My plant of 'Alchymist' came from Pickering nurseries about 9 years ago, budded to R. multiflora. It is now about 12 feet tall, as a somewhat freestanding arched shrub. (I has a fence to "lean on" on one side) It has suffered badly from Blackspot infection some years to the point of near total defoliation by the time it is at full flush, but most years it has only partial defoliation from the disease. I do not spray the group of roses in that area because of their proximity to one of my vegetable beds, and so they have to fend for themselves. (Also in this area are 'Konigin von Danemark', 'Maiden's Blush, Great', 'Tour de Malakoff', 'Ville de Bruxelles', 'Stanwell Perpetual', 'Comte de Chambord', 'La Belle Sultane', and 'Alika', all of which require no spraying to remain healthy. It surprises me greatly that 'Comte de Chambord' remains Blackspot free in that part of the garden, as it is known for being quite disease prone in many parts of the country.) Andrea said: "I just talked to a rose expert at Peter Beales, and he told me that both La France (1867) and Gloire de Dijon (1850) have not been "as vigorous and healthy as one might want them to be" having shown "problems" for a long long time, certainly much predating the time he's been dealing with roses professionally, that is for 30 years. Beales only keeps these roses for collectors who buy them regardless of their poor performance. He thinks that these roses might have either never been especially healthy and vigorous, and/or that the cloning process is not as perfect as one might expect it to be." (emphasis mine) I tend to agree with that assessment. I suspect that many of these older roses were never particularly good growers and that 100 plus years ago, people were a lot more willing to tolerate their imperfections and work a lot harder to get a few perfect blooms than we are in this era. We have a lot of superb, vigorous roses available to us now and its against these that we measure all others. When you start to compare 'Gloire de Dijon' with a modern climber like 'Westerland', (to name only one of dozens of examples) you quickly discover the relative weakness of some of the older roses. As I said previously, I suspect gardeners of the early 1900's worked a lot harder to get roses of a quality that they deemed admirable for the period, keeping in mind that "admirable" by modern standards has risen to greater heights of perfection. I think many of these older roses we grow never were particularly good plants. 'Marechal Niel' is a good example: even the writings of that time went into great detail to describe what lengths one had to go to in order to obtain a few really good blooms. That included heavy manuring and growing under glass, to name but two. (I can't imagine what they must have had to do to fend off Mildew under glass, since its hard enough to prevent out in the open air!) In the case of varieties like 'Mme. Caroline Testout', which is indeed still an excellent rose, even by today's standards, I think these were excellent roses right from the start and have maintained their vigor and excellence because they were good varieties all along, not necessarily because they avoided the damage inflicted by decades of propagation and viral infection. (Although perhaps this was a factor: maybe 'Mme. Caroline Testout' has some ability to withstand viral/bacterial infections that other roses do not. We can't really know without extensive research what the mechanisms are that depress some cultivars when other seem unharmed. Case in point would be Ralph Moore's 'Climbing Yellow Sweetheart', a climbing Polyantha with superb vigor and health, and yet all plants of it have come from a lone specimen found a few years ago which has been proven to be infected with a fairly aggressive strain of RMV. The plant is an excellent one and seems to be unhampered in spite of the infection.) "I wonder if Paul or anyone else here could tell us something more specific about this generational factor (other than saying of course that "older" roses may be, or may be not weaker than "newer" roses.)" My knowledge on this matter is limited to what I have learned from experts in virology and nurserymen vastly more experienced than myself. I have come to certain opinions based on this knowledge, in combination with observations I have made on my own over 20 years of rose culture. I have also included in my knowledge the things I have learned by reading old catalogs and books from earlier periods (thanks to rosarians like Graham Thomas and archivists like Brent Dickerson), which often tell us quite a bit about the performance of older cultivars. That said, I believe that many, many factors play a role in the performance of some of our "antique" roses. I think viruses play a very important role, I also think that some cultivars may be more susceptible to "clonal degradation" (which may or may not be due to accumulated detrimental mutations) than others, just as some cultivars are far more inclined to generate sports. The 'Radiance' group would be a prime example of a rose that tends to sport often. Is it not reasonable to think that some roses are more inclined to suffer from detrimental mutations rather than desirable ones? I definitely think that some roses were never very good plants, not then, and not now. I think that in some cases, "Rose X" which we grow in our gardens may not even be the right variety, having been passed along for generations under the wrong name. In that case we are comparing oranges to apples and so we are looking for properties which the rose can't possible exhibit. I've said this before, so I won't go into detail on this point. Considering all of these possible factors, I think we are stuck in a kind of informational limbo and trying hard to make judgments that we can't very effectively make, since so much data isn't available to us. Some things we do know, such as the effect that accumulated viruses has on some cultivars. But there are undoubtedly other factors that we don't currently understand or even perceive yet, such as why some varieties appear to suffer from some kind of genetic degradation. So much can be speculated, and so little of it can be known with certainty. FWIW, Paul

I have the Vintage clone...I am happy with it. It is in the ground about 1+ years. I have had maybe 3 or 4 flowers. It is obviously making roots and gettin' settled. My experience with every single tea-noisette I have ever planted here has been the same. In this climate, in my soil, they are very slow in getting started. Since mine are all still very young, that means I have lots of tiny plants. My Marechal Niel is a monster compared to the Lamarque, Bouquet d'Or and Reve d'Or here. I am just prepared to wait, feed, and shower them with all sorts of love. Example: Maman Cochet took forever to get started here. Put in a band in November of '05, and it was disappointing. Each flower that came out gave me a coronary (they are So Beautiful), but otherwise, a flop. Now, suddenly this spring, she's sending up finger thick basals like there's no tomorrow...so I think some of these puppies just take their own sweet time. I have a Crepuscule that is staying tiny, but I have decided I don't like where I put it, and will move it before it warms up, and really prepare the soil in the new spot. We'll see. Jerome

Peppers clone fairly easily when you give the proper conditions. Heat n proper humidity play a huge roll. I've learned that adding nutrients at a decent lvl help peppers establish roots quickly to Maintain a full leaf system. Cloning powder and about 450 ppm nutrient (1/2 tsp pr gal of maxibloom water at 70 degree water) clone great. Peppers can produce a lot quicker from clones that seedlings so go for it I'm about to fire the cloner up as soon as the production lettuce gets going so i have buckets full of spring planters.

Say, rogerzone6. Can you send me a Gmail with pictures of your leaf-less Ruby Slippers Hydrangeas? Maybe showing the ends of the stems, as clear as possible (not fuzzy) and then another picture showing the plant (all branches -if any- visible). I have been discussing this issue with the director of a plant clinic that I know. She too is puzzled and requested pictures to get some additional ideas... Hope you do not mind that I am still researching what could be going on... I lost your original post on the subject but "found you" in this other forum. Or email me the pics at lflluch@yahoo.com