Steven - so sorry your rose has rust! I get it in my garden sometimes in the Fall, mostly on mid 20th century HT roses, which seem to be very susceptible to it (as well as all other fungal diseases). Perhaps more air movement would help - that bush does look a bit dense.

Jackie

Well that stinks, darn ingrates, you water, feed , deadhead and speak words of love and encouragement and that's the thanks you get.

I know that you will get it handled in no time and all well be well.

Let's hope its a freak event, and never repeats.

Moses

Do you have lots of rain in July? One neighbor had the most perfect Angel Face (3' x 3') with 60+ blooms in morning sun. The next year we had tons of rain in early summer, and it came down with rust and she removed the entire bush. Rain leaches out calcium and potassium (necessary for disease-prevention).

Kristine, I love your take! Gave me a chuckle, thank you! I figure with R. setigera being a native, I'm going to let it be. It's the wild and it will take care of itself.

Moses, thank you. I do as well. I'd never seen rust before on roses here!

Straw, thank you for your expertise in chemistry! It had been very dry and hot for a while, then we had about two weeks straight of warm, humid, and very wet/rainy weather. So that seems to be it based on our weather here.
I admit I was very surprised because I have things that are notorious rusters out West that are clean still. Things like Conrad Ferdinand Meyer and Tradescant, for instance.

Jackie, thank you for the tip! I'm glad this rose is out in that open in my just exposed setting for air versus against a wall!

Thank you all for your charming, supportive, and informative words!
I'm honestly not too concerned and do chalk it up to weather pattern anomalies. Like the powdery mildew in the middle of summer. I'd never had that before. Usually PM is an autumn thing for me here. Black spot is always present to some degree but this year has been a bit better overall. It's really interesting to observe certain diseases being present in certain locations of the yard but not others.

Steven

Very interesting observation, roseseek.

Thank you Kim!

I recall your wonderful piece on water stress induced rust on R. arkansana (I forgot if it actually was the species) and wasn't sure if enough folks would remember it to reference.
I'm so very glad you've brought it up.
I love learning things like this. I've gleaned so much wonderful and useful knowledge from you and other experts from the Gardenweb forums.

Steven

You're welcome, Steven! Thank you! Oddly, R. Arkansana "Peppermint" isn't subject to water stress induced rust. https://www.helpmefind.com/rose/l.php?l=2.31976 

I betcha you will never have to worry about it again. My climate is dry as dust and black spot doesn't happen here, but one year my Ivor's Rose literally covered itself in it. The worse case I could imagine. Looked like I had dribbled tar all over it. It was the only rose in my garden of a couple hundred that had even a speck of black spot. Ivor's Rose has been clean ever since that year. I hope your experience with rust is the same.

Sorry you got rust. We have had tons of rain here this summer. A lot of my roses have BS now. I didn't have the time to spray. The landscaping roses (KOs and Carpet roses) are still Ok. Do you spray your roses for rust and BS?

Flowers, I hope not! Hehe. Is Ivor's Rose the name of the rose sold here as Flamenco Rosita? If so, I have it, and it's usually healthy here overall.

Summers, I actually tend to not spray at all. I've been telling myself I am for the rose slugs and Japanese beetles first, then the fungicide, but I just haven't had to actual desire to. I have chemical warfare at hand, but I hate doing it.

Steven

Rust comes and goes here, depending on weather conditions and the rose variety -- I could ALWAYS depend on 'Souvenir du Dr. Jamain' here though, for example, for a rust specimen for the Botany 1 Fungi, Basiomycota Lab, as well as powdery mildew for the Fungi, Ascomycota lab :-) -- what a useful guy! (now gone, unsurprisingly, despite the beautiful flowers). If, like on SdDJ, the rust is practically perpetual, I shovel-prune it, but if on others it is fairly intermittent, it gets ignored (I'm pretty good at averting my eyes during unsightly periods of an otherwise desirable rose's existence). I don't spray anything on anything here.

Sounds like your rust will likely be transient, Steven. I just added a band of a R. setigera hybrid to my collection, "North Bloomfield Raspberry", and will be interested to see if it's susceptible or not here.

