Carefree Beauty or Carefree Wonder would do the job. CB repeats fast in my garden. Also Berlinda's Dream is very pretty. If you want yellowJulia Child is good...,,,

Check out Music Box and see what you think. Cold hardy, shrubby, continual bloom, doesn't require dead heading. I have not had any disease issues with it here at all. Nice light fragrance. The colors may be too pale for you though

It's almost twice this size now, this was early last year

Thanks all.

Carefree Beauty is one of Knock Out's parents, it doesn't need deadheading? So it is self cleaning? From my understanding though it has a rather sprawling growth habit or am I wrong?

If you like yellow Kordes Lemon Zest fits your requirements. Carefree Celebration, Pomponella,Super Hero, and My Girl are nice shrubby roses.

My mom grows carefree beauty in KC, Mo. It's disease resistant, heat tolerant, cold tolerant, everblooming and grows approx 4.5' x 4'.

Lemon Fizz is self cleaning? Didn't read that anywhere!

http://www.starrosesandplants.com/plants/landscape-shrub-rose/lavender-meidiland

The Meidiland series is described as self cleaning

http://www.helpmefind.com/rose/l.php?l=2.57993.2

The flowers on Lemon Fizz drop cleanly. Most Kordes roses will set seed thou. Have had mine for two summers this will be the third. Clean foliage through out the season.

Bonica, Royal Bonica, Julia Child, Apricot Drift (a little short for a hedge, though), Morden Sunrise. Diane

Yes, the drift roses would work actually but they don't grow tall.

Hmm... will Julia Child continue to bloom with no deadheading?

I only have JC for one year but it does keep blooming without much deadheading if I remember correctly. I could be wrong because my plant is only one year old. Honestly, this will be one rose I will love to mass plant. However, it is a compact plant. It behaves very well so if you are looking for that natural wild sprawling bush, I don't think JC would be a right choice. I think she is good for more formal type of plantings.

Diane's recommendation of Bonica is a better alternative if you want that sprawling look. I have yet to grow this one as it reputation is well known to be a trouble free rose and a non-stop bloomer. If I get to expand my front yard this year, I would love to do a JC with Bonica or JC with Queen of Sweden (David Austin) rose pairing.

However, I would definitely advise you to see how these roses do in your environment. Probably visit a local garden where these roses are grown or talk to folks at nurseries. Since this is for a public garden, you may have to take thorniness into consideration. Most roses have thorns but some are definitely more thornier. You wouldn't want people and especially children to run into those when they play around the area.

Good luck and let us know what you have decided.

Planted Lemon FIZZ (not ZEST- FIZZ is the Kordes rose, ZEST is J&P) last year. Looks like a good rose so far, good BS resistance & I did not winter protect....It looks like about 50% of the canes made it thru the winter alive for me. Also holds it yellow color well which surprised me for a low petal count rose. Also second the Easy Elegance rose recommendation....Music Box, Champagne Wishes, Kashmir, Sunrise Sunset (a ground cover), High Voltage & one that you probably can't get because they quit releasing it, Funny Face

Julia Child can be quite large depending on where you live, and it surely has a neat growth habit. She blooms more constantly for me than any other rose I grow. I do love Bonica, which blooms a lot, too, but does have a more casual growth habit. Royal Bonica is slightly neater than Bonica, and taller. It's pretty wide as is Bonica. I love Morden Sunrise. It's tall and more upright, blooms lots, but it's a single. Diane

Thanks all for your help, will consider all that has been said.

How about that Radler rose Carefree Celebration? I just got one for my home so I don't know how it behaves other than that it has great flower power, is hardy to zone 4 and has excellent disease resistance. Does it need deadheading to keep blooming or is it self cleaning as well?

Right now I'm gravitating towards a row of Innocencia Vigorosa, next to a row of something taller and then a row of Lemon Fizz on the other side.

