Green Ice Cooling the Heat

It has been so hot I thought maybe a few pictures of Green Ice might help cool things off.  My small plant of Green Ice has just been covered with blooms.  As you can tell this Ralph Moore miniature gets it name from the green tint its old fashion form blooms take on as they mature.  The plant architecture is nicely spreading and is always a healthy bush in my garden.  It is nearly Wednesday so let me stop here and let it be a Nearly Wordless, Nearly Wednesday.

A New Hybrid Musk Rose - Jeri Jennings

Having enjoyed growing Hybrid Musk roses for some time, had success with several of Paul Barden's roses, and enjoyed Jeri Jennings comments on the GardenWeb Antique Rose forum I felt like I had to grow Jeri's namesake which was introduced in 2007 and is now growing in its second year.  Jeri has been a help to me and many, many other people as they have sought to learn about and grow antique and shrub roses.  This rose is a wonderful tribute to her sunny disposition and friendly greeting to those with even the most simple questions.  It opens with a cheerful yellow then fades to a warm buttery color.  Jeri Jennings' fragrance is a strong tea scent with both sweet and musk overtones.  Very pleasing.

Jeri Jennings' graceful habit is very typical of the Hybrid Musk class growing wider than tall but maybe just a bit smaller than many.  Its long pointed leaves have a refined elegance.  I think that in many ways Hybrid Musk roses represent a near perfect ideal of graceful repeat blooming shrub roses.  My own selfish desires would simply add size to the flowers which typically are about 2 inches in size.  I personally think that might be the image David Austin has had in mind working with the English Roses.

The Hybrid Musk group was created by Rev. Joseph Pemberton, an Anglican Priest, from 1912-1939.  He was assisted in his work by John and Ann Bentall, who continued the work after his passing.  There are a large number of roses in this class that it is hard to say who of the three was the actual breeder.  Record keeping was not at the top of their "To Do List", and maybe that type of credit was relatively unimportant to them.  In any case, the group draws upon a wide variety of lines while at the same time finding a unity that holds the class together.  To my eye, Jeri Jennings would have (and does) easily fit in with the early roses in the class. 

Maybe it is Rev. Pemberton's vocation as a pastor and avocation as a rosarian that draws me to the Hybrid Musk roses or maybe this gives me a deeper appreciation for these roses, but I find a special joy in these lovely, graceful, refined roses.  Jeri Jennings is a very welcome addition to the group.

Hot Days in the Garden

We just finished the hottest June in recorded history here in Oklahoma.  Today we hit 110 degrees and our 20th day of triple digit temps.  When it gets this hot there are few roses that can stand up to the heat.

This morning I took a few photos in the garden.  Here is Graham Thomas with a few roses fried by the sun and one that opened over night. Below is the same cluster of roses just eight hours later.

While many of my roses enter a summer semi-dormancy, usually this comes a month later than it has this year.  When you see how the Summer heat affects the flowers you understand why.  Still others seem to flourish in this heat.  Here are a few others that got caught in the sun today. 

 This is Braveheart and it actually holds up somewhat better than many other red roses.

Here is St. Swithun surviving the day.

This flower of Twister made it through unscathed.

The heat turned out to be too much for Tradescant.  I'm praying for rain and cooler days - the forecast has 107 for tomorrow but we will cool off to 101 on Tuesday. 

Today we are treated to a fully opened blossom of Moore's Striped Rugosa.  This rose is the third striped rose in our current garden.  I have grown several others over the years.  Compared to Twister's precise petal formation and Scentimental's rounded and cupped blooms, Moore's Striped Rugosa's flowers are loose and carefree in form but no less beautiful.

Stripes for the 4th of July!

Striped roses were not created to celebrate the Fourth of July but there couldn't be a better time for these roses.  I currently grow three varieties Twister (three plants), Scentimential, and Moore's Striped Rugosa.  Here are a few pictures to celebrate the Fourth!

Twister is a wonderful "climbing miniature" rose.  It grows to a height of four feet and is more upright than spreading.  Ralph Moore called these "climbing," because he had a group of miniature roses which had miniature flowers and leaves but grew much taller.  So, as a marketing strategy, he called them "climbing."

Modern striped roses go back to Ralph Moore's work with the hybrid perpetual/bourbon,  Ferdinand Pichard, and can be found in every modern class of rose now.  Twister's flowers (above) are filled with petals and are very fragrant.  It also is one of the roses I can always find a flower on when I go out in the yard.  Twister's vigorous, upright growth is always healthy and this is one rose I will not go without growing in my garden.

This is Scentimental, a floribunda rose bred by Tom Carruth in 1997, with large loose flowers and a wonderful spicy fragrance.  I'm withholding judgement for now because I love its flowers and it blooms regularly, but it has a bit of a problem with blackspot.  It is also shorter than I expected, but I will give it some time to grow up.  If not then it may have a different use than I had been thinking.  

As you probably have noticed from the above pictures, part of the fun of striped roses is that from flower to flower they will move from one color being dominant to the other.  Scentimental's flowers are red and white striped, however, sometimes the white can be pink.

Here is my first bloom and photo of Moore's Striped Rugosa as it begins to open.  This was just this afternoon, July 2nd, wanting to make a statement before the Fourth.  For some reason I am really drawn to its crinkly rugosa foliage.  I have also noticed, putting this post together, that I find mostly white roses with red strips to be most attractive.  How could you not like this rose? 

Just one more picture of Twister because it is such a photogenic rose.