Steven, my deepest sympathy and understanding! We all get smacked with crazy rose disease years, and they can truly be times that try our gardening souls. A couple of years ago or so, I experienced a spring that will live in infamy. My usually absolutely 100% disease-free HUGE Rose de Rescht broke out in rust. It was pure vintage horror cinema in my front beds! RdR’s foliage was caked in creepy crawly mounds of caterpillar-like cheeto fungus. Abe Darby, who is always a total disease magnet in my garden, jumped into the fungus fest with BOTH rust and blackspot. I have never before, and never want to again, experience anything so awful! It was all laid bare for the whole neighborhood to enjoy, too, since the beds are by the sidewalk. Carol

Guys! Thank you for your understanding, stories, and wisdom.
I know my example isn't a severe case by far. I don't have any Cheeto Curl Monsters or anything.
I must say I had probably a bit of a perverse thrill discovering it and was "excited" to share. Increased sympathies to all you West Coast gardeners that face heavy rust issues.
Catspa, I'm 100% with you in expecting this rust to be an unusual and transient visitor. Now I'm thinking I ought to take a look at my Abe Darby because he is literally on the other post within a few feet of R. setigera.
Oh Carol, I can just imagine the burn of that unusual "embarrassment" and surprise! Especially in a more visible place and populated area. In June I noticed folks slowing down a bit when the roses were blooming, so I'm sure folks notice good and bad. At least it's mostly an Amish audience that sees my plants, eh?

Steven

Are there different "species" of rust? My roses that rust have yellow spots on the top side of the leaves and then on the underside of the leaf is fuzzy orange - looks exactly like rusty metal. Not thick, raised cheetoh looking stuff.

Abe Darby was so bad i got rid of it years ago, like so many others. But now I have just a few left that are notorious rusters. Jude the Obscure, Evelyn, Florance de Lattre, and Scepter d'Isle. I tolerate these because I love them.

I learned on this forum that roses that are stressed, as in lack of water, will break out in diseases. I am giving these roses more water, corn water (high in potassium, extra potassium fertilizer - Masterblend (in addition to regular fertilizer). Scepter d'Isle has totally responded with awesome healthyness - so much better than it was. I was gone for awhile and came home to Evelyn with lots of rust. I picked off the rusty leaves and gave lots of water, masterblend and corn water and now she has gorgeous new foliage and lots of buds. Jude the Obscure is still small but had rusty lower leaves, so got the same treatment and now has a few gorgeous blooms. Florance de Lattre is very old - probably 20 years - such an interesting color to her blooms, but dang that rust to ruin the whole thing. I keep giving her the same treatment, but still have a few rusty leaves, mostly on older foliage, but i pick it off, so there's not much foliage left.

So I really think - at least for me - with no summer rain at all, and then recently hardly any winter rain either, that additional water is probably the key thing to prevent the rust. In addition, the high potassium, as StrawChicago says, helps alot.

We spend a lot of time in the Rocky Mountains in Spring and Fall and i love seeing the wild roses. I do remember seeing rust on the native roses in the summer when it was hot and dry and I was really surprised because I thought the dry conditions would prevent the fungal diseases. But i really think that stress caused by dry conditions can promote rust. As opposed to Blackspot which almost never occurs here (southern California) but does occur if we have a rainy spring - highly unusual.

Steven, to be clear, I meant I hope your rust is also a one-time-only, never-to-happen-again experience!

What seems like something that comes out of nowhere for no reason must actually have a scientific explanation, as Kim points out, but to the average home gardener, we just want it to go away.

Yes, Flamenco Rosita and Ivor's Rose are one and the same. Ivor's Rose is just easier for me to remember.

Carol, apologies, but I had to laugh - at your story telling, not the actual disaster you describe. So weird how these plants can humiliate and befuddle us.

Flowers, thank you for clarifying, but yes, I understood you meant for hoping this to be a rare, or even one-time thing, lol! I do as well.

I'm sure most things have a rational, scientific explanation to them even if we/scientists haven't discovered the processes, mechanics, chemistry, and theories behind them!

