Levy, does Unk 15 throw many foot long shoots in summer? Not many, foot long ones, but shoots that are MANY feet long. Mermaid, after it's been in the ground a little while, will throw HUGE climbing canes. You can't keep it as a smallish shrub, it just won't do it. Also, Mermaid does NOT have apricot coloring in the buds or flowers...ever. It begins a sulfur yellow and can fade to a very pale yellow in high heat. The foliage texture and color are all wrong for Mermaid. Completely wrong. One of your photos shows a cluster of buds forming and Mermaid never generates that large a cluster, particularly on such a smal plant. This plant is a shrub, potentially a shrubby climber. Mermaid is a rampant climber, period. Take closer looks at Long Tall Sally and Sally Holmes. They are much better bets. Kim

Spider mites. Please stop using the insecticide immediately. It does not kill the mites but does kill the insects that would naturally eat the mites thus you have a big mite population explosion. The very best thing that you can do is to buy a water wand for your garden hose and wash your roses every day for a week or so. Using the water wand, you can reach the underside of the leaves where the mites live. Since your Knock-Outs are in a hot, dry location (ideal for spider mites), you will need to wash the foliage weekly for the rest of the summer. Good luck!

Rosetom, I understand your hesitation about accepting "petal base-tip-color" as being a valid (reliable) ID-clue. So, please test my theory yourself, using "Scientific Methodology" for the test. In science, for a theory to be accepted as Valid, the theory must produce the same result "consistently" - and also be "replicatable" (produce the same result when other researchers test it). Select four large petals from a healthy, fresh (young newly-opened) red-rose bloom. But not from the very-outermost ring of petals, nor from the small central petals). At their base is a small point, which I call the "attachment-tip." It will be the same color on each of the four petals taken from that bloom. Decide whether that tip-color is closest to one of the following colors: White "Nearly-white" (a quite pale yellowish-greenish color) Butter-yellow Deep-yellow (some are an "electric" deep-yellow). Take note of the "comparative size" of the non-red area at the petals' base. (I've noticed that although the base-tip-color of Mr. Lincoln and Chrysler Imperial is the same (electric deep-yellow), the deep-yellow area of Mr. Lincoln's petals is consistently about twice as large as Chrysler Imperial's deep-yellow area.) Next, do the same tip-examination procedure for (say) three other varieties of red roses in your garden. The result I got was: (1) The attachment-tip / base-area color was the same for each of the four petals from a particular varieity's bloom. (2) The attachment-tip / base-area color of some red-rose varieties is distinctly different from that of other red varieites I have two bushes of Mr. Lincoln. I checked the tip-color of large FRESH petals taken from each of the two bushes. The tip-color was the same (specifically, electric deep-yellow) for both bushes. I also have three bushes of Dr. Huey - and the tip-color on large FRESH petals from each of them was the same (specifically, white). This data led me to third conclusion: (3) Petal-tip color seems to be a "genetically-set" characteristic. Important Note: The petals' tip-color tends to fade lighter as the bloom ages - therefore, for the tip-color test to be valid, check ONLY some large FRESH petals from a newly-opened bloom. I am now quite certain that if someone handed me a large fresh petal from each of four red-rose varieties WHOSE TIP-COLOR I AM FAMILIAR WITH ...I can correctly name the rose each petal came from. Please do not take what I've said here as being bragging - take it as "interesting amateur scientific research." And please check my Petal-Tip-Color Theory for yourself, on various red roses from your garden. Let me know the results you get. (As I noted elsewhere, the theory also seems to work well on orange, pink, and lavender roses - but white blooms and yellow blooms can be difficult, because those colors are also tip-colors.) Regards, JohnReb

I did think of posting a picture but it's done blooming. Mine is only 2 yrs old off the original found at the old homestead. It is a bush type. My friend's(the original) is about 3ft high, and 2ft wide. The leaves are darker, I'm not sure if they are a green-grey like the albas. I'm thinking it may be an OGR as it is not a repeat bloomer, but I've looked and looked on the web and haven't yet found one that looks like it. Would a picture of it without blooms be of much help? Thanks Jacqui