If you all recall (groan, she is at it again!), I have never been sure that my Marchessa Boccella is truly Marchessa or some other rose. I think she may be the climbing version of Souvenir de la Malmaison. She is definately huge and only develops leaves and flowers if I have her 10 foot canes bending down. She is so easy to bend as well. Here is a picture from yesterday afternoon.


Her flowers are a light pink (almost white) and she is definitely not a bush shape but acts like a very large climber. What do you think?

It's not 'Souvenir de la Malmaison, Climbing' -- the canes are too bristly. SdlM is a Bourbon-Tea, and has the expected smooth canes with more widely-spaced hook-shaped prickles. I wonder if what you have is some other leggy Hybrid Perpetual -- probably something early, since later HPs had further infusions of Bourbon, China, and/or Tea in them, and so looked less like their Damask and Gallica ancestors.

Where did you get it? That can help narrowing it down.

:-)

~Christopher

Burling--Thanks Christopher