Some questions: 1) What kind of rose bush, exactly, is the one that is troubling you? 2) Do the leaves on the new long canes look like the leaves it used to have? It sounds to me like this bush is now, even if it wasn't before, a climber. Climbing roses sometimes don't bloom until they have achieved what they think is the proper height - by continually pruning the long canes, you may just be forcing it to continue to produce more long canes, in an attempt to reach its "proper" height. If this rose used to be a normal sized bush that bloomed, what I am guessing may have happened is that the OGR root stock may have taken over. In my garden, this would delight and intrigue me, and I would move that plant to somewhere where there could be support for the climbing canes, let it climb, and then let it bloom eventually, and find out what rose it is now. Of course, I realize that this might not be practical in your climate (mine is warm - no "winter dieback" at all). Just some guesses - Jackie

Animals aren't collections, even if you do have several, okay 6 cats and four dogs. China isn't a collection...you use it. Besides, some of it was my grandmother's and some mothers, and I really liked the soft pink abstract rose on that set and you need Christmas china, and of course, you need different china for the grandkids at Christmas. I suppose having 350 different daylilies means I must admit to collecting them. But all the Christmas decorations are just decorations, not a collection...except maybe the Dickens Villiage is a collection. And Josh, I am really impressed with all of your languages. In addition to English, I speak only Spanish and German, and, like Melissa, I can read French, but I do not speak nor understand the spoken French. And like Susie, Books are not a collection any more than food is. kay

A week or 2 sounds just right to me seeing as I have a limited attention span. I certainly would not put up with months and months of dull foliage, whatever the colour, shape or form...which forces me to admit that flowers always have, and always will come first and foremost (even in the wood). Then again, I have a home pot garden (with many handy hideaways) and various other garden projects to amuse myself - when one is looking down at heel, I avert my eyes and ignore it - but fully understand this is not gardening as is done in most of the world but more a sort of permanently temporary sow and show spectacle which will never pass muster for a garden design of any merit. Literally thousands of plants have passed through my hands with a tiny minority surviving more than a few seasons. I do look, sometimes enviously, at other people's mature and elegant vistas - compared to my ramshackle collection of pots. tubs and trays - but....so many plants, so little time. I have perfected a sort of short-sighted squint which handily renders most of the picture vague and fuzzy, while focusing solely on each particular specimen - as far as possible from a fully integrated scenario which gives most people a headache but gives me profound delight. Which is also one of the reasons there are never any pics of my gardens on this forum (as they are mostly rubbish). Cannot do variegation either. I recently signed up for a botanical art course, thinking this would chime nicely with my preference for close observation of single specimens...but I swear it is the most boring thing ever. Hours and hours spent drawing every minuscule detail on a single leaf...am planning to subvert this at every opportunity with 2 inch paintbrushes and great sweeps of indian ink.

Yep, understood on the magnitude of the task. Apparently the persons who coded and filled hirsutum.info with data are taking an indefinite break from the task. Just what I've heard through the ARS grapevine. Actually the ACS one has more data though, than I remember from looking at it a couple years ago. I like this "article" format, I think it makes more sense for conifers. So on this entry: http://conifersociety.org/conifers/conifer/metasequoia/glyptostroboides/ogon/ It's pretty darn good as it is, but, again, the ability to click on Larry Stanley and go to a holder page of any other articles mentioning him, would be nice. Any kid who knows programming well should be able to set something like that up in a quick, semi-automated way, just use some perl and regex to convert selected bits of bolded text to a special hyperlink of whatever is bolded. (I don't do web design, per se, but do work in IT and have dealt with web designers for over 15 years) "A mature specimen will easily exceed 20 feet (7 m) tall after 10 years in the landscape." Try 5 years LOL.