Royal Sunset is against a south-facing patio wall so it gets quite a bit of sun. I bought it bare root. I bought two Sombreuil and Madame Alfred Carriere at the same time. MAC I bought as a 5 gallon plant so it was already 4-5 feet tall, although it just consisted of the one main cane tied to a stake. Sombreuil I bought bare root. MAC is now over 12 feet tall and Sombreuil would be bigger than that except I cut it back every year. So in my experience Royal Sunset does not grow as fast as the other two. It actually gets more sun than either of the others. I wonder if being in part shade encouraged the other climbers to grow taller more quickly to reach the sun, because they are in sun all the time now at the height they are at.

Yes, but it won't in much shade :-) It needs summer heat (which we don't always receive) and is not self-fertile either, so needs a second variety to cross pollinate. While the fruit is a curiosity and certainly interesting, I'd not consider it a stellar menu item - unpleasant, gummy and pulpy texture with a slightly sweet taste. Think a combination of watered down tapioca and sweet, non-fishy caviar :-) Our display plant at the nursery, in a very exposed location, still has most of its foliage, although rather ratty looking at the moment. You didn't get hit with those two strong cold fronts we experienced this winter - one in November, the second just last month? We had temps in the teens (farenheit) in some areas here. I'm surprised you didn't experience something similar up north.

I think it's amazing this thread went on so long with no mention of St Augustine. UC Verde and all the other buffalo and prairie grasses are for full sun. Kikuyu is one of the most invasive imported pest plants short of kudzu. The others mentioned are ground covers that do not repair themselves. Dichondra will die annually from flea beetle. They wipe it out faster than you can diagnose it, but it returns from seed. Fescue, in my opinion should be formally outlawed in CA unless you live west of the 5 in San Diego and Orange counties and west of the 405 in LA. North of the 10 it can be grown on the west slopes of the coastal range, but not in the valleys. St Augustine is a real turf grass, unlike many of the alternates mentioned. It spreads to repair itself under the dog feet, is very shade tolerant, also sun tolerant, and it will crowd out other grasses when mowed at the mower's highest setting. St Aug comes as pieces of sod on a pallet. Cost is about a dollar per piece covering about 2 square feet. It spreads 10 to 15 feet per year in all directions, so if you don't cover the entire area at one time, it will take over and cover for you. St Aug takes as much water as any turf grass if you want it to remain green. If you stop watering it for more than a month, it might die completely, so it differs from other grasses in that regard. But I have revived it from beyond the grave at my my new residence in the Texas Hill Country. St Augustine is considered to be a water hog, but that is pure myth. All grasses need 1 inch of water, once a week, in the hottest heat of summer. This goes for the cool season grasses in the north and the warm season grasses in the south. In Phoenix both bermuda and St Augustine need 1 inch every 4-5 days, but in the rest of the country it only needs it once a week. This time of year in your area you should be watering 1 inch, all at once, every 2-3 weeks. The problem with fescue is it needs water 3x per week in the summer and that dries up your aquifers and lakes. Not sure why you think you have clay, but you likely don't. I don't recall any brick factories in your area, so I'm skeptical. After 12 years of moderating three lawn forums, fewer than 10 writers really had clay. Your soil might have clay like properties, but those can be fixed. Even real clay can be fixed, but you have to have a good soil test along with a good reading of the soil test before you can fix it. 9 times out of 10 people who think they have clay have no clay at all but they do have fine silt and a salt imbalance (calcium, sodium, magnesium, and potassium). You can't know what the problem is without the chemistry test. A secondary issue causing hard soil is allowing the soil to dry completely such that the beneficial microbes in the soil are depleted and unhealthy. That can be fixed by spraying the soil with any clear shampoo at a rate of 3 ounces per 1,000 square feet. Follow that with 1/2 to 1 inch of water and let it go for 3 weeks. At the same time feed the soil with an organic fertilizer like alfalfa pellets, corn meal, soybean meal, or even Milorganite. Compost and/or manure won't do the same thing as the fertilizer. The deep moisture creates a perfect environment for the microbes. The organic fertilizer feeds them. Hard soil is easy to fix. The best soil test in the US is from Logan Labs in Ohio. Yes, it's been tested against all the other labs. Get their $25 test and post the results on the Lawn Care forum and you'll get about $250 worth of free advice from people who know specifically what to apply, when, how much, how often, and where to get the stuff. If you want to see some alternate grasses in action, visit Descanso Gardens and the Huntington Library in Pasadena.

Good points nippstess and thank you frances and buford. I did forget about hardiness only meaning "Does the plant survive?" Our winters range from mild to cold, but I lived for years in upstate NY, Wi and Montreal, so I don't really consider it cold, but I'm not a rose! DA says it can be grown as a 6-8 fto climber if un-pruned. It's the same plant, just trained differently. I think it's possible because the canes are thin and bendy. Frances, I already got the roses from Lowe's for a stupid cheap $$$ and am trying to incorporate them in something remotely approaching 'aesthetically pleasing!' Hah! :) I really only need it to go to the bottom of the 5' window and not be totally obscured by the 'Sugar Moon' that will be placed to its left. I'm putting Heathcliff in front VQ and to the left of Sugar Moon. I'm trying to plant them out today after rigging up the deer fencing. (Not taking anymore chances) as I already amended the soil. I've waited for some more blooms on the 1st yr VQ to see how it will look. I'll post pics next yr when it matures a bit. (And I fix the concrete and paint the window trim.) Thanks for the input. Oh, and how much sun are your plants getting? Will 6hrs. be enough?