Good information to have, thank you, Patty.

I wonder if some roses are just more attractive to the mites? Like some are more attractive to various insects. It is odd how some persist without infection right next to an infected plant.

Neal, looks like I outran/outfoxed/outtrimmed the virus on Easy Does It.

It looks absolutely perfect! Awesome news!

Congratulations!

I was reading a blog from Paul Zimmerman owner of the closed Ashdown Roses. He has been having about 50% cure rate when he is able to catch the infection at it's earliest sign. He has the most amazingly helpful rose videos that one could hope for.
Neal since the mites can't fly they stay were they land unless blown by the wind to a new rose.

If you want a lavender color with smell, get a Barbara Streisand and the color of the leafs are a dark shinny.

gemini_sage said:
Was looking into Freisia, thinking it was new to me, but saw in our database it is Sunsprite, that I've known about for a long time, but haven't tried.

I have it, it's nice but not great, it's fragrance is obvious but not especially strong when compared with most other fragrants and it's blooms (quite large) open up quite a bit as they age which I assume isn't the general preference given most other commercial cultivars I've had don't do that. No disease issues for me, breeds fairly easily. Keep in mind I'm in a warmer climate so results may vary. I'd be surprised if there isn't a better yellow though, given the fragrance probably being half strength compared with cultivars like Ebb Tide, Double Delight, etc and how the bloom ages a bit relaxed. It's still nice and has a number of good qualities but if there is another yellow that's caught your eye compare them and check reviews.

gemini_sage said: think a lot of modern hybrids are unable to grow a strong enough root system to develop into a sizable plant.

I think there is some truth in that but at the same time realise that doesn't make too much sense....I mean the original seedling had to have gotten big enough to make canes to graft and I don't see breeders leaving a seedling that isn't growing for several years on hope when they're probably got thousands to sow and asset each other. I do notice that some of the seedlings I've grown seem to reach an inch or two and then do nothing for a year or more (often have meh roots, if you don't grow out you go...but they might all have meh roots at an inch tall) while others first bloom happens a few months after germination. The ones that do better tended to have a species somewhat recently (like Friesia has a fair bit of Rosa eglanteria/rubiginosa not far back...although it is considered an invasive species in Australia and NZ so climate preferences or something)...granted this is anecdotal at best there could be other factors in common I can't see and I've fallen into confirmation bias.

I've had Sunsprite/Freisia for a couple of years now and "meh.." is right- it's performance has been underwhelming. It hasn't shown very good winter hardiness either.

Could be my climate, but several of the modern hybrid teas, grandifloras, and floribundas I've tried on their own roots have remained very small. However the more recently introduced Kordes varieties I've tried are performing well. I read somewhere that they trial them on their own roots.

Neal stated: "Could be my climate, but several of the modern hybrid teas, grandifloras, and floribundas I've tried on their own roots have remained very small. However the more recently introduced Kordes varieties I've tried are performing well. I read somewhere that they trial them on their own roots."

Apparently, in 2000, Kordes did test their all their roses as own roots. This was confirmed by 2 reliable sources. In 2000 Kordes started testing all their roses as own roots in there own fields and each one was evaluated to see if it could survive and was healthy without grafting. It is my understanding, that the ones they offered from 2002 to date are good as own roots.
I would assume there have to be some Kordes before 2000 that are good as own roots. It seems to me, that's why they were testing them all to find out which ones they wanted to keep in their hybridizing program.

Here's something I found interesting on HMF (help me find). I decided to look up one of the grafted roses in my garden named Stormy Weather (climber, Orard, 2010)
. I came across the following statement under the "members comments" section:
"in greenhouse tests conducted amongst 20 rose genotypes, Stormy Weather appeared resistant (no disease symptoms, no virus replication) to the Rose Rosette Virus. Field trials are to follow. http://forums.gardenweb.com/di....
You can read about it in the above garden web link.
And, I read it here too:
http://rosebreeders.org/forum/...
Of course, I began thinking about what makes this rose resistant to RRD???
I also thought about the possibility of using Stormy Weather as a rootstock???

gemini_sage said:I've had Sunsprite/Freisia for a couple of years now and "meh.." is right- it's performance has been underwhelming. It hasn't shown very good winter hardiness either.

Winter hardiness is something I don't need to consider (yet, possibly when moving to Victoria as it's a bit colder there but even then I don't think it's a major concern) so can't comment on that.

It's an older rose (bred in 1973) so it may reflect the times a bit (?), I mean I've heard rose fragrance was largely bred out in pursuit of other things so maybe it just had significant fragrance (compared to others at the time) but now it's just not especially remarkable. It seems to be upsold a lot (at least here) when looking at fragrants, but that may be due to yellow and fragrant not being common and no ones come out with anything better yet (although that would be surprising given the amount of room for improvement and it being 40+ years).

I don't hate it, I just don't think it really excels when compared to other modern types...but I can't really find a better fragrant yellow either (I only look at whats being sold in Australia, so no idea what's happening else where). It'd be pretty quickly displaced if an improvement turned up I imagine.

Interesting, Margie. I wonder if resistance to the mites has anything to do with it?

Moved to other thread!

Most interesting...

I am very late coming to this thread, but want to share a few thoughts.

I had read the post about 'Stormy Weather' on GW and dismissed it simply because a sampling of 10 is too small to be considered significant statistically. Sample size is one of the few things I remember from that class taken decades ago ..

However, they may be onto something. I think the field testing is where they will get more valid information.

