This rose was mislabeled "Purple Tiger".

This rose is a hybrid tea and the fragrance is absolutely to die for. Does anyone recognize it? I couldn't quite get the color in the photo right; it's a deeper purple than what is shown in the photo. I was thinking it might be "Big Purple", but I've never seen one in bloom, so I don't know.

Regards,
Joanne

Okay, here's another shot, a bit better color I think...

GrowJo, that is a stunning, stunning rose! I've never seen anything like it. Big Purple seems like a good guess. I don't grow that one, so I had to look at the HMF photos and they do resemble your rose. Of course, there's also the possibility that it wasn't mislabeled at all. It has a few subtle stripes. It could be a Purple Tiger that's reverting back to Intrigue (one of Purple Tiger's parents) and isn't all the way there yet. Take a look at some photos of Intrigue. There are several pages of them here:

http://www.helpmefind.com/rose...

Hi zuzu! Thanks for your reply; you're right, the roses do have very subtle striping. My next question is, Intrigue is a floribunda, right? This rose I have appears to be a hybrid tea, only single flowers on each stem, not clustered.

That really isn't an argument against it, because Intrigue, oddly enough for a floribunda, also does not cluster. One bloom to a stem is the rule for Intrigue. That's even noted in our Cubits rose database (under "characteristics of bloom"):

http://cubits.org/roses/db/ros...

I was gonna say Stephen's Big Purple or Intrigue. But I see stripes, so I don't know why it couldn't be a very dark Purple Tiger w/very little white on it. I've noticed that most of my Perfume Tigers are more red than last year.

Well, isn't that interesting. I just assumed because of the single bloom, it was a hybrid tea, not a floribunda. Shows you what I know about roses (zippo). LOL. Thanks for your help zuzu and Skiekitty!

I'm going to pass your comments on to another lady in our rose society; she has the same issue with her Purple Tiger (they came from the same greenhouse).

Oh, my gosh! Did you have that adorable tabby cat avatar yesterday? How did I miss it? It's a darling kitty face.

Yes, that's my baby doll. (aka Holmz, which we never call her). She's 16 1/2.

So I decided to go out and look at my purple rose a little more closely. Look what I found. Clusters of buds!!! Hilarious. Every other flower so far has been single and now there are two clusters forming. This has been really interesting!

Well, maybe this flush will be Purple Tiger and the last flush, the one with one to a stem, was a part of the rose that wanted to revert to Intrigue. Big Purple most certainly doesn't cluster, I don't think.

The kitty is a baby doll!