I decided to have a look at this forum because I have one little rose I haven't been able to help. Name is Gismo. It leafed out white this spring, I have tried several things, including the tea. Got BS and lost all white leaves, now is leafed out again and blooming with more white leaves. Anyway, here is my alfalfa tea story.I mixed up 4 cups of pellets and some epsom salts in a 5 gal container. Unknown to me the container had a small slit in it. All 5 gal of it leaked out onto 2 daylilies. They grew like mad, and are blooming for the 3rd time. Poor Gismo is still white, yes I made more of the magic brew and Gismo got some. I love that little rose, but hate white leaves. He has always had green ones before.

Baronne Prevost could probably be trained on a pillar but it is fiercely prickly - the big, pointed kinds - I would not want to be the one to tie it up! We have Mme Joseph Schwarz growing in almost total shade in the Sacramento cemetery where it stays clean and blooms. I'm pretty sure it's a sport of Duchesse de Brabant since it sometimes throws pink flowers, but it performs much better. DdB gets mildew here, too, although our summer heat discourages it so the mildew is spring and fall. I heard a European speaker (don't remember who) extoll Mme Joseph Schwatz's virtues as a much superior plant to DdB, and that's been my experience too. Some teas are big. Some are huge. Mrs. Dudley Cross is in that category. Mme Antoine Mari is the closest to a moderate-sized tea that I've encountered but even that is building in our garden. Anita

I like 'J.E. Murphy's Pink Tea' (which may be 'Mme. Emilie Charrin'). It has a perfectly healthy and vigorous plant, good leaves, and a flower of a decided pink color with a form which is both pretty and distinctive. Recommended. My 'Second Street Tea' is taking its sweet time to make anything of itself; but early this year, it started to show some interest in growing, so we'll see. The plant is not yet large enough for me to trust how representative the flowers it has are; but, as of yet, they're a warm light pink, and full of petals. 'Arcadia Louisiana Tea' is wonderfully happy in my garden--healthy, vigorous, bloomy, and beautiful. The flower color is essentially a chalky pink, which doesn't sound as attractive as it is. The bush is about six and a half feet tall, and thickly foliaged. It would dominate that area of the garden if it weren't for an extremely vigorous 'Faberge', which is just as tall, and, by its orange color, distracts from 'Arcadia Louisiana Tea'. I think 'Faberge' is an outstanding rose, indeed one of the very best; but I wish I had planted it elsewhere (it wasn't supposed to be so tall!). But no way am I moving a big, healthy, happy rose... Like 'Second Street Tea', my 'Florence Bowers' is a little slow getting started; but, that said, it did put out this year a good, if slender, six-foot cane, more like one would expect of a climber than of a regular Tea. The plant is young, so I can't really say much about the flowers; but it seems to bloom in flushes rather than anything like continuously.

Usually the stripees do not have classic exhibition form. Most of them pop open. And I actually like the fully open form better anyway, as it better shows off the stripes. I have Secret Recipe, but I just recently got it from Heirlooms, so it's too early for me to make any comment on it. The other striped mosses however are probably similar, and none of them has exhibition form either. Of those, I grow Strawberry Swirl and Rose Gilardi. Rose Gilardi is the better rose of the two. But I don't know of any exhibition form striped minis that hold that form for any length of time. I do take pics sometimes that show such form, but usually it's just becaue I happen to catch them at the right moment, not because they stay that way. As for Dreamcatcher's availability, I just took a look around and I don't see it anywhere. That's a shame. It's a nice rose and should be more available. It's a short climber and does hold good form for awhile. We had one last week in our auction. I got mine from the Uncommon Rose when they were still in biz, but they've been gone for 5 years now. And it's not going to get any better in the future -- The USDA is stopping imports of all garden roses to the U.S. from Europe/Japan etc effective Jan. 2012 due to some citrus root weevil issue, or so I hear. Lesmc -- In referring to Stars N Stripes, I was referring to the red/white stripe mini by Ralph Moore. There is however a Clements shrub rose called Stars and Stripes Forever that I think is a dog and is soon to be outahere. Stars and Stripes Forever grows like a climber and yes, it hardly ever blooms here either. And even when it does bloom, its blooms have all the same faults as Scentimental, which I also disliked and got rid of. If you want a red/white striped big rose, you can't beat Fourth of July.