Steven

Steven

Steven, I'm sorry to change the subject ,but I saw that you mentioned "Tradescant". Do you still grow it? If not, how well do you remember it? I am trying to figure out where to place mine, and am looking for info about it's size and habit.

Now, just to show that I'm not trying to usurp your thread, I will add my comment on the disease issue. I think disease is often caused by stress of various kinds,but weather issues can cause it even in a basically healthy plant. Spraying SHOULD be avoided; it's bad for the environment, and bad for the gardener, not to mention being an enormous pain in one's bare bodkin, lol. The approach that I like is to try to improve growing conditions for a plant that tends to be unhealthy, and if that doesn't work, best just get rid of it. However I'm not really strict. If a rose still looks good in spite of a touch of mildew, for example, I close an eye.

Good day Bart! (It's almost 6am here; just getting off work!)
I don't consider it highjacking since the discussion is still regarding rust/a variety known for it! (Hehe)

I'm terribly out of zone in comparison to your garden conditions, I'm sure. My one Tradescant is from David Austin, grafted on Dr. Huey and planted in 2016. It's never been spectacular, but seems a bit better this year. Mine hasn't gone above 3.5' and is narrow (like an HT). I have significant die-back from severely fluctuating winter conditions.
It black spots, but I haven't had PM or rust on it yet.

Due to suspicions of The Good Doctor not liking my climate, soil, or whatever, I've sought some roses grafted on the Asian invasive Rosa multiflora.
I've a new Tradescant sold under its registered AUS*** name from Palatine Roses (oh, what a fabulous Canadian supplier) that's on multiflora. It's already out-grown my five year old Huey grafted specimen in its first growing season. It's wider, branchier, and more floriferous too.I can't determine a verdict until it gets some winters under its belt.
My only good Huey rose is Chianti, and I suspect it may have gone own-root.
Honestly, every new Multiflora grafted rose I have is out-growing and performing my equally new Huey roses. Own-roots seem to do well too when they're good, vigorous varieties.

So; mine are still small or young at the present. I'll try to be a good boy and remember to grab some pics to share.

Steven

Thank you so much, Steven. Yes, there definitely IS a lot of difference between our climates. But your input is still uber-important to me.If you look at my "Tradescant" thread on this forum, you will see that the people who were so kind and responded to me all come from climates very different from mine. Even California sounds like it's quite different from the climate here in Tuscany,though out of all the USA climates I guess it might be the closest, though California is so huge it's hard to say.

Here in Europe I don't thinbk they graft on Dr Huey; I know they use Multiflora and Laxa, probably others.

You're very welcome, Bart!
I snapped a couple pics this morning when I got home from work, so now that I'm up, it's time to share!
My new, Multiflora grafted Tradescant is definitely wider and branchier.
I'll list the Multiflora grafted specimen first, and Huey one second.

Steven

OT. Look out for poison hemlock in your yard. I heard it's everywhere this year.

Summers, I read that, too. A really good heads up! Maybe worth an OT post? I spotted poison hemlock towering above my neighbor’s garden here in Portland. Ugh. It has invaded. My neighbor thought it was Queen Anne’s Lace. At least the toxic monster wasn’t seeding before it was removed, and I was able to cue my neighbor to use protective gear and bag it to dry out before disposal. Carol

Wow, Steven! That is a HUGE difference between the Huey rootstock and the Multiflora.Well, now you know what rootstock to look for in the future, lol. Thank you so much for the photos.

I’ve got Poseidon and a few others on Multiflora, and they are powerful growers in this soil/climate, too. After a ladder collided with Poseidon, I went outside to inspect the break in one of his canes and discovered this chunky specimen. A cane that is twice as thick as my index finger. Rootstock can really make an impact! Carol

Summers, thank you for the heads-up on the poison hemlock!
Bart, I'm very surprised at the difference. If I must get grafted, I'm definitely going to seek out Multiflora moving forward if initial results are a good indicator.
Carol, that is incredible! What an amazingly substantial cane! Wow! I think powerful is an understatement!

Steven