It isn't quite a "public garden," it is for a church with a small budget and I will be doing the work for them for free. Basically there will be enough money to buy all plants, mulch, soil amendments and some fertilizer and maybe pay two helpers for me. They definitely do not have enough money to pay a typical landscaper to do this work.

So while helping them why not make it fun - I love mass plantings but due to limited space and desire to have every rose cultivar at home hahaha I only have one area of mass planting - a 28 foot row of pink double knock outs. So I'm looking forward to doing a huge mass planting here, I have 2 parking lot medians each 20 feet long and 8 feet wide to do here. It's all day full sun, no trees over the area.

"Bukavu" -single red with white eye. Always blanketed in blooms that hide the leaves. Pictures don't do it justice, but will stop people in their tracks when in full bloom.

Burlington Roses has it in stock at a better price than Heirloom Roses. "Rush", its parent is good too but pale pink colored. Another classic pale pink is "Ballerina."

Blood red "Lavaglut" is eye catching planted en masse.

Bright red "Crimson Bouquet" is also floriferous and low maintenance.

A low maintenance flame colored hybrid tea is "Perfect Moment." This is a tough plant that will love the heat radiating from the parking lot.

For a knee high groundcover I like "White Meidiland."

I've seen the yellow rugosa "Topaz Jewel" in municipal gardens and it has always looked good. Forms a Large spreading plant.

If you have a low fence or wall for a climber, "Secret Garden Musk," would look nice draped over its top.

Thanks

romogen(CA US10/SSZ15) but how many of those need deadheading to continue blooming? I'm quite sure that Perfect Moment needs to be deadheaded for instance.

I recommend 'miracle on the hudson'. The flowers drop off cleanly, it's everblooming, disease resistant and a nice color of red.

Braverichard: the roses I suggested don't need to be deadheaded to continue blooming but will bloom heavier if you use hedge clippers to do some bush shaping every now and then.

Perfect Moment didn't set hips for me, so I didn't do much dead heading; however, I did cut off many stems for indoor bouquets.

White Meidiland and Lavaglut have been self cleaning for me.

Have you considered visiting some public rose gardens around Mother's Day, and then again three weeks later? That way you can tell which varieties need minimal care for maximum bloom.

Thanks Cynthia and romogen, I'll look into Darlow's Enigma, could possibly try Home Run, a descendant of Knock Out though I'd like to be a little more creative if I can.

Actually around here all public rose gardens are tended either by paid workers or volunteers or both. If you mean rose plantings in public landscapes where they are not tended apart from a typically chopping down to 12" and mulching, those are all Knock Outs and Double Knock Outs! No variety. Even the other Knock Out Family members (pink, double pink, sunny, rainbow, blushing) are ignored for landscape use.

Knock Out really is a storm that never ends. I read in an interview with Bill Radler (the breeder of the KO line) that typically new rose introductions sell the most the first year and he was told to expect that. However his checks from KO sales have increased every year since the first year. Then two years ago KO lost its title as best selling rose to... Double KO.

Good for Bill Radler fulfilling a need and actually making money from hybridizing. Not so good for rose diversity, and the day all those plantings of Knockout roses succumb to rose rosette disease.

Not the roses fault.

Well RRD is just generating more KO sales... folks are replacing diseased ones with new ones. Definitely not Radler or the roses' faults that people like them.

I do fault garden centers for not carrying more diverse inventory. For instance, the subject of this thread should not even have existed if I could find landscape roses around here which are not KOs or Drift roses.

I am late to this - but I have some beautiful landscape rose bushes - planted 2 years ago when I was "out of rose growing" and just had to have a little no care roses - but not knock outs. They are called Drift and we bought them at Lowes. I absolutely cannot tell you how wonderful they have grown. Disease free - no signs after 2 1/2 years and they have grown - doubled. They will stay about the size they are now I think. They have a beautiful peachy pink bloom and bloom throughout the whole season - which is from April until November or first frost here in Eastern NC. I'll attach a recent picture of my round garden of Drift .

Thanks for your suggestion, I'm aware of the drift roses and will factor all info into consideration.