@Protoavis re: your comment:

I don't see breeders leaving a seedling that isn't growing for several years on hope when they're probably got thousands to sow and asset each other.

It happens a lot more than you think. Often it depends on how many roses are available to be introduced in a given year, what is happening in the market place and more. One of Ralph Moore's 2005 introductions, 'Lady Moss', was bred in 1970 and sat on the bench until he felt that people might want to buy it.

More often, breeders would sell the rights to roses that were good roses but too similar to other roses that the marketing department selected for introduction to smaller rose companies that did not have as broad a distribution and would not put the rose into serious competition with the rose they chose to market. A good example in the US is 'Golden Sheen' bred by Swim & Weeks in 1966 and introduced by Carlton Rose Nurseries, Inc.

As for fragrance ... no it has not been bred out of roses. The gene for fragrance is a recessive gene, but there are other factors that can impact the fragrance of a rose. The anatomy of the rose petal makes a huge difference.

Here's a link to a post I put up with an explanation from one of Jack Harkness's books a while back:

The thread "Fragrance In Roses" in Roses forum

As for own root vs grafted ... all of that could go into a completely different thread. The industry is going own root. It's just that the nurseries are not telling their customers how to grow own root plants well, so most gardeners don't get the best results.

Neal asked: "Interesting, Margie. I wonder if resistance to the mites has anything to do with it?"
I looked into it a little more and this is what I found.
https://www.preprints.org/manu...

After reading the following link, I had two questions 1) I wonder what's in the parentage of Stormy Weather (cl Orard 2010) that makes it resistant?

http://www.rosebreeders.org/fo...

And 2) - "could Stormy Weather as a rootstock protect against a new infection even though it could not protect against a massive concentration of virus in an established infection." The same question someone else on the forum asked.

I decided to look into the parentage: Heart 'n' Soul' and 'Rhapsody in Blue. I thought to myself if SW is resistant there must be others. I came across this thread, the post by mike_rivers(z5 MI) is most informative (it's about 1/3 down the page) :
http://forums.gardenweb.com/di...

This link has a chart "Table 2"
http://neilsperry.com/wp-conte...

What stood out to me in Table 2 was Rosa californica - I remember Porkpal acquiring this recently.

Getting back to the parentage of SW : Heart n Soul x Rhapsody in Blue.
Rhapsody in Blue parentage is:

Seed: Summer Wine (climber, Kordes 1985)
Pollen: International Herald Tribune × [[Blue Moon × Montezuma (grandiflora, Swim, 1955)] × [Violacea × Montezuma (grandiflora, Swim, 1955)]]

Here's a chart I made of International Herald Tribune - notice the yellow stars.







Numerous people are working on RRD:
http://www.newplantsandflowers...

http://americanhort.theknowled...

Good work on the lineage tree, Margie ...

Also, these links are much better than the first ones you posted. There is a LOT of good information here. I recognize the names of some of the people listed in the Summit Speaker Bios ...

Thanks for posting the article and Webinar links.

OOPS. Sorry guys, someone did not read to the end of the thread...

gemini_sage said:
So now, I get to order some new Roses! Getting my Palatine order in first, as they do sell out of many selections quickly, and considering several from Chamblees. After a few years of not considering Roses, it seems the number of sources for grafted plants has dwindled. Where is everyone ordering bare root Roses from these days?

Congrats on eradicating one of the scariest banes of rose cultivation, Neal!

I like to buy roses from Palatine. I like their selection, I like that they will ship second-day-air to me (for a small fortune). I like that the roses arrive in really excellent condition.

I placed an order with Edmunds this year and I think most of the roses will survive. I've been a maniac about watering them, and I think I had to be. Olympiad's canes are dead down to the bud union; and, I think were so when I took delivery. One or two others in the order were in similar condition and will not make it.

I placed an order in early March with J&P just to find out if their reputation has had reason to change. No roses. No updates. No reply to my complaint e-mail. No apology. No refund.

Last year I ordered from Garden Valley and the roses arrived in mid January - during the two weeks of the year when the ground is frozen! Planting season here starts the second week of March. Somehow I always miss the Regan Roses ordering season. As luck would have it the only order I placed with them arrived at the start of three weeks of freezing rainy weather -- it never does that here -- and I did not get them in the ground before they had all dried up like autumn leaves.

I have had some measure of good luck buying roses from David Austin Roses. Their roses are pruned a little more severely than Edmunds, but they are up and running much faster, IME. The selection of HT roses is pretty limited; but they are mostly safe choices. In one order I found that I got slightly better roses by ordering over the phone in early January and giving them a full nine yard truckload full of grief about their failure to reliably deliver big, healthy, viable roses in my previous order; did not do that last time and was only slightly disappointed.

I still order a lot of roses from Antique Rose Emporium. I like that their selections survive my gardening ministrations (or severe lack thereof) better than most. I was a little disappointed in my Fall 2016 deliveries; but the ten that arrived this spring were fully developed gallons where all the soil was held together by roots, but there was no evidence of the plants being rootbound. Nice size canes for own root roses. All are showing timely leaf development over all the canes - an unusually good outcome, IME.

I always miss the Regan's deadline too, which always bums me out because they do have such a large selection.

Steve, I ordered a few from Rosemania last year and they were nice plants with roots that hadn't been overly trimmed. They don't have a huge selection, but offer some nice varieties.

http://rosemania.com/shopsite_...

I didn't realize Antique Rose Emporium sold gallon size plants, that's nice to know. I don't much care for dealing with tiny bands or 1 quart potted roses.