I hope you'll let us know if you buy any and how they look. I'd be interested in Chrysler Imperial and Chicago Peace. I know, you can find them anywhere but those are special common. I've had roses on Fortuniana in my zone 7a garden for many years...maybe 20 years for some, and it is hardy enough here. They usually do well. I also have an own root Fortuniana plant, virus free, so could use it if I knew how to do grafting. I bought a Beautiful Bride clematis plant from Spring Hill and it has done fine.

The more I think about it, the more inclined I am to try a couple or three. Now I'm hoping the ones I want aren't sold out before the sale comes along, lol.

I'm not buyin' -- but I really wish more roses WERE available of Fort. It's a better rootstock, where I live.

I bought a rainbow of roses from them a few years ago when they used to have them very cheap for $20 for 5 roses And they all did well! I would get them if you can find them on sale otherwise they are expensive. Erasmus, I know you are very busy, But I think that would be so much fun to learn how to graft. Maybe just bud grafting. I think Burlin had a Good tutorial that I read and bookmark a couple of years ago. Unfortunately I lost that when my phone was hacked. I'm sure you can find it. I'll see if I can.

I noticed that SpringHill had Fortuniana grafted roses about the same time that John did, I was pleasantly shocked to see them. I most curious about who is supplying them! SpringHill doesn’t grow their own stock, they use Weeks and other major growers like most other big nurseries in the US, so someone else must be doing the grafting. I was fortunate to obtain about 40 plants from K&M on Fortuniana before they had their flooding and employment issues. They have morphed into beautiful giants, I dug most them out when I moved, and they the huge powerful cord-like roots that probably reached all the way to China! They were easy to distinguish Dr Huey (smaller) and Multiflora (dense and fibrous). I really hope K&M recovers. That said, I’m willing to pay SpringHills much higher price for something I really want, I’m also eyeing Chicago Peace and Julia Child. I can be frugal when it comes to many things, but not roses! I would also love to try my hand at grafting on Fortuniana.

Fortuniana itself can stand my winters. Roses on Fort. cannot. My Fortuniana is going on ten years old. It even got RRD out (way out ) on one cane, we cut the cane off at ground level and there's been no RRD repeat.

BUT. Fortuniana doesn't go dormant here. It just keeps pushing growth and the new winter growth gets killed and cankers where it's dead.

Were I to try roses grafted on Fort. again, I'd plan to protect them December through mid March and be willing to go in and inspect after hard freezes to remove any dead bits.

I'm also really curious about where Springhill is getting their Foruniana roses from. Some of you may know Kitty Belendez, a legendary rosarian, who lives in a hot dry valley of So. Calif. Her husband, Bob, who sadly died a couple of years ago, budded a ton of their roses onto Fortuniana over the years, which do fabulously well for her. Just saying that it's not just FL rose growers who are interested in Fortuniana budded roses. You can find Kitty and her roses at the Santa Clarita Valley Rose Society.

My big question on these fortuniana roses from Spring Hill is, are they going to try and "bare root" these roses? If they do this, it will be a VERY iffy situation. I've been growing roses on fortuniana root stock for a very long time and I have NEVER seen anyone bare root a bush in the mail. They have always been in 1, 2 and 3 Gal. pots in soil. (by the way, after a long break, I'm back on HOUZZ)

Good to have you back ken! I hope you're feeling well.. Thanks for the info. Smiley face

Hmmmm... you have a good point, Ken. They ARE listed as bare root. I would think that's contrary to best practices with fort, considering the more fibrous root system.

Yay, Ken is back.

How in heaven's name could you "bare root" a fibrous root system? Would not doing that just destroy it? I am ignorant, just asking. Does anyone have any experience with this?

Jackie

@jacqueline9CA Jackie, Cool Roses, one of the vendors who specializes in roses on fortuniana, has an explainer on their site that fort should NOT be bare-rooted, not because it destroys the root system, but because a fibrous root system does not store/refrigerate well; they dehydrate. So it does give me pause that Spring Hill is offering fort bare root. One, they don't grow their own plants, so just how long have those plants been out of the ground? Two, how are they storing them? And three, how are they wrapping/preparing them for shipment?

