Fastest repeat for me: Firefighter and Bolero. My plants are each two years old and reliably produce heavy flushes every 3.5-4 weeks with smatterings of bloom in between.

Slowest repeat: Pretty Lady Rose. My first season plant has been maddeningly slow to repeat. It grows well and produces plenty of buds, but these buds take FOREVER to develop. This season, I‘ve had 5 massive flushes from Bolero and Firefighter and barely three from Pretty Lady Rose. Or more like Slow Lady Rose…

All of my roses are own root.

These are fast repeaters in my Seattle Z8 garden. All are own-root except Secret.

Groundcover:

Watercolors Home Run

Candy Sunblaze

Floribunda:

Iceberg

Icecap

First Impression

Cream Veranda

HT:

Secret (Grafted)

Dee-Lish

Ingrid Bergman

Shrub:

Lady of Shalott

OGR:

Comte de Chambord

Rose de Rescht

Marie Pavie

Fastest rebloomer: Our Lady of Guadalupe. Still short in 2nd yr in 9a, hot dry inland SoCal. Vigorous. The silvery undersides of the petals seem to cool me on hot days.

Slowest? That would have to be Lavender Crush, a climber. Planted fall 19, first bloom late in season (that would be late May here) 2021. Unspeakably beautiful flowers with swoonworthy scent —- and it‘s hard to detect scents here most of the time — but no more than two or three. Since then, nada except for two proliferated blooms eaten alive by chili thrips. I should probably remove at least one of the two flanking roses, because while crowded beds appeal to those of us with limited space, pests and diseases thrive with insufficient air flow. This summer proved that.

Runner-up fastest: Darcy Bussell. 7 foot shrub here. Starts early, never stops even on triple digit days. Doesn‘t fry in the sun, either, and very nice fragrance — nonswooning, but nice.

Also located near Seattle. Fastest repeat would have to be Bathsheba, QuickSilver, Royal Jubilee, Princess Charlene de Monaco and Bolero.

My fastest in 9B California:

Distance drum (grafted): currently in its fourth flush this year. But blooms open too fast for me. So each flush is not long.

Moonstone and Strick it Rich: Just finished their 3rd flush this year. And each flush lasts long, especially Moonstone.

Color Magic and Quietness: 2nd year own root. I can already see the repeat blooming is very good. New growth coming out even without deadheading.

Slowest:

PAOK and Love Song. Hope they can improve as they get more matured.

My fastest repeaters/nonstop bloomers this year have been Queen Nefertiti, Sweet Mademoiselle, and Marc Chagall. They have not been without a decent showing of blooms since the start of the season. Incidentally the first two are also at the top of my list for fragrance and vigor. Honorable mentions include Coffee Bean, Apricot Twist, and Iceberg. All plants are four years old or less, and I garden in zone 4 with a growing season that lasts from June to early October.

@joeywyomingzone4 so happy to see your comments! Both Sweet Mademoiselle and Marc Chagall are on my To-Buy list! I'm waiting for Marc Chagall to be back in stock on Heirloom, so I can buy them together to save the shipping charges.

Season long: Cream Veranda. No contest. True continuous bloom

Both 1 OR - 3 years in ground, and 1 BR - 4 years in ground.

Crap. rifis is correct. I have Cream Veranda in a skinny pot on my front porch in mostly shade and she pumps out blooms from spring to now. I don’t know how I forgot her. She is so floriferous when I pruned her one time this summer I stuck the cuttings in potting soil and they both took.

I have planted them in the ground and they should get about six hours of sun

Alway in bloom

Olivia Austin

Julia Child

Darcy Bussel

Easy Does It

Sweet Mademoiselle

Peach Swirl

Bolero

The Fawn

Charles Renne Macintosh

Quick to repeat

Munstead Wood

Ingrid Bergman

Hot Cocoa

Fiji

Memorial Day

Desdamona

Violets Pride

Quietness

Slow repeat

Love Song

Crimson Glory

At Last

Quicksilver

Distant Drums

Quickest to rebloom:

bolero

olivia rose

the lady gardener

bliss parfuma

abe darby

batsheba

mary rose

slowest

forever rose

st swithum

First crush parfuma

I would like to second First Crush as being VERY slow to rebloom…luckily she’s beautiful and fragrant so I will always have her!

Moonlight in Paris always have blooms, and the blooms last a long time.

So interesting! I have PAOK and she is a little sluggish, but then she is only in her second year.

