Many thanks, I enjoyed reading your newsletter, and took in mind Gregg Lowery's caveat about garden mission statements including the preservation of heritage roses. - Mea culpa...I first interpreted the phrase "pick one or two roses to observe" and thought at first, you were welcoming the picking of rose blossoms, instead of choosing one or two rosebushes to observe. I do hope I can get up there to the sale this year, the "Duchess de Brabant" I bought several years ago from the Sacramento Cemetary sale is flourishing. Thank you with all my heart for your propagation of old roses. Luxrosa

It's Climbing Pixie. The auction gives a nice description, but there's no photo on HMF or on the auction description. "Charles Walker's Miniature China" isn't on HMF at all. I'd like to know how much this rose differs from "Mableton Rouletii", which I bought from Vintage three years ago at least, and is also not on HMF. I collect rare, unusual roses, and I'm still very tempted to pull the trigger and see if I can add these to my collection. I'd just like to have as much info as possible to justify spending that much cash ... even if it IS going to such a good cause. Connie Here is a link that might be useful: Climbing Pixie on HMF

It's true that where I am in So. CA, the roses can get really really big in a hurry. Many times I had to find another spot for a rose because it got much bigger than any description in the book or catalog. Some tolerated the pruning and some wanted to be left alone. I think you just have to try and see what works best. I was trying to keep my Heritage at 4 feet like I saw at the LA Arboretum, then I saw a big poofy one in someone's yard and was smitten by that look. I have an old no name climber going up an apple tree that I ignore. It has a few ancient canes and all the young growth is sky high. I never see any new growth from lower down and I wonder if I should have cut it back years ago. Whatever happens, I'll just enjoy the plant as long as it's there. I think it's too late now to try removing the old canes. When the HTs are left alone, they get so tall. Lagerfeld/Starlight and Honor will go way over my head and the flowers are up in the sky where no one can see or smell them. Then too, when you cut the flowers, a wierd kind of pruning happens and the canes get shortened by taking the flowers off. I suppose just snapping off the hips is best, but I can't resist a bouquet. Around August, I get some strange tallish looking HTs and everyone is talking about plans for a nice fall flush and how they are going to trim the plants and when. I usually cave in at that point and shorten them down because they look untidy from the street and I have fall flush visions in my head. Besides, the flowers look terrible in the summer heat and I am longing for some really pretty ones in the cooler weather. Some years it's better than others. Last year, I had a great big crop of fall flowers on the DA roses after a light pruning, but the year before was not spectacular even though I thought I pruned them the same. This last year, I left a few alone, thinking they did not like the 2007 fall-flush pruning and they did nothing in the fall of 2008 but are now really dense with wood so I am hoping for a big spring bloom this year. Regarding my modern HTs, I notice that if I just snap off hips, they have intermittent flowers up to the hottest times in summer. Then when it cools off a little,there are intermittent flowers until January. I can't seem to get a big bloom in fall unless I deliberately prune them. By January they are really tall again and it's hard to enjoy the flowers on the HTs when they are up that high. I like it when people can see them and smell them. If they are out of reach, no one pays any attention. The first roses of the year are like celebrities with the fresh mulch and new shiny leaves. If I let them alone and they flower off and on through the winter, I wonder if they would have the big spring bloom I always look forward to.

I'm new around here. I get updates from their website also. I think everything is going to work out just fine. Funny tho, my peonies are are in rare form--standing up in attention. So many other things are looking tired, but they're bouncing back.