ss, I went back and re-read that thread. Maybe you should post the blooming photos on the end of that thread. The whole story is wonderful to me--using Craigslist to find a new home for a rose, your struggle to keep it alive, all the great suggestions from forum members, and now, finally blooms! Gotta love a happy ending.
Yesterday I had a helper planting some of my new roses, and I had laid them out where I wanted them. He came to me and said there already is a rose where you placed that one. I said it's dead, because it has no nametag. He showed me a tiny bit of green...guess Betty Boop is only mostly dead. She was a too-small rose from Chamblee that arrived in the middle of the heat wave last summer. I had so little hope that I didn't even give her a metal nametag. Fortunately, I had covered the whole plant with mulch, and it had 9 months to recover. Today, I'll hit her with Superthrive and fish emulsion and hope for a miracle. Patience, grasshopper, patience.

I thought that I transplanted one of my climbers (Rose Marie Viaud) early enough before shocking her.. nope. She's still really really green from crown to tip, but lost all her leaves. Tonight I'll trim down (which sucks.. losing 6' of cane that survived the winter!!) down. Hoping to get more rain tonight.. I'm greedy & want more rain!! I don't wanna have to start watering steadily so soon...

SSGardener - That is a BEAUTIFUL rose! You done real good! *jealous*

Toni, why cut back a green cane? I'll bet it will put on new leaves if you give it a chance. Some of my roses routinely lose all their leaves (black spot usually) and with benign neglect, recover after a brief rest.

PPal - Stress it out even more. LOLLL I've found that after transplanting, if the rose is too awake, they usually just sit there like a lump on a log if I don't stress it out. So chop chop. This weekend I have to mulch the crap outta her and figure out where I'm putting my other two climbers. Pretty afraid to touch Charles de Mills with all his thorns... *bleed!!*

It is taking considerable willpower for me to pass the plants in the plant section while picking up groceries, moving supplies, etc. Winston the pug and I are on the move with all of the plants (except the divisions which I am sharing with my friends). I'll spare you the details, but have more info on the "Advice on Moving Roses ' thread I started. So far, the plants are alright in their pots. I am running out of pots, buckets, etc and less than half thru! I have been putting small plants in cut off soda bottles. It is the monster roses that need the big pots.

My Tiffany rose was the only one that wasn't leafing out. She is a borderline hardy diva, but I love her. The iconoclast (grumpypants when I am angry) surprised me with a Tiffany rose when I first moved here because my dog's name was Tiffany and it was a nice, fragrant soft pink. The original body bag Tiffany rose was replaced with a Chamblee's own root rose.

I cut the dead branches back a lot when I was doing my first spring pruning. Then some more. No sign of life. I dug up Tiffany and saw baby canes starting at the base of the plant under the soil. Happy Day!!!! I will remember this when I am tempted by grafted body bag roses in the store. Own root roses do better for me. (To be fair, I haven't tried any premium roses on Fortunata stock, only grafted roses available locally.)

Roses are starting to bloom! Baby Blanket (aka octobaby) was first this year - followed by Jens Munk, William Baffin and Carefree Celebration. William Baffin is HUGE this year. he took a while to get started, but wow.

Andi - In Sept, look at what Palatine (www.palatineroses.com) has to offer. They are the BEST BEST BEST roses! Seriously! I them. They do the absolute best with my environment here. The .. 13? I bought last year & put in the ground in December (!) are all leafing out.. even the one I completely planted wrong and didn't mulch until it was waaaaaaaaaay too late. But I'm glad that Mr. Winston is helping with the move. I'ven't moved with dogs since I was a child, but I know moving with cats is a major PITA. And you have roses blooming? I barely have leaves!!

I think I have less than 10 racemes of blooms on my massive 12' lilac. My trees in the back yard have no blooms (plums & crabapple), my crabapple in the front has .. 15? blooms on it. That last snowstorm we had wiped out all my spring blooms. The phlox, though, is starting to bloom (woodland & creeping). My spirea (mostly Magic Carpet) is leafing out nicely, as is the artemisia. However, many of the daylilies I put in last year I guess didn't make it. I do have a few iris stalks, but most of my irises are fairly new, so I wasn't expecting blooms this year. Spring's been so late in my area... at this rate, I'll have irises blooming when the leaves turn for fall!

I posted an update on the original post as suggested.

