I love tan roses and I think I have them all, pretty much. Here are the favorites. Best tan roses: 1. Spiced Coffee (I got a nice one from Hortico this year, believe it or not. This rose, like most brown roses, does better grafted, not own root) 2. Honey Dijon 3. Stephen Rulo (Wisconsin Roses carries it) 4. Butterscotch (aka Jactan), the climber (available at Burlington Roses) 5. Pam's Choice (Rogue Valley Roses) 6. Irish Creme (Certified Roses - available at big box stores like Lowes, but only during bareroot season). and if you like mini's, then Smoke Signals (also from Burlington Roses) Julia's Rose is okay, but I haven't found a source to obtain it grafted. I think it would be a MUCH more vigorous rose if it was not growing on its own roots. As an own root plant, it is notoriously a weak plant, and my own root specimen bears that out. It's a rose that just wants to fade away, and I'm on my third or fourth plant because of that. Kathy

I hadn't looked at this topic because I know so little about California natives. I finally did, and just wanted to note that bunchberry (Cornus canadensis) is not the slightest bit drought tolerant. It also does not tolerate hot summers. Check out the timber press web site. I think they have books on California native plants.

Hey Marianne! I am living in south of France,and your advices sounds quiet"adéquats"! Which part of Sweden do you live? Cordially phil

For me Grandmother's Hat is a nice rose but not one of my most frequent bloomers. She only blooms in small flushes and no more than others of my HPs. HPs in general do well here as do Bourbons. Mme Pierre Oger is a monster (from Vintage who obtained a virus cleaned clone so maybe that accounts for some of the robustness???) Bourbon, healthy as can be and blooms repeatedly. Souvenir de la Malmaison is more demure in size but also a very healthy Bourbon with very good repeat. I can't remember whether she has many thorns. However, my HP Reine des Violettes is thornless and repeats about as much as Grandmother's Hat. Another HP I have is Comtesse O'Gorman, she is quite healthy and has few thorns. GH, RdV, and COG all seem to have very flexible canes, not twiggy/stiff like what I think of as HT habit. The HP that has bloomed the most for me is Baronne Prevost. She has also never shown any disease and has flexible canes. I have an HP from Eurodesert that came misidentified as Symphony but Cliff said it clearly wasn't. It's very pretty and healthy but quite strange. Grows in a very narrow, elegant, upright shape. I don't have a single rose that has that particular growth habit. Some canes are bristley while others are entirely smooth. I wonder how many of the found roses aren't any particular historic rose but rather seedlings of them. We know that in France back in the old days if you ordered a rose with a certain name you just might get a seedling. So what do we know about very old American nurseries? What were their practices? Did they always sell the actual variety or were seedlings sent? I really don't know but am curious about it. In addition, it seems modern day roses can easily get mixed up in commerce, so I have to wonder how many times that happened in the past, and we just don't know about it. Or if someone, way back got a seedling and that rose did really, really well, it might have been passed on to friends and spread because it was such a good plant. It won't match precisely a famous antique variety because it isn't. But should be treasured because of garden merit. With roses at Sangerhausen, I wish someone or a group would visit and discuss, in depth, the ID's of roses such as Cornet and Mrs. R. Sharman-Crawford with staff. How certain is Sangerhausen that these roses are correct in their garden? Do they have documentation that helps in the ID, and can this be viewed? Were these plants growing in parts of the garden that were bombed to heck during war, or in areas that came through unscathed? Then it would be nice if DNA of GH, Cornet, and MSC could be compared to see if they are related or are any of them identical.