My Love Songs, on the other hand, also two years old, never stopped blooming even on triple-digit days. i should have included them in the first place.

The antique tea rose Dr Grill, while most floriferous in the spring, is seldom without a bloom, even in winter.

@rosecanadian I can't believe that about your MIP! Well, actually it reinforces my theory that MIP performs much better in cool climates. Mine started pumping out so many buds once we finally got to September and nights cooled way down, but protested the entire rest of the season. You're so lucky that your summer temps are so good!

My Easy Does It is almost always in (a bit) of bloom after the great flush in Spring.

Magpie - but you know that my roses really suffered from my ineptitude this summer...so it wasn't loaded with flowers (also a new rose)...but there were always blooms. :)

I'm zone 5, dense black gumbo heavy clay, 38" to 40" of rain per short summer, all my 145 varieties are own-roots, except for Lavender Crush, Belinda's dream, and Double-Delight. Most of my roses get 4 hrs. of sun, some get 6 hrs. max of sun. My rating is based on their performance in pots (6 hrs of sun) and in the ground. Most of my own-roots are 11 to 3 years old:

Always in bloom: Marie Pavie, Poseidon, Mary Magdalene, Bolero, Well Being, Parfum de Paris, Sonia Rykiel, Munstead Wood, Sweet Mademoiselle., Carding Mill, The Dark Lady, Gene Boerner, Tchaikosky, Prairie harvest, Pat Austin, the Squire, Betty White, Blue Mist, Wise Portia, Governor Rosellini, Firefighter, Liv Tyler, Francis Blaise, Darcy Bussell, Flowercarpet Coral.

Short pause: Dee-lish, Radio Times, Evelyn, Princess Charlene de Monaco, Comte de Chambord, Savannah, Princess Anne, Abraham Darby, Stephen Big Purple, W.S. 2000, Climbing America, Lady of Shalott, Aloha, Twilight Zone, Honey Bouquet, Rouge Royal, Pink Peace, Lynnie, single-knock-out, Strike-it-rich, Just Joey, Anna's Promise, Sharifa Asma, Scepter'd Isle.

Long pause: About Face, Double Delight (grafted-on-Dr.Huey), Belinda's Dream (grafted-on-Dr.Huey), Golden Celebration, Annie McDowell, Crown princess Mag., Leander, Tradescant, Tess of d'Uberville, Lagerfeld, Pretty Lady rose, Christopher Marlowe, Queen of Sweden, Versigny, Old port, Shocking Blue, Deep Purple, Crimson Glory, Mirandy, Frederic Mistral.

Very Long Pause: Lavender lace (grafted on Dr.Huey), James Galway, Eglantyne, Teasing Georgia, Wenlock, Solitude, Bronze Star, Sutter's Gold, Nahema, Excellenz von Schubert, Cornelia, Orchid Romance, Charles Darwin, Gruss an Teplitz (I don't have the sun nor loamy soil for it), Veteran's Honor, Neil Diamond and Jude the Obscure (all are wimpy as own-roots), Queen Nefertiti (doesn't like my dense clay nor partial shade), Peter Mayle (needs more sun than what I can give).

From the 2 rose parks with alkaline soil and roses grafted-on-Dr.Huey. Cantigny rose park with 1,200 roses in less dense clay than mine, roses that are always in bloom:

Double Delight, Chicago Peace, Bolero, Apricot Candy, Cherry Parfait, Bonica, Gene Boerner, Singin' in the Rain, Angel face, Munstead Wood, and hardy roses bred by Ping Lim's (such as Kashmir, My girl, Sweet fragrance), Kordes FlowerCarpet and Buck Carefree series.

In hot summer near 100 F, everything shut down (zero blooms on Julia Child), the only ones that were blooming: Gene Boerner, Chicago Peace, Cherry Parfat, Double Delight and Singin' in the Rain. I took pics. of Cantigny's roses in below post.

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/3194694/cantigny-gardens-roses-mccormick-mansion-war-museum-perennials

From Chicago Botanical garden (5,000) roses in loamy & alkaline soil: SdlM (souvernir d. l. Malmaison), Kashmir, Elle, Singin in the Rain, Spirit of Freedom, The Dark Lady, Buck rose Distant Drum & Hi Neighbor, PcdM, IceCap, and Kordes FlowerCarpet. I took pics. of their always in bloom roses in below link:

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/3179492/chicago-botanical-gardens-waterfalls-roses-perennials

@strawchicago z5,

For those designated "Always in bloom," how would you characterize their bloom in summer, after that magnificent first flush in the Spring?

