kittymoonbeam, thank you very much for the detailed information about this rose. That is very helpful! Pam, what a great idea to grow MEC over a ladder! I am glad to hear that you agree with kittymoonbeam that the disease resistance is improving with age. Jeri, thanks again for your input. I will follow kittymoonbeam's advice. I definitively will give this rose a shot in my garden. For me she is too beautiful to not trying to grow her. organic tosca, thanks for the book recommendation. I have heard got things about this book before, but never got it. Now I really have a reason :-). malcom manners, thanks for sharing your experience with MEC. Also thank you for the correction of the name. From now on it will be Mme. Ernest Calvat for me. Unfortunately I can't change the headline of the post anymore :-(. lori elf, thank you sooo... much for posting a photo and describing your experience with MEC. This rose looks so lovely in your garden. I really like the way you have trained her around the pillar! Christina Here is a link that might be useful: Organic Garden Dreams

I do not have MEC or MDE. Do have Louise Odier. When I did spray, this one did not keep 2/3 of leaves. But maybe that was just my perception, cause a tall lanky bourbon does not necessarily have lots of leaves even when healthy. But she looked awfully naked and did not repeat very often or very heavily. IMO, the blooms on LO, especially the ones after the spring flush, are not big and lucious enough to be worth the trouble of a bourbon.

Hi Eric, My MEC is not overly vigorous or overly cane hardy for me. From what I've read here over the years is that MIP is still quite vigorous in zone 6. Of course I still love my MEC, but she has never attained the growth that I anticipated. I love the foliage which retains a red coloration for a long time. I remember reading someone describing it as if some of the flower pigmentation of MIP had gone to leaves of MEC. I also love the kind of pink the flowers have, a raspberry pink. She of course smells great. She can get some black spot, but does not become defoliated sticks like a hybrid tea would at least for me. Here is a link that might be useful:

'Mme de Sevigne' is more climber-ish than MIP, but it may be what you're seeking. There are several other long-caned Bourbons out there. 'Deuil de Dr. Reynaud' is another one. Yet another is 'Souvenir du President Lincoln'. And, yes, there are some Hybrid Perpetuals of similar habit. I like my 'Pierre Notting', which has the same type of shape, but grows more slowly. It's also certainly not pink, but rather a deep wine-red leaning into purple. By chance, did you get to buy the Vintage Gardens' catalog before they closed? If so, look through their Bourbons of growth habits #3 and #4 to start, then search their names on HelpMeFind to see if anyone still sells them. Otherwise, look through some of the nurseries' online listings of Bourbons and check them out on HMF. :-) ~Christopher