Well, I guess all said & done, the Hunt today was successful. It almost wasn't. Lots of disappointment today, but lots of goodstuff, too.

Got up early this morning to be on the road to Paulino's Nursery. Today's the first day that they start selling their roses. I was one of the very first people to buy from their stock, and I was not impressed. I went there looking for Ketchup & Mustard, Twilight Zone, Sugar Moon, and possibly any blue rose I could find (specifically Blueberry Hill). For the past 4 years that I've been looking at their roses, the first weekend of May is always their sale where the roses are $20 (normal price is around $29.99). I had the expectation to spend about $100 there. Imagine my surprise when I saw that A) they had but only Sugar Moon & K_M (only blue roses they had were Blue Girl, Intrepid, Heirloom, Neptune, & Ebb Tide), and B) the roses were $31.99. Little bit more than I wanted to spend. Not to mention that I just really didn't see any Sugar Moons there that I felt that should come home with me. I did pick up a Ketchup & Mustard, but was a bit disappointed that there was hardly any scent. So there I go, with only 1 rose in tow when I was expecting a lot more. I went up to the counter to pay, handing the young lady a $100 bill. She looks at it like it's a bug or something, then is a bit pissy because she can't break it so needs to get change. Bleh, this is my fault how?

However, life became much much much better when I went to my next nursery, Timberline Gardens. Tabby here is the one who suggested it & I had picked up a Groupon for $40 worth of stuff for $20. I'm willing to try it out. And boy am I glad I did! Holy guacamole did I get myself into trouble! Not only were their roses all the most beautiful 3gal Weeks roses, they were also only $25!!! Score!! So Chris Evert, Sunstruck, Sugar Moon, & Marilyn Monroe came home. That was only $103, I had $40 in a groupon and $65 in change from Paulino's. It's official, I'm now broke. That's OK, I have one more Groupon to spend clear across the city (I'm already clear across the city from home, about 34 miles from home).

My timing was off by about 30 minutes, so I had like 30 minutes to kill before lunchtime. Since I wasn't too terribly far off, I decided to hit this one Home Depot in the middle of Lakewood that I always manage to find good stuff at. So down we wander to that particular Home Depot (off of Wadsworth & Colfax for anyone interested in mapping this). It's a fairly new Home Depot, only about 5-6 years old, and built definitely NOT for the garden center. They usually end up taking up half the parking lot for their plants because the way it was built can't really support the amount of garden supplies they get in. I saw that their rose stock had been depleted pretty heavily because roses have been on sale for $8.88 since Thursday, so I figure I'll just get some petunias & then check the extreme back of the store where the docks are. And boy did I hit the jackpot! There was a single virgin pallet hidden between a bunch of metal shelves that had either Red Masterpiece/Touch of Class roses or evergreens. And on this pallet were some of the most beautiful Blue Girl roses I'd ever seen. I'm drooling over these roses! There wasn't a broken cane or a nasty leaf on any of the plants.. there was about 20-22 plants on this pallet. However, there is no way for me to get my cart back there as I have to squeeze my fat butt between the shelf-units to get to that pallet. And that's when I started to unload the pallet myself (which I've done plenty of times). I'd look at one rose, determine if the budunion was big/strong enough, and then either reject it onto the extreme top shelf of the shelf unit next to me, or skooch my way back to my car w/rose in hand. I was waddling back to my car with a 2gal rose bucket in each hand when I saw an older Hispanic lady making her way to my cart. And I don't think it's because she wanted the petunias hanging on the side of the cart.. my purse was in plain view. So I zipped rather quickly to my cart & gