The last one we have has a daphne in it - we got that daphne 23 years ago when we got married - all of the sources I looked at said that daphnes were very short lived - Ha! (tricked by paying attention to generic sources AGAIN!) The daphne has gotten big, and is going strong. This winter the barrel finally collapsed on one side, the plant sank over sideways a bit, but is still going strong months later - I think it must have rooted into the ground a long time ago. It is sort of hidden behind a Duchesse de Brabant, and so I just avert my eyes when I go by it, although I do look at the foliage to make sure it is still doing OK. Sometimes I just like to wait and see what happens - I am not a neat & tidy gardener at all. That's why I like old roses! Jackie

Each time a new "break through" rose becomes popular, there is the rush to use it to the point of over use. Grey Pearl, Pinocchio, Peace, Queen Elizabeth, Lavender Pinocchio, Sterling Silver, Angel Face and many others were forced into every breeder's lines, now Living Easy, Knock Out and several others are the studs to make the next "wave". There is great push to continue using what worked and made other commercial roses. More push comes from memories of how wonderful the variety was and can be, but in my opinion, going backwards and using older roses, particularly ones with such severe issues over much of the country, tends to give you less of anything you want. In many places, AF is a real weed when it comes to fertility and it does create many mauve seedlings, but that comes at too high a price when considering vigor, health and habit. You'd probably be much better off choosing a newer, healthier mauve rose to play with. Whichever one performs well in your area would make significantly better babies for your breeding, presuming it is fertile where you are. There was a mauve modern introduced just this year, IIRC, bred from AF. I remember thinking, why would anyone DO that? Considering how bad many of its seedlings are, the thing can't be very good many places. Each decade, the bar is raised significantly concerning health, vigor, performance. Why stand in a hole when you're trying to reach higher? Kim

Try looking at the family trees of brugmansia at BGI and ABADS brug registery. Look in the galleries as well. Note what kinds of brugs you like-keep a notebook. Think about what you want to cross for, tendrils, shape, doubles, colors, fragrance, hardiness, etc. Both of the forementioned societies have pollen banks or you can also trade for pollen. So really all you must have is the mother plant also known as the pod parent. You can also save your own pollen by removing the anthers and letting them dry a few days on a paper plate and then storing it in the freezer in little ziplock baggies or tubes etc. It should keep up to a year in the freezer. Back to crossing...know that white genes are usually dominant. Knowing the genes of the brugs you want to cross, and which brugs pass certain traits along to thier offspring is the tricky part. Look at the crosses and who the parents and grandparents are can help too. There are some brugs that are considered true pinks, true yellows etc. because they have pink or yellow ancestors and have had most of the white genes bred out of them, so to speak. Certain types of brugs do not normally cross with others for example, sanguinea does not normally cross with insignis, aurea,candida, versicolor,suaveolens. But it can cross with arborea, flavasanguinea, and vulcanicola according to Preissel's book. There is a chart in that book that illustrates this. I think most hybridizers have started out just crossing brugs they like and see what happens. Some plant hybridizers (haven't seen anyone fess up to it in brug hybridizing~but who knows) use charts or punnet squares to figure the percentage of what genes will be expressed in a cross. I am planning to play with it and see what happens though :)

I looked back into my log records and found that trialed the "Rose" variety in 2001,; I was growing for restaurants at the time. My records indicate I got the seed in a trade from SE PA (indeed, that is Amish country). Some of my end of year ratings were as follows: Folliage desease tolerance/resistance 2.3 on a scale topped at 3.0. (Rutgers rated a 2.0) Size typically 3.5 to 4.5 OD X 2.0 to 2.5 deep. Yield 70% to sales, 20% to sauce or juice. Comments--Shows promise, very good tasting attractive fruits. So, I saved seed and then somehow forgot all about the variety. We were involved at the time in negotiations to sell our orchard and home to a developer, and 2001 was not one of my better managed years! Seeds now out of inventory and on deck for a 2010 growout!