- Bush almost covered in blooms virtually all the time (dream on)

- Moderate coverage

- About 4-5 blooms open at the same time

- 2-3 blooms open at the same time

- 1 bloom continuously (when one goes another opens)

This summer, my potted roses on the deck had gotten lanky and stressed out during my hospital stay, and they could barely support a bloom, so I ended up doing some pruning in the summer. I suspect the fall bloom would have been better had I not done that, but right now, I am getting the "1 bloom at a time" option from Easy Does It.

All others have none. Belinda's Dream is coming up with three buds and I did not prune her - but she was stressed out by a Supertunia this summer, so I am not surprised she's not doing much either.

I also realized that in the summer, they are not getting quite as much as sun on the deck as I thought during the Spring - because of all the tree leafage that filled in in the area.

Since my roses are in partial shade, it's 4 to 5 blooms max at the same time.

Roses can bloom continuously IN FULL SUN if it's moist soil 24/7 plus well fertilized like nearby rose parks .. they have workers who water roses daily. For my pots to have more than 4 blooms I have to top them WEEKLY with rich potting soil (Beyond Peat has chicken manure & horse manure). This got mixed with lime (for calcium) plus alfalfa (for nitrogen), plus SOLUBLE fertilizer high in nitrogen and potassium. I also watered my pots twice a day in hot weather above 90 F:

Frank Gatto, owner of rose nursery (grafted-on-Dr.Huey) in high rain PNW advised AT LEAST 5 GALLONS of water per week per rose, plus 1/2 cup granular organic (Espoma tone or Mill's magic mix), plus 1/2 cup of granular chemical fertilizer NPK 10-10-10, that's done every 3 weeks per rose. For hot & dry climate plus clay, I would skip the chemical fertilizer due to salt-accumulation, but the organics are still needed at 1/2 cup per 3 weeks.

"Five gallons per week per rose" is Gatto's advice. "Water deeply," he stresses. "When you pour on five gallons and it soaks down deep, your roses grow roots to reach that water."

For planting, Gatto mixes 50 percent native soil and 50 percent organic compost or good potting soil and adds a cup each of bone meal and soil sweetener per bush. He also gives established plants a cup of lime in March, for optimal soil pH, which allows plants to make better use of food."

Gatto advises giving roses small but frequent meals, as opposed to large amounts of fertilizer less often. He uses a balanced granular fertilizer with an N-P-K number no higher than 20 (such as 15-15-15), along with a blend of organic meals including alfalfa, cotton seed, fish, blood and kelp."I give each one a handful (about a half a cup) every three weeks."

Besides his nursery, Frank Gatto has 300 roses in his yard, and 950 roses in his other house. He and his son breed 250 new roses.

https://goodlifenw.blogspot.com/2012/07/seven-essentials-to-growing-healthy.html

@strawchicago z5,

I did not know about topping weakly with fresh rich soil!

I thought this is only necessary once in the spring, and from there it's just fertilizers - dry (like Magic Mills) once a month, and soluble weakly. That's quite a lot of fertilization for 4-5 blooms at a time.

Mine too are in partial shade. Is it correct to say that any extra fertilization might compensate for the lower sun exposure? Would you fertilize less if they were NOT in partial shade?

I will try this next year although at this time of the year, I don't think I will do anything anymore. They say stop fertilizing in Sept/Oct for my area, so I will stop.

I will probably have to find a way to spray too next year. I am thinking to try the middle road with some organics. It clearly won't take care of everything, not in the South, but it might be better than nothing.

Without spraying, all of my roses get a lot of BS by the end of the season and lose lots of leaves (some lose all of them). That's no matter how "disease resistant" for my area they are supposed to be.

Even some of my Coral Drifts BS-ed by yellowing with black spots, and losing a significant amount of leaves, and these were supposed to be 'all that and the bag of chips' in terms of BS resistance for the area. No such thing.

Do you think the amount of water they get affects their resistance to BS?

Because I noticed some differences. For example, those in pots in the deck were watered pretty consistently and they did better in terms of keeping their leaves than those in the ground.

By comparison, the ground ones are almost completely defoliated by now, but the again, my watering of the bed was poor this summer.

Then there is the front row of five Coral Drifts, in the same bed.

Of these five, two can't be reached with the hose placed on the ground, at the root, so these two I had to water by hand, standing there. This was not exactly an incentive so they ended up getting less water than the others. These two also happened to be the ones that lost most leaves.

