Okay, I'll give it a shot so you don't conclude you're talking to yourself...Always intrigued by descriptions & photos of this early 50's rose, found a grafted 2 gallon maybe 14 years ago at a nursery & scooped it up during a garden construction phase. (Mistake #1 - assume construction will go as planned & conclude as scheduled, followed by mistake #2 - collect plants in the interlude that will likely neither be planted nor potted on as anticipated due to mistake #1.) Repotted to a 5 gallon where it stayed for nearly a year. (Mistake #3 - neglect to routinely check root growth, leading to mistake #4 - confining a plant in an inadequate volume of soil.) Used to climbers that didn't grow much the first year, and lulled into complacency by its topside good health, didn't occur to me to check it's root growth till planting. Never seen such a case of thoroughly rootbound as that poor rose showed when slipped out of its pot. Did my best, (and the rose did too) from that point to make up for unintended neglect, but by the following Spring the scion perished & the rootstock ran rampant with glee, freed at last. Sadly, no actual growing experience with this rose besides committing root strangulation, perhaps I shouldn't be answering this at all! However, at the time the dearly departed originally followed me home, I'd a good guess of the mature size possibilites. Anticipated a minimum height of 10' & a maximum double that at 20', with a breadth of 3-10'. Keep in mind I wasn't planning on training & controlling it in any ongoing manner once it got up and running, but rather thought to let it loose in a half-willdling manner. There's currently a "sidetable" beside the reading chair of stacked books on various subjects, along with others taken from the bookcase months ago still randomly piled. Checking Coral Dawn in these references (as we did pre-web), find a general concensus among the 5 authors represented of 10-12' average height, with Taylor hedging at 8-12' & Nisbet avowing he'd not seen one taller than 10' in New England (with no mention of cane hardiness or Winter dieback as considerations there). None comment on width. All say vigorous, with several adding upright, suitable for pillar or trellis. No index entries for this rose in the books past 1972 publishing dates, though I did see it online as Climbing Coral Dawn (is there a bush version?) & never looked for that variance. Many more volumes on hand that could be checked, but I'll go with that random sample. Checking online, find 12x4-8' fairly common, with Rogue Valley using Ashdown's info (they were in South Carolina while in business, as you may remember) of 15-20' high. Heirloom's listing 12-18x6'. You have spoken to Heirloom regarding Coral Dawn's possible eventual stature in your location, haven't you? Their educated guess would surely be worth more than my guestimate based on the experiences of others, who may themselves never have actually grown CD, depending in turn on secondhand info. So my best guess is the 9' height of your arbor will present no vertical challenge to Coral Dawn & her controlled width will bulk to a minimum 2' on the arbor side. I'd plant the rose no closer than 2' to the support, probably more like 3-4', in case the rose decided to grow that 12'+ loaded, with a nice flowery edging below the rose & arbor. But then, I'd rather underestimate than be swamped by roses on either side eventually obscuring the passageway. Could always put a birdhouse atop the arch in the meantime. or suspend a hanging basket or light as spacefillers while the roses are growing up & out. Sorry for the rambling, the pollen's got my thoughts as moving targets, challenging to coherently catch. My 2 cents worth is probably not worth a penny. Does seem each plant's growth is highly site-specific, and we only find the answers to these questions through discovery. This post was edited by vasue on Tue, May 20, 14 at 11:17

No comments from here. I have had way to much rain,33 degree nights, 60 degree days. Last week I thought winter was over than another CA storm, more rain and a 28 degree night. I never cover any plants when rain is forecasted, I think soggy heavy wet covers do more harm. But I made an exception, and just put some old sheets and shade cloth over some. Well it rained for about an hour at dusk, by 2400 the skies cleared and the temp went down to 28. All my wet covers were frozen stiff, I lifted a pillowcase, and it could stand up by itself. I have some S. greggii in bloom and S. clevlandii seens to like the rain, S apiana appears to be ready to bolt.

Overwintering bonsai IMHO is the toughest job. Basically what you want to do is put it where it will be out of the wind and doesn't get subjected to the freeze and thaw that happens in most winters. I would be careful about digging a hole. If you have a "warm" spell and get melt water, the water could fill the hole and then that's that. If you have the room you could build a cold frame. Replace the window that you usually see with wood slats. It's ok for the tree to freeze. If it does you want to keep it that way. I store mine up against the North side of my house. There's no chance of it freezing and thawing daily which damages the roots and pots. I keep it on the ground and just pile up leaves or shredded bark mulch around it. I add stakes around the outer edges and enclose it in weed fabric. This is used as a wind break. If your spot is sheltered and gets little precip, when it snows I will gently pile snow in there. This will also insulate the tree roots, and as the snow slowly melts will keep the soil from drying out.. If there's no snow, I will add ice cubes to the top of the soil and then recover the pot tops with the mulch. Again the cubes will sloooowly melt keeping the tree from drying. As far as what tree, the smart a$$ answer is just look around. Any tree growing outside in your neighborhood can be used and kept outside. Of course follow the bonsai rules - pick a tree with smallish leaves etc... HTH

I am not sure mmm12 when I got the first blaze rose from the Garden centre or Nursery near me it said on the tag that was in the pot that it was just the blaze rose and that it was grown in Canada. There was nothing saying it was improved on the tag. I was so enchanted by how the first one reacted I ended up getting a 2nd one. The first one had blooms on it but none after that. I managed to cover it up with burlap as I heard they don't survive the winter. Soo the next spring I removed it and it grew and grew and it reached right up to the top of our fence and above it but got no blooms on it. Had one heck of a time covering it up and of course it has outgrew the trellis tried to put 2 trellis together but wasn't working out that great. The 3rd year these 2 ladies that moved into our building took over the gardening and the one pruned it back for me. I thought well you watch it won't do anything but boy was I wrong as it developed over 15 buds on it and all opened. It was breath-taking. Did one big display and that was it. I wasn't complaining in fact it made me go out and buy a 2nd one. This one had no buds on it whatsoever and I planted it further down up against the fence like the first one. But due to the snows coming early last year and with having to go for therapy on pulling muscle in arm or leg I couldn't cover them up and then too it seemed everybody near me had ran out of burlap. In the spring the one lady assumed it was dead the first one but it proved us wrong as it started getting green buds on two of the canes!!! I said you know when we thought it was dead well apparently it isn't and showed her. She was amazed to see them and it just got going when the sawfly larvae did a number on it. Looked like a sight for sore eyes on the one cane but picked the larvae off it and threw them over on the other side of the fence. Or the birds came and helped too. The cane that didn't survive was cut back. The 2nd blaze rose was growing like it hadn't a spare minute to live :) Was up to my calf but getting leaves on it. The other lady that cut them all back for me also gave them this stuff to make them bloom. Well they went crazy. The 2nd blaze developed 15 buds on it. And the blooms are what opened on it in the above picture The first one due to the larvae munching on the leaves on the first cane was still having issues. But on the 2nd cane new leaves began emerging on it and just this week it got 4 buds on it so far!!! I got something like burlap to cover them up with but may get more. And all of the roses survived the winter without being covered up except for the At last rose. But all of them are developing buds on them or in bloom. This is one of my 1st blaze rose in full bloom last year. Was awesome and could see it from my bedroom window or my living room one. Also the 2nd one I can see from my bedroom window.