that has already been pampered beyond belief, in a green house or poly house, planted in soils that are totally unlike the real world, and fed the rosey equivalent of fois gras, lobster, and eclairs to make it grow. Nothing any of us can do inthe real world will equal that kind of pampering for twelve months of the year. Well, maybe some folks in California's cooler summer/warmer winters areas can approach it, but weather survival wasn't designed into the genetics of modern roses. Not all rootstocks are alike, some force roses to grow 12 months of the year, others may help dormancy happen. Some soils are better for Dr. Huey; other soils will make roses on R. multiflora wonderful plants; still other areas demand R. x fortuniana to overcome soil problems. About public gardens....go there earliest spring. Be sure you're comparing roses there with your own roses by starting to see if their roses made it through winter. We've been to some northern public gardens in early spring and I've been shocked at the number of roses that are replaced in a given year. It's not fair of you to evaluate your home roses by comparing them to roses that last year were in California, and only recently exposed to the last gasps of an Ohio winter. FWIW, I had a hedge of 24 Graham Thomases in east Tennessee. Their main problem was a tendency to put out spring growth early in spring, and that growth would get killed, dependably, by later spring freezes. That frozen growth would then be the locus of a nasty canker that would gird and kill the cane by mid June. The most cankers I have ever counted on a single cane was thirteen on one single cane of Graham Thomas. So, I'd guess Dave protects his GT.

Jackie -- We tried tying the d*mned thing horizontally, but it was in a location that made that difficult. Had we had, say, a picket fence to espalier it along, I think it might have been great. As it was, it -- yes -- made about 15 lanky feet, and produced one bloom or small spray, right up at the top. We finally dug it up and donated it to the trash company. (That was before we took to using failed roses as kindling. I'm sure it would have burned well.) The Austin yellow which succeeds here, and blooms well, is 'Golden Celebration.' But even that -- like every Austin we've ever grown -- likes a generous supply of water. And in today's world, that isn't easy. DH carries dishwater over to them, and supplements the watering system with that, and that seems acceptable. But in today's world, in Southern California, we ain't plantin' no mo' Austin roses. Jeri