Gee, I think I've just convinced myself NOT to buy my fort-grafted roses from Spring Hill, lol. I might still take a chance on one, and if it does well, hope that they offer them again next year.

Just for ancient history, at one time J&P was encouraging several Florida growers to do stentlings. Fort rootstock not yet rooted, with the scion placed at the same time.

Supposedly the fort would root at the same time as the scion would meld with the Fort.

It didn't work for two growers who did two different mist regimes.

Just in case someone suggests stentlings.

I might order 1 just to see what they are doing and how they are doing it.

Yes , please do . They are expensive .

Perhaps they don't store them and Dig them right away to mail. I know some people bare root OR roses and they are fibrous.

Where are you folks seeing that the Fortuniana roses will be shipped bare root? I’m not seeing such a specification:

If you click on the Fortuniana option, it shows ’Ship as #1-1.5 Fortuniana Rootstock’. There’s no mention whether it will be bare root or potted. I‘d guess it’s being shipped in a pot like the other Fortuniana growers do. Also, it’s been a while since I’ve ordered from SH, but they were good about returns, so if your $70 rosebush arrives as a dried up thorny little broomstick , you could just return it.

(That said, I have dug out Fortuniana rootstock plants, kept them bare root for a few weeks and than planted them with success. But my plants were older than what’s normally sold, and had massive big roots.)

I put in an email request for more info. Hopefully Spring Hill will answer tomorrow, although the website says they are still operating with a shortage of personnel.

I went ahead and ordered Chicago Peace on Fort. I’ll report back with a pic when I receive the plant.

I also signed up for marketing promotions and got a 10% + Free ship code, so the total was $62.99. I hope I did not sell my soul to the Nursery Industry bottom feeder conglomerate (Spring Hill, Gurney’s, Henry Field) for $7.00.

Welp....not good news. Here's the answer to my inquiry from Spring Hill:

Dear **** ******,

Thank you for contacting us. I apologize for the delay. It looks like most of the roses that are on Fortuniana rootstock are shipped as bareroots.

Please let us know if we may offer additional assistance.

Sincerely,
Ashley 2666
Customer Care



www.springhillnursery.com

I'm not sure what to make of "most of..", but my guess is that all of the fort-grafted roses come from the same source, and will all be bare root. Rats.

My guess is Weeks is doing the grafting for Spring Hill. My Chicago Peace just shipped from Wasco, where Weeks grows their roses. If you go on Weeks’ website, you’ll also see they have a selection of roses grafted on Fort, which includes the Spring Hill selections and more. I hope we can find out who else carries these Fort roses, as the selection is much larger than what Spring Hill is carrying. Surely, Weeks would know the different rootstocks and how to storage / transport them?

Just looked again today and it appears most of the Fort grafted roses are sold out. You might want to order quickly if you’re really interested in something. I hope everyone gets what they want, but I’m also happy SH is selling out their inventory fast, which means this effort was a big success and they should continue to do it.

Thanks for being the guinea pig, Ben. I feel a bit better about taking a chance on the two I want. They're STILL awfully expensive, so I'll have to take a chance on waiting for a discount. Crossing my fingers.

BenT---Did it come with any instructions on how to plant and take care of it or "here it is. Good luck."

Ken,

I don’t recall a single written word, unless I accidentally tossed it. I’ve grown many Fort grafted roses and this is just one more, but I agree instructions would be a good practice.

John

I hope they save some of what you want for the sale. I agree the price is super high, and I’m not sure why, though I’m glad they’re being offered, at any price. (I feel the same way about Heirloom and their $50 twig). K&M never had Chicago Peace in stock in the 5 years that I checked. Cool Roses never answered any form of communication with me (email, phone, facebook) over the years, and now I understand they’re gone. So I was very happy to snatch this one up.

Did anyone else take the plunge on the $70 Spring Hill Bareroot Fortuniana?

