Actually DD roots quite easily for me. A my old house I had a hedge of DD planted along the sidewalk in my front yard. It never failed to stop passersby who smelled their wonderful fragrance. All but a few were rooted cuttings. It took a couple of years for them to become full size but once they did, they performed as well or better than graftted. All were removed and brought here and are growing well supplying me with the blooms I give to all the women, old and young, who visit. I have at least 12 bushes and all are own root and hardy. Although they dieback to the ground each winter, by late May they are blooming fools. DD remains my favorite rose!

Buy slug resistant hostas. Many of the newer varieties have thicker more slug-resistant leaves and most of the classic hostas exhibit this trait - which is why they have become classics. Any reputable garden centre or hosta supplier can help guide you here. Do not buy from box or grocery stores. Plants are usually smaller and too often carry viruses you do not want to introduce into your gardens. I spray my hostas with a homemade solution of 10 parts water to one part household ammonia. Ammonia is inexpensive, easily available and will kill slugs on contact. I have also heard of gardeners using vinegar and water and salt and water, but have tried neither. Slugs need to rest in a cool, moist place out of the sunlight, so many gardeners lay traps, like boards, bricks, rocks where the slugs collect and can be sprayed en masse at once. I have heard that orange peels are very effective. An old remedy calls for laying out bowls of stale beer, buried level to the ground. Slugs are drawn by the aroma, crawl in and drown. Brewer's yeast is an inexpensive substitute. I grow about 350 hostas in my gardens and many others in containers. I break up the spraying routine over several days. I spray at the beginning of spring when hostas are beginning to emerge and then spray afterwards as needed. I walk the gardens routinely to see my hostas and look for damage and if it appears, I begin spraying again. Because I am a relatively lazy gardener, I stop maintaining the hostas at the beginning of August. I am also very firm with my hostas. If a variety proves to be a slug magnet, I cull it. There are so many good, easy, beautiful hostas to grow that I will not be bothered with a poor specimen.

Most of us got these in 2011 at the convention as liner sized plants. They were distributed in 9 oz cups. It was the convention gift plant. So nobody (not even Carol Brashear who introduced it) has a mature one. By that I mean a plant that has been undivided for 5 or 6 years. Mine is 2 years old and growing nicely. The pic was taken today. So that means it was planted almost exactly 2 years ago. It's about 2 ft in diameter right now. I don't know how big it will get. Mine gets pretty much full sun. Steve

Hi Phil, I was answering the question from above, from Luis. I grow quite a few of the lakeside hostas and the ones I've grown from wholesale stock, for the most part, have done fine - even tissue culture plants that I received from wholesalers did better (by leaps and bounds) than the originator stock of the exact same plants from Mary. So I was not referring to the lakeside plants in general but the ordering experience, service, and plants I received directly from Mary Chastain.