Does that mean watering affects BS resistance?

I am not sure whether my yard may be more infested than other Southern yards but the BS is relentless here.

Why I don't spray regularly:

1. I must cover myself too much and it's a pain.

2. I am a mosquito magnet in the summer and I am also allergic to whatever other tiny creatures seem to be in the air here, because I end up red and scratching myself to death even when I don't see a mosquito around. In five minutes max outside, I am mauled/devastated by pinches. Applying all sorts of sprays on me first so I can spray the roses is a major pain.

3. Being pinched to death is also the reason why I don't water enough in the summer. It's hardly an incentive to get out there, if you have to be covered top-to-bottom every time...

4. I still haven't found an automatic watering system that is easy and inexpensive enough to justify it for the 5 rose bushes I have there + the 5 coral drifts. I keep saying I'll water by hand in the morning and I end up NOT.

Unfortunately I am not a morning person either.

Urgh.

Topping pots with rich soil (horse manure & chicken manure & lime & alfalfa) is to offset acidic rain that leach out nutrients. This is NOT necessary in hot & dry climate like CA, but helps in weekly rain climate. Rain leaches out nitrogen & calcium first, then potassium & magnesium and trace elements. That's why Frank Gatto in high rain PNW recommends 1/2 cup chemical fertilizer NPK 10-10-10, plus 1/2 cup organic-fertilizer every 3 weeks.

After week-long rain, I found 2 TBS of whitish calcium oozing out from the bottom of each pot. Daily watering also leaches out nitrogen & calcium, then potassium. That's the logic for granular chemical fertilizer with at least 10 for nitrogen. The reason why roses blackspot in fall is due to depletion of nitrogen to form leaves, plus potassium for disease-prevention. Nitrogen mobility is a 10, potassium mobility is 3, and phosphorus mobility is a 1. Calcium mobility is a 5 (data from NOBLE Plant foundation).

Also roses consume lots of nitrogen & potassium. Rose tissue analysis by U of CA at Davis showed 3 part nitrogen, 2 part potassium, 1 part calcium, and only 1/10 phosphorus and 1/10 magnesium. The trace elements most consumed are in this order: iron, manganese, copper, zinc, and boron. Chicken manure is rich in copper & zinc, and boron, besides high in phosphorus. Blood meal NPK 12-0-0 is high in iron and is ideal for pots, but that gets expensive.

So does watering less often than necessary makes roses more prone to BS than they would be if they'd been watered consistently?

To "ration" roses in pots with water, that is, to water just enough to moist the soil, rather than let it leach out helps to conserve nutrients. For a 2.5 gallons pot, I give each rose about 2 cups of water in hot days.

Some roses like Sonia Rykiel did nothing (despite how much SOLUBLE fertilizer I gave), until I gave it lime and it grew canes & buds. Calcium is the building block for all rose tissue, and potassium regulates water osmosis. Roses consume lots of nitrogen for leaves and potassium & calcium for blooms. Phosphorus is needed in less amount since it's used for branching of stems (for more blooms) plus branching of roots (more water-absorption).

Osmocote PLUS (with all trace elements) NPK 15-7-12 is NOT enough, one big bloom alone weighs just as much as 1/4 cup of Osmocote !! I have 5 roses in pots that won't bloom with 1/4 cup of Osmocote (too slow of a release). But they bloom with fast release & HIGH chemical granular fertilizer NPK 10-8-6 or rich topping of soil high in nutrients, esp. trace elements for blooming.

I was thinking about those in the ground where nutrients don't leak.

If roses in the ground are left with less water than they need, will they be more prone to Black Spot?

Severe_novice: I don't want to hi-jack this thread so I'll continue the discussion in a new thread, entitled "Questions and possible solutions for plants & roses"

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6183067/questions-and-possible-solutions-for-plants-roses

For my Northern VA garden, Life Of Party is top continuous bloomer. Super fragrant and it is not impacted by thrips or rose midges. It is grafted one in ground for 3 years. Stays compact 3 ft tall by 3 ft wide. Spring starts with fireworks of blooms. I counted total of 50 plus blooms. Gets 5 hours of morning sun.

The second position goes to Easy Living. It is in Pot and standard form. Continuous bloomer and beautiful blooms (Orange Mango color).

Third position goes to Mr Lincoln Standard form. I started using high potassium fertilizer - liquid feed- and it is blooming crazy and big size and more fragrant.