I grew a lot of Austins when I lived near the coast in San Clemente, so probably a bit more moderate than inland even a few miles. My experiences there: Heritage A wonderful rebloomer, nice (but not strong) scent. Two minuses: For me it turned into one of the jolly green giants, shooting out 8 foot canes like mad. I might have been my inexperience in how to correctly prune it, but I ended up having to move it to a spot on its own where it could just explode. My biggest surprise was that it by December it was covered in rust while most of my other roses were fine. I'd be tempted to grow it again, but I'm not sure I would. Cottage Rose: The other rose that shot out canes on me. The scent wasn't strong enough for my tastes, and the plant looked to ragged, I think there are a lot of other Austins I would buy before this one. Eglantyne: Eglantyne has gorgeous blooms, and a soft, nice scent. It wanted to be a big plant for me, around 5 feet. Queen of Sweden: I love the flowers on this rose, and indeed, they sit perfectly upright on the tops of the branches, almost like waterlillies floating in the air. Nice scent, soft. The Prince: I grew this in SoCal. Worth every minute waiting for the blooms on an unremarkable bush. The flowers are magnificent. Rich, royal purples that change colour every day on blooms that last well over a week, sometimes two. The most amazing, strong, luscious scent. Highly recommended. Evelyn: I really liked this rose in SoCal. They say you need to feed and baby her, and I guess I feed and baby all of my roses, so she didn't get any special treatment, but they all had lots of organic foods and manures throughout the year. I love the shades of pink and cream, a most romantic rose, with a delicious scent. Molineux: Molineux in my SoCal garden was in bloom a lot. I don't find the flowers to be very remarkable, but as a back bush with reliable colour I think it is hard to beat. It has a strong Tea scent that for me, smells just like tea!! I finally understood what the name meant!. I'd also recommend from my San Clemente garden: Sister Elizabeth: Lots of blooms, strong fabulous scent, very beautiful flowers verging on lilac colouring. Small plant, medium flowers. William Shakespeare 2000: Fantastic flowers on a nicely shaped shrub with strong, wonderful scent. One of Austin's best. Jude the Obscure: If there could be only one Austin, this might be it for me. Globular flowers with an amazing sweet fruity wine scent. I could stick my nose in it all day long. It grew really well for me, putting out new flowers constantly. Charles Darwin: Some people complain about the flower colour, for me it was always a rich mustardy yellow. Strong scent. Strong branches hold the flowers out. I really liked it. -- Here in England, I've started all over again, and I have a few additional recommendations, but I'm not sure how they will do for you in SoCal. Scepter d'isle: I just planted Scepter d'isle last year here in England, and I have to say I was very impressed with its first year. Lots of flowers, no disease at all, and a strong scent. Recommended. The Ingenious Mr. Fairchild: I love this underrated rose. I love the peony-shaped blooms and the incredible, sweet strong scent. In two seasons it has not been the fastest rebloomer, but there were several very good flushes and the flowers are absolutely worth the wait. The Huntington Rose/Alan Titchmarsh: This rose has had two seasons, and was almost constantly in bloom. I had complained at one point that the blooms were too heavy for the stems, but it ended up being a benefit similar to self-pegging where if I just left the plant alone it turned out to send up shoots all along the cane and I had dozens and dozens of blooms. A very good, medium scent. I hope this was helpful. Best wishes, robert

Hi I have the great pleasure of looking after a garden designed by and mainly planted with David Austin Roses in U.K. with both informal and formal beds and hedges totaling some 900 plants. Due to the size and time constraints involved I have introduced a pruning and deadheading regime mainly using handheld hedgeshears. The hedges are reduced from 6/7feet to 2 feet every Dec.,A 50 metre hedge takes less than an hour to prune; and shrubs by approx. 50% around the same time. The plants are then speedheaded with the handshears after the first flush is over. This induces an exceptional amount of new growth. The results have been spectacular; the hedges flower top to bottom with generous sized blooms, the borders are a riot of healthy, vigorous exhibition quality flowers;and dieback and other disease problems are almost non existent, as a regular spraying program is employed. I am very happy to state that from a hands-on, practical point of view the hedgecutter pruning/deadheading option works for me! I will be pleased to supply more info. if needed. Mikgreen.

That is so odd about DdB, no I don't have any Eucalypts anywhere nearby. I noticed the downward-pointing floppy wilted (yes, also slightly rolled) leaves when it was still in the pot I bought it in and even returned it to the nursery to ask advice. I was sure it must be verticillium wilt or similar. They said it was normal for DdB. I 100% know it had enough water as it was in a pot getting watered everyday! I even watered twice daily to see if I could change the new wilted growth but nothing happened and it wasn't even hot. I had significant misgivings about planting it in the ground, I guess I'll just keep an eye on it!

