I had six new plants that started as tubers. Planted them along a fence and they get 5 hours of sun per day, plus the heat off the wood fence is a plus. . This is their second year with slow start due to the bad NW Spring, too much rain and little sun, but last year they all performed beautifully. I had blooms into October. We'll see this year. One plant didn't come up, but the rest are growing. My old gardens got about 7 hours and I had 20 plants. All did beautiful. Key is to deadhead old blooms and water regularly. Don't stress dahlia or they will not due well, like overwatering or competing with weeds, and not desdhesding. Happy growing!

Thanks everyone for your support. I know I need to leave but I suppose I've always been a sucker to help people. Amber - Thank you for your words. You are right, the only person I can save is myself. I suppose the battle is really working up the courage to say enough is enough. I struggle because I hate hurting people or feeling like I am letting them down but in the same regard I suppose by me doing things for my partner, he will never do anything to help himself or his son. Colleenoz - thank you for your kind words. I never thought about it like the way you put it. Seeing that he could turn like that if something bad happened to me is some what alarming. Because when I think of the answer to something happening to me and would he be there, I can't answer that. And if I can't answer that, then there is a real big problem. LaVerne - Thank you for your comment. Do I want to change? Yes i really do, so I guess I know what I have to do. Reading Lady - Sadly this situation is real, it would be nice if I was making it up but unfortunately I am not. I know everyone on his mother's side has bi-polar and basically have lived their lives in and out of either jails or foster homes. Sometimes I think the cycle can be broken but in the same regards, it's not my responsibility to have hero complex (i.e. trying to save everyone). Let me just say this, I know that none of you know me from a bar of soap, which in turn makes you more truthful. I appreciate your honesty and i thank you for your wisdom. I know everyone goes through hard stages in life, but you are right. If I am not happy with the situation, then only I can change it. I think it's time for me to worry about myself and get back what I want. If I succeed (and I truly hope I do) than please know every little word by each of you contributed to giving me strength. You all really have no idea how much you have put my mind, heart and bank balance at rest.

Of these roses I only have 'Jaune Desprez'. I would be concerned about your zone in its case, but have no personal experience to go on as I live in a mild climate. My plant is currently about 17' x 10'--something like that, it's big--trained up a balcony, and is thirteen years old. JD in my garden is big, lax, thorny--really notably thorny--has beautiful foliage that is deciduous. Mine is basically spring blooming, but I don't water it and we have a regular long summer drought; I believe it blooms much more with summer water. The blooms are beautiful, the color of ice cream, and are fragrant, with a musk scent that carries on the air. Hardiness apart, JD is a tough rose, tolerant of poor soil and part shade. It gets more disease than some of my roses, but nothing serious, and nothing to bother it. I like 'Jaune Desprez' for its grace and somewhat wild air, for its fragrance and the beauty of its blooms, for its toughness. It has a reputation for being a slow starter, which I found to be true; my grafted plant didn't bloom at all its first year. With me it gets an annual pruning in March, to cut out the oldest growth and retie the canes. I cut up the pruned growth and throw it down around the base of the rose, and that's maintenance for the year.

Lisa, I think you will have great success with Lady Ashe. All climbers take their time getting going. Go with the flow. It seems at first they are duds, but watch out, they are slow to mature, like large/giant breed dogs. Climbers are famous for a huge spring flush followed by a disappointing show for the rest of the flowering season. Lady Ashe is a work horse regarding strong follow up flushes, unlike any other climber I know of. I think a strong hybrid tea presence in Lady Ashe's ancestry is why. Lady Ashe apparently has hybrid tea genes in her background. I say this because after her first flush of the season, during which blooms come in clusters of 3-4 buds, the following flushes are 95% one gorgeous bloom per approximately 16" long, straight stem. They are perfect for cutting, unlike so many climbers' blooms which either nod or have very short necks. Also, Lady Ashe has excellent petal substance, a high petal count with high centered, layer cake blooms. Her lateral flower stems are like rebar, stiff and strong. Her new basal canes are flexible when young, and easy to train, but once mature, be prepared to have a small battle trying to he some cooperation out of them. The flowers never, ever nod. They also last a long time on the bush and equivalently so in the vase. My Lady Ashe is mature now, at year 6. In my zone 5/6 garden, she has been 12 feet wide (6 feet in each direction), filling the upper half, 2 feet, on a 4 foot high fence. She has not spread much in the last two years, just hulked-up nicely. I do not expect her to get any larger. In your CA garden you can safely expect your Lady Ashe to exceed mine in size. By how much, I cannot say for sure, but I would estimate at least 25-33% more. The caterpillar damage you showed is disheartening. Caterpillars targeting rose buds is a hard to treat. There two approaches you can try. Spray just the caterpillar vulnerable parts of the bush, just the shoots developing buds, not the entire bush. Try either of these two insecticides: SEVIN - spray every 5 days. Spray the bud growing tips only, during the caterpillar season. Sevin is a nerve poison that must land on the caterpillar's body to kill it. It is not a stomach poison, so Sevin on the plant will not kill the caterpillar as it chomps on the rose buds/leaves. BAYER COMPLETE INSECT CONTROL - Spray every 7 days during caterpillar season. Just spray the bud growing tips. Bayer is both a contact and stomach poison. It is systemic, so kills the caterpillars when they eat sprayed foliage. Its systemc action does translocate to new or expanded growth. That is why weekly spraying during caterpillar season is required. Your aim is to kill the caterpillars when they just hatch and are tiny, before severe damage occurs. When tiny, they do little significant damage, but as they grow (and do so very quickly), the damage done increases exponentially. With Sevin, you hit the tiny, baby caterpillars' bodies as they hatch. With BAYER you not only kill them as they hatch by the spray hitting their bodies, but any that escape will die when they begin to eat the leaves/buds. These leaves/buds have absorbed the systemic insecticide and are lethal to the caterpillars. There are no organic, i.e., insecticidal soap, neem oil, etc., I can recommend. They are very damaging to new rose growth/foliage, especially with your intense heat and sunlight. I did not see saw fly larvae, a.k.a. rose slugs, damage in your photos. These caterpillars primarily make patterned windows and as they mature, patterned holes, in rose leaves. I have not experienced them attacking buds, but I can imagine they could. I hope your Lady Ashe exceeds your expectations as mine has for me. Moses