One pleasant surprise with this rose has been the scent! The only other rose I have is a Knockout, so I wasn't even expecting the Rose de Recht to have any scent at all. It's not overwhelming or perfumey, but I can smell its sweet scent as I open the back door.

I can see why roses are so addictive!

Absolutely! You must need more of them...

I have blooms for the first time on my potted lilac. I have two - a (hopefully) white/light pink one and a purple one. The purple one bloomed. I forget their names, but they have them. Primrose, the yellow lilac, is on my wish list.

As my friend and I drove to see my potential future home, we past tons of wild honeysuckle - mostly the white variety but some pink ones. It smelled fantastic! I have some cuttings (again) from a pink honeysuckle that I am trying to root. I also got some beautiful weeping forsythia cuttings from along the river that I admire.

I have to make sure I have room for my current roses before I start thinking of new ones. (That is what the logical part of my brain is saying - but logical women don't try to grow roses in the zone 6a mountains.)

William Baffin is monstrous this year with tons of blooms. I grow him with the clematis Rubromarginata. Although I haven't seen them blooming at the same time, yet, they seem to be good companions. Both are very robust. They have grown beyond my trellis and taller than the roof. I haven't gotten around to potting up the "monster trellis" - not to be confused with the monster trucks that are so popular with some of my neighbors. I am enjoying the first spring blooms while working my way toward that trellis.

My potted bleeding heart vine also came to life. It didn't like spending the winter in the north window, but I didn't want to give up on it.

I divided my beautiful big dahlia tuber, potted the baby tubers in two huge pots and waited. I have one group of leaves popping up in one pot. The others better hurry up because I am short of huge pots for the roses. I may pull them out of the "dead" pot and check for signs of life. It has been a damp spring, hope they aren't soft.

The repotted roses are doing fine - a bit of sulking, a few dropped leaves, no sudden deaths. It was extremely hot and humid the past few days, but will be cool and rainy today and tomorrow and cool sunday. Perfect weather for digging up more plants. Now, I just need some more pots, buckets and the like.

Winston the pug is becoming an excellent gardening companion. Last year he fussed to go inside, this year he wants to stay outside. Our friends/neighbors gave him a steak bone yesterday. He was a happy fellow. We are working on the "quiet" command because he barks at the dogs he doesn't like, the people he doesn't know and rap music. He prefers reggae.

Of the two choices, I'm with Winston.

Andi - Don't waste your $ on a Primrose lilac. I searched for years for one before I finally found a teeny itty bitty one at a LGS. Planted it, then waited another 2 years for blooms (blooms on old wood as you know). They don't bloom yellow, no matter what the pretty pictures on Wayside Gardens shows. They bloom white. And it's not even a pretty white, more of a dishwater white that fades to a bleh greyish yellow white yuck. And doesn't even have that spectacular of a scent. I'm SOOOOOOOOOOOOO disappointed in my Primrose! Waited 4 years for one.. and this is what I get? Seriously? I'll see if mine has any buds on it. The last snowstorm we had killed almost 100% of my lilac blooms.. my big ol' lilac has maybe 10 blooms on it. Last year it was covered from head to toe. This year? Nothing. Seriously. It's almost June and I'm barely starting to see spring flowers. My one forsythia still has blossoms on it.

Could your lilac just be an oddball! I have a bottlebrush that blooms a sort of grey, but I don't think it is representative of the shrub in general.

PPal - No, the general consensus is that Primrose is way over hyped. Google the images and the ones from real gardens versus catalogs show the truth.

From a catalog: http://www.collectionsetc.com/...


My Primrose


A real lilac farm w/real pictures of what it'll really look like.
http://www.lilacfarmusa.com/Li...

My Primrose was a disappointment also. It hardy ever blooms, and I would call it a sad color. Dreary. Sickly.
My roses are really exploding in color today! Yay!
I may post a parade tomorrow. I'm still trying to get ready for a tour here Tuesday night, and then another one on June 1.
Looks like they'll have iris, clematis, peonies and roses to look at yippeee!

First rose bloom of the year.


Roses are a jungle!

Aw-right, Cindy and Rita!

Got a couple of other irises blooming. This is one of my no id's.. But with the irises I don't really care about names.

I think I agree with your way of thinking. Too much bother to keep up with those iris name tags. Especially as they are just here to be pretty garden flowers.