Crispy lawn to go

Teas are generally the right roses, given that many of them were bred in a mediterranean climate, actually the original Mediterranean. However, they do still need to be watered.

You might take a look at Texas A&M's list of Earth Kind roses: https://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/earthkindroses/about/

These are roses that have been found to have excellent heat and drought tolerance.

Also, another plant you might consider is Catalina bush poppy: https://inlandvalleygardenplanner.org/plants/dendromecon-harfordii/

These can be ordered from various California native plant nurseries online. The plant is extremely drought tolerant and is covered in bright yellow blooms nearly all year (only stopping for winter). It's evergreen with bluish green leaves, quite attractive; and slow growing, so easy to keep pruned if you don't want it to get too big. Mine is around 4-5' tall after 8 years in the ground. It does just fine with zero supplemental watering during summer here in southern Oregon (Mediterranean climate).

I’ve put in the spray form of Cecile Brunner, but the foliage is not as heat resistant as Mr T’s, and she is a bit frazzled.

I grew Duchesse de Brabant in my old garden, but was disappointed with how the flowers shrivelled to nothing in the sun.

Adam, my conditions are totally different (HUMID summer heat, upper 90's F, sometimes monsoon-like rains), but as far as heat resistance, Mon Tillier is one of my best, also. Right behind him are Papa Gontier and General Schablikine. As an aside, PG is also one of the first to bloom for me each Spring.

John

You could try messaging billy teabag on HMF She gardens in WA, and grows lots of Teas.

Thanks Shiela, I feel your frustratio. I have taken to drafting my posts in notes and then psaying them into the forum.

There are three issues here - heat, water, and humidity. I understand that your climate is very dry, which dispenses with the humidity issue. We are also very dry here during our summers. Teas AND CHINA hybrids do well in dry heat.

Water is a different thing - even heat tolerant roses need water, in my experience, most especially in a hot dry climate. Perhaps someone who gardens in Arizona will respond on here, but I can tell you about my garden, which is in heat zone 9 or 10, and gets no rain whatever for 6-7 months of the year. Our "rainy season" is plenty wet to water the roses, but during our normal Summer drought we do irrigate them.

So, now we come to heat. Here we do get up into the high 90s (F) in the summer, and occasionally the 100s. I get the idea that your climate is hotter? In addition to teas, I would recommend that you do try a china rose or two. The classic red ones like 'Cramoisi Superior' have smaller leaves, and this is helpful in the heat. I would also recommend that you try 'Le Vesuve', which is listed as a china by some and a tea by others. It does extremely well here.

In many hot dry climates folks use partial shade to protect the roses during the hot afternoons. My garden is full of trees, and there area huge street trees along our street - they provide partial shade to most of my garden, and in the hot summers I think it helps.

Do you have the book by the Australian tea ladies "Tea Roses: Old Roses for Warm Gardens" ? It is on Amazon, and is a gorgeous and very useful book for those of us who garden in warm places.

Jackie

Thanks Jackie. Yes I do have the tea book, and was thumbing through it this afternoon (thinking the hot reds of General Gallieni would look good).

We have summer water restrictions here, so are limited to irrigating twice a week at a recommended ten minutes per station. The biggest issue I think is the intense sunlight. On hot days even the leaves of plumeria, plane trees and succulents will scorch. I do plan to plant some triangle palms to create a bit of shade.

the leaves of Mr T are completely free of scorching. I have an Archiduc Charles in the same bed, and it has nasty black scorched leaves. I have also been giving AC some extra water.

my potted roses get some shade from a cocos palm, and they have been mostly fine. However Perle d’Or is the first to burn.

It was 100 degrees today and we are expecting 105 (41C) tomorrow, thankfully it is our watering day....

I don't know if this is even feasible for you, but have you considered some kind of overhead shade structure? I was thinking of criss-cross lattice, comparatively inexpensive, to provide dappled shade over a corner bed or two of roses. Of course you would have to provide some kind of support to hold it aloft. Maybe something bolted to your fence.

Oops, I just went back and looked at your photo, and apparently you don't actually have a fence. I was apparently remembering someone else's photo. That makes the idea of a dappled shade structure much more of a project. I still think it could work, but a lot of work to install, and more expensive than I was thinking.

@Adam Harbeck I think you are prematurely judging Spray Cecile Brunner. A younger, smaller plant is far more likely to sun burn than a larger one. There is more heat reflected off the very near bare ground with little air circulation to help distribute that intense heat. A larger plant will shade more of the heat absorbing ground, providing shade with cooler, damper air and a tremendously larger foliage mass to absorb the heat and light. Judging the resistance to any issue of immature plants is premature.

General Gallieni could be a good choice, Adam, if you like him. (Some people don't, but I do..). GG was one of the massive teas at Ross Roses that IIRC, flourished in scorching (40 degrees plus) heat while many other less staunch old soldiers were disgracing themselves, fainting and flopping about on parade... Always smartly turned out, I don't recall any scorched leaves on him either. But they did irrigate; I'm not sure how often.

How about Harison's Yellow? It is one of my absolute favorite roses - simply stunning in the spring. Smells good too. And is quite tough and drought tolerant.

The Tea's bushes are so much more attractive, and Teas are constant bloomers. I have Harison's Yellow too, but could not live without my Teas.

Sheila, what can I say I'm a sucker for singles! (or almost-singles) LOL

Me too.

