I bought this rose for 50 cents at the flea market about 20 years ago. It's either a climber or a very, very tall hybrid tea.

Any guesses?

Purdy? I just love mysteries. Does it smell as wonderful as it looks? Big big big blooms or kinda normal sized? My mom has a beautiful yellow that we got as a Walmart bodybag about.. oh.. well, it was '89, so about 21 years ago. Doesn't have the biggest blooms on the planet, but it smells rather nice and grows up and up and up and up and up and up and up! Seriously! It grows higher faster than any greenbean I ever planted. It's worse than sweet peas!

Could it be Elina (aka Peaudouce)? Or maybe Francis Phoebe? My database suggests also Madame Butterfly, Limelight, and Northern Lights; but I'm not smart enough to know whether those are good guesses.

It's a huge, huge bloom -- so big that I always assumed it was Midas Touch, but I have another Midas Touch and it's nowhere as tall as this.

Steve, I love all of your guesses. A couple were out of the running right away (Francis Phoebe and Northern Lights) because it's unlikely that they were available on this continent 20 years ago. Madame Butterfly isn't the right color. Elina is too light, more of a pale yellow verging on white, but it could have been an interesting coincidence because my name's Elena.

Limelight matches the color best, although hmf says it's between 2 and 3 feet and my rose is more like 8 to 10 feet tall, but an argument in its favor is its other name -- Golden Medallion. I had always assumed I had Gold Medal in my garden because I had a vague recollection of buying a rose by that name. A few years ago, I saw Gold Medal in bloom (and bought it, of course), and it's definitely not something I already had in the garden, so maybe my vague recollection was of Golden Medallion rather than Gold Medal.

Gold Medal is more of a bronzy apricot color. More like a brass color than yellow. At least the ones I've seen here are that way.

Hmm.. maybe a Climbing Golden Showers? But they have smaller blooms, not huge blooms.

Oldtimer? How about a Climbing Golden Masterpiece? They have pretty big yellow blooms, smell nice, and my standard grew over 3' last year with the crappy weather we had. Of course, I don't have ANY pictures of it in bloom I think.. typical, huh.

I was amazed by all of the different colors in Gold Medal, Toni. I had just assumed it was a solid yellow rose until I saw it in all its glory (for sale at the local Rite-Aid drugstore, to my surprise).

I have Golden Showers and it doesn't match in any way but height. It's lighter yellow and the blooms don't have as many petals. Also, these blooms have staying power and the blooms on Golden Showers seem to shatter in just a few days.

Oldtimer's too orange and Golden Masterpiece has too many petals.

I can see I need to get the second half of my db online. It did pretty well on color, but I didn't have an easy way to check height. ... I don't think Golden Medallion is in the db though, only 1400 roses. Most of the time I've seen Midas Touch it has been a much stronger chrome yellow, which is why that was not one of my guesses: otherwise, the height and flower form match pretty well.

HMF isn't that reliable when it comes to some details, Steve, so I'm inclined to disregard their height information for your guesses. They say Limelight is short, but it might actually be quite tall, or at least tall in California. I remember when they listed Three Weddings as a mini, but Palatine sold it as a climber and mine grew to 8 feet in the first 6 months. They also list Smarty as a 3-foot shrub and I really have to work at keeping it down to 12 feet.

Hey, what about St. Patrick's Day? I was looking at the picture blown up and saw that the outside edge of the flower was kind of greenish. Maybe it's my monitor? I konw that St. Pat's gets tall.. at least over 5' here. Does it fade to white or to tan? My Summer Sunshine faded to brown, but my Shockwave faded to white and I have a NOID that kept it's yellow until the flowers were bleh. Maybe it's a yellow sport of Mr. Lincoln? I'm a wrackin' my brain and, well, my brain is protesting.

St. Patrick is too new to be this rose, I think. And mine has no greenish tones. It fades to white rather than tan, but it really doesn't fade badly at all.

You know, Toni, I know you didn't cite this one as a guess, but it resembles Summer Sunshine more than anything else. I do have a Summer Sunshine in a different part of the garden, though, and it's nowhere near blooming yet, although it also is incredibly tall for a hybrid tea (but HMF says 3-4 feet).

Gold Glow is another possibility. HMF says it's short, but there are references to it as a climber in the member comments.

Yellow Blaze! I bet you dollars to donuts (yumm.. donuts) it's Yellow Blaze.

Commercially available
ARS:
Light yellow Alba.
Origin:
Bred by Rolf Sievers (Germany, 1976).
Class:
Alba.
Bloom:
Light yellow. Strong fragrance. Large, full (26-40 petals), quartered bloom form. Once-blooming spring or summer.
Habit:
Height of 5' 11" to 6' 11" (180 to 210 cm).
Growing:
USDA zone 4b through 9b. Hardy.
Parentage:
Small Maiden's Blush × Golden Giant
Notes:
Bred 1976, registered 1988.

Plus the images, especially this one: http://www.helpmefind.com/rose... looks like your rose.

Yes? No?

Yellow Blush is dead wrong because it's a once-bloomer, but I think you mistakenly identified my rose. You typed Yellow Blaze instead of Yellow Blush, and that seems to fit in every single way. I'll go out and sniff mine tomorrow and see whether it smells like licorice. I kind of hope it doesn't. I hate licorice!

It would be funny if that's what it is, because I have it growing next to Blaze (the red one).

http://www.helpmefind.com/gard...

Yikes, I read the right one, clicked the wrong one. That's what I get for trying to do things on like 4 hours sleep. Doesn't work well for me. :D

But as long as we kinda figure out what it is (other than a gorgeous yellow rose that is humungous), who cares!