My Chicago Peace has been a slow little wimp. Alive, but with very sad little growth.

Meanwhile, here’s Chicago Peace at the local nursery for $25:

Which brings back the question of whether Fortuniana should be sold bare root, and if not, why is SpringHill/Weeks doing this?

I recently had to dig out and transplant about 80 roses bare root across country , a mix of own root, Fort, Mult, Dr H. If the rose was in good shape prior, it’s in decent shape now (almost 3 months have elapsed). The big exception is that 8 of the fortuniana plants have hardly done anything at all. I dug out one of them out , and found less than a centimeter of sparse feeder root growth. It took me about 10 days to dig out all the roses, 5 days to transport, 4 days to pot them all. They’ve been potted up for over 2 months now. I tried my best to keep them hydrated and sheltered, but many variables could have happened during all that process and time. Still the ONLY some fortunianiana grafted roses are struggling. Some of the Forts took off like rockets, others seem barely alive. All the Own Root, Mult, and Dr H are acceptabily decent.

I hope someone else chimes in with better results. I’m also not ready to say Spring Hill didn’t do the right thing, as my sample size, 1 plant, is too small. But for now I’d be hesitant to buy another bare root Fortuniana plant.

@BenT (NorCal 9B Sunset 14) Ben, I took the plunge for Chrysler Imperial and Pumpkin Patch, not because they're hard to find, but because I was hoping the fort rootstock would make them ultra vigorous. The thought of an extra-vigorous CI made my heart flutter, lol. But...so far, it's not quite as far along as my other bare roots on Huey. Not quite a wimp, but certainly not what I was hoping for. The fact that it is the most expensive rose I've ever bought makes the disappointment worse. I paid considerably less for my very rare Prairie Peace (not this year) than I did for this very average Chrysler Imperial and PP. I'm still hoping that in time the fort roots will be an advantage. But from now on, I'm only buying fortuniana grafted roses in a pot.

Pumpkin Patch, is even a little less far along, but it's naturally a smaller plant than CI anyway. Live and learn!

When you were on Weeks website, did you notice they haven't updated their site in about 4 years?

@hugogurll When I got a mislabeled bare root Weeks rose from my local nursery in Jan 2021, after it bloomed I went to their website to see all of their 2021 offerings. I made a list of all of the roses they offered in that color clsss, and was able to narrow it down to what my rose is. So it was updated as of 2021.

John,

Thanks for reporting back. I bought my Chicago Peace for the same reason…hoping it’d become a super plant. I have Peace on Fort and it’s quite nice. It’s a shame those plants were bare rooted, it still baffles me that Weeks would not have known how to properly ship these plants. Perhaps it was one of those management decisions made by some top brass at Spring Hill that knows nothing about roses. ‘Every rose we sell must be bare root!’. Oh well, I might check K&M to see what they have in inventory.

I think Weeks could have updated their website more. They are still highlighting the Downton Abbey roses which are several years old, I think even the show is ancient history. Several newer roses, Silver Lining, Chantilly Cream, Painted Porcelain aren’t mentioned. They used to highlight the new roses every year. Almost like they can afford a web developer or just couldn’t be bothered, I hope they are doing OK.

Well, I decided that time is up for my SpringHill Fortuniana grafted Chicago Peace. Every time walked by the plant I couldn’t help but think how pathetic she looked. Her replacement, $22 local purchased Chicago Peace is ready to give her the boot:

The two tiny mounds of green represent the Spring Hill fortuniana rose, hopefully you can see them, as the entire plant is much smaller than just the BLOOM on the new Chicago Peace, and it’s been growing for 3 months.

If I think I’m at fault that a rose didn’t grow , I won’t ask for a refund. For example, Palatine shipped me what looked like a perfectly healthy Roberto Alagna, it never grew, and I just chalked it up as a problem with my culture or environment. But in this case I think the sellers’ practice of barerooting the Fortuniana is likely the issue. I received a $67 credit on my plant, more than enough to try a nice new rose introduction next year. @fig_insanity Z7b E TN, I hope your plants are doing better.