Poor little Charlie

Even Mr T has suffered

I feel for your scorching plants Adam. It's painful to have them suffering. I wish more watering were allowed. More shade from some temporary structure would be nice too.

My husband constructed a light bird netting covered cage for our shelter in an alcove we keep cold sensitive plants over Winter. The birds were digging in the pots something awfully. Maybe something to drape shade cloth over could help. Obviously, this is all rather unsightly.

@Adam Harbeck I was seeing that heat damage to nearly all of my roses in zone 10a Encino, CA more than six years ago. They were west facing with filtered light part of the day but once that blistering sun hit, they fried. Sun intensity and heat levels are increasing...

I don't know anything about growing roses in Australia but what about rose de rescht?

I’ve not seen it offered, but I’ll investigate.

It’s not all doom and gloom in the heat. My Sophie’s Perpetual cuttings have taken and are chugging along (under cover though).

I have Monsier Tiller too and it is my best Tea! Right now it is finishing a winter flush with large 3 inch blooms, which shrink to 2 inch in summer. It got to 110F/43C last summer and was well over 90F/32C much of the time. All my Teas and Noisettes did quite well including Rosette Delizy, G. Nabonnand, Madam Joseph Schwartz, Reve dOr and Madame Alfred Carriere. However blooms fried on GM and MJS. RdO and MAC don’t bloom midsummer so I don’t really know for these. But best bloom time for my Teas is the weeks around winter solstice so I don’t worry if summer blooms fry. Also we get massive wind that comes from the East so my MT being a larger plant is leaning slightly towards the West. I noticed that when I looked at the base I can see a massive root on the East side of the plant anchoring it into the ground. It has the look of a thick taproot so I wonder if this goes deeper into the earth and keeps it happy. My MT is on it’s own roots

Actually my Teas don't bloom all that much in the heat of summer. Jeri once mentioned that they can shut down in the heat, and I have observed that many of them do. Fall, winter, and spring are their seasons to shine. I no longer have Rozette Delizy which several have mentioned (probably succumbed to armillaria), but it did bloom year round.

I have forgotten chinas since I don't grow them, but they are definitely worth trying.

Finally, you might have good luck with some of the polyanthas. Both Marie Pavié and Perle d'Or did very well for me. MP is very close to thornless, and PdO is a thorny beast. Both are fragrant, which is not common in polyanthas.

Oh yes Rosefolly...Marie Pavie! Mine is in constant bloom and the flowers hold in the heat. Mine gets lots of water in my annuals bed though.

I have a PdO in a pot which is doing well. But it does get shade from a palm, and daily watering. Devoniensis and Hugo Roller (also in pots) are flowering nicely, as is Francis Dubreuil and my seedling (which I call Fire and Blood). How long the flowers last before dessication is a different story.

Maybe use shade cloth during the worst heat days? I use shade cloth on my blueberries during the summer - just lay it right on top of the bushes - works fine. Of course that means you won't see the roses on those days; but at least it would help until the plants get very well established.

This year I'll be using cattle panel arches over my blueberries, with climbing veggies to create a more productive kind of shade for them....

I do think that some form of shade might be part of your answer.

Adam, I forgot to say that billy teabag on HMF is one of the Ladies that wrote the book on Tea Roses. She lives in WA.

Mrs. B. R. Cant and Le Vesuve are more of the old roses with sky-high heat resistance. As young plants, they maintained healthy foliage after a sudden 116 F/47 C day, other than a couple of leaves, about the same performance as your Mr. T. This is 17 miles/28 kilometers east of Los Angeles, more interior/hot/dry than L. A. They both get mildew, Le Vesuve less so.

While I don't recommend it for this, the now-matured Mrs B. R. Cant is surviving in a 'waterless' (no water once-established) garden. Unfortunately Le Vesuve has died off. It's a testament MBRC's hardiness that it is leafing out like normal after the first soaking rain in 9 months. It defoliates during the summer drought. However, in spite of surviving, I believe the conditions are probably too harsh for it, as it shows major sunscald on the canes.

Other old roses--Marie van Houtte is more heat sensitive as a young plant than the 2 above, showing more tissue damage; has not yet been tested under waterless conditions.
Old Blush does quite well under waterless conditions, better than MBRC, but was never directly tested by very high heat as a young plant. OB defoliates completely to leave an attractive silhouette of branches but unfortunately gets mildew. Madame Alfred Carriere might be hardy under waterless conditions (need to test longer) but was not tested as young plants under very high heat. It does sunscald on the canes but because it sends up healthy new canes more easily than MBRC I rate it as more resilient, provided it continues to do well under waterless conditions. Gets some mildew under my conditions.

Old Blush, after 8 months of complete drought:

Thank you everyone. There are two still quite young frangipani trees planted to the north of AC. I was initially worried about them eventually casting too much shade, but now think it will be very beneficial in time.

Mrs BR Cant is one of my absolute faves. If I had a mature tree or pergola for her to lean on in this garden I would definitely have planted her again.

I don’t think any rose could survive without at least weekly watering on our hot, sandy soils. It’s like gardening on beach over here.

Yes, I put in a heavier more water retentive soil, 18inches to 2 feet deep/45 to 60 cm, which overlays the native rocky soil, I believe they would have died otherwise. Also tilled in a lot of compost and added deep mulch on top.