Below is the info. that Floweraremusic (zone 5) in Washington gave on her 2020 winter-survival. She has alkaline clay with rocks at bottom like mine & less snow in winter: "My hardiest roses are the Canadians. John Davis, John Cabot, Wm. Baffin, Morden Sunrise, Morden Blush and Morden Centennial, Victorian Memory aka Isabelle Skinner, also a Canadian rose. All these only have tiny bit of tip damage and bloom a lot with no special care. Also, my Hybrid Perpetuals only have tip damage after winter. Magna Charta, Mrs. John Laing, Black Prince and Marchesa Buccella. The only negative is they don’t have long enough cutting stems. All my Austins are very hardy. The one I just can not grow is Jude. Leonardo da Vinci is super hardy and always healthy. Quietness comes through winter very well. Even Rouge Royale survives beautifully. Cinderella Fairy Tale is very hardy. Gruss an Aachen also. Ballerina and Marjorie Fair are both hardy. Poseidon, Princess Charlene de Monaco and Crazy Love didn’t do as well as I’d hoped. The surprise losses this year are Quicksilver, and Dames de Chenonceau who is left with only 1 cane. Versigny is also reduced down to almost nothing. This was a mild winter with very little snow. " Floweraremusic (zone 5). From StrawChicago (zone 5a with hard black-gumbo alkaline clay & less snow but with freezing rain in winter). Versigny didn't survive winter either. So I lost Versigny TWICE. Besides Versigny, other wimpy own-root roses that don't survive winter well: Paul Neyron, Anna's Promise, Pink Peace (own-root died 1st winter, but grafted-Pink Peace survives many winter), Elantyne, Jude the Obscure, Young Lycidas (bought as grafted-on-Dr.Huey, now with only one cane), Mary Daly, and many floribundas don't survive my zone 5a: Pink Chiffon, Sheila's perfume, King Arthur, Deep Purple, Shocking blue, Honey Bouquet (survived 1 winter). Polka Climber (survived 1 winter), Cloutilde Soupert (died twice on me). Sutter's Gold didn't survive winter, same with many fragrant mini-roses from Burlington nursery. Below are my hardy OWN-ROOT roses in my zone 5a alkaline clay, only Double Delight, Young Lycidas and Lavender Crush are grafted-on-Dr.Huey. Bold-faced are the very vigorous ones: Own-roots with 3 feet of green canes: Carding Mill (since 2012), Princess Charlene of Monaco, Duchess de Rohan, Crown Princess Magareta (since 2012), Zepherine Drouhin, Lady of Shalott, James Galway, Lavender Crush, Queen of Sweden (gave away but very hardy), Poseidon (right below the rain-spout, dug down to 2.5 feet), Scepter'd Isle (very big & hardy own-root but gave that away with its lousy scent). Own-roots with 2 feet of green canes: La Reine (many winters), Blue Mist (since 2012), Prairie Harvest (since 2014), Mary Magdalene (since 2011), Evelyn (since 2012), Radio Times (since 2011), Pat Austin (since 2011), Christopher Marlowe (since 2011), Golden Celebration (since 2011), Lilian Austin (gave away but very hardy), the Squire, the Dark Lady, Wise Portia survived 4 winters but died in poor drainage clay, Dee-lish (since 2015), Twilight Zone (since 2016), William Shakespeare. 2000 (since 2011), Comte de Chambord (since 2012), Princess Anne, Sweet Mademoiselles, Aloha climber, Orchid Romance, Bohemian Rhapsody, Marie Pavie, Lagerfeld (since 2017), Frederic Mistral survived 2 winters but died when I didn't winter-protect with leaves, Sonia Rykiel (survived 3 winters) but died in freezing rain winter, same with 1/4 of the street-trees in my neighborhood, Excellenz von Shubert (since 2013), Own-roots with less than 1 foot of green canes: Gina's rose, Tchaikosky (since 2015), Cornelia (since 2018), Bolero (few winters), Peter Mayle, Sharifa Asma, Neil Diamond, Amber Queen, A Shopshire Lad, Strike it Rich, Old Port (since 2012), Veteran's Honor (many winters), Double Delight (grafted on Dr.Huey), Savannah, Tess of d'Uberville, Gene Boerner (since 2014), thornless Yves Seedling (since 2013), Stephen big Purple (since 2012), Louise Este, Mirandy, Crimson Glory, Liv Tyler survived 1 winter but needs winter-protection, Rouge Royal (bought last year with no winter-protection). Annie L. McDowell (survived 2 winters but needs a wet-spot since it's almost thornless), Nahema (survived 1 winter then died during freezing-rain winter), same with Eyes-for-you (drought-tolerant and doesn't like freezing wet winter), Souvenir du President Lincoln, Madame Issac Pererie and Madame Earnest Calvat, Firefighter (survived 2 winters) but died since it's next to tree. Bayes Blueberry (survived many winters but I gave away), Charles Darwin (gave away since it fades badly), Arthur Bell (since 2012 & killed it since I don't like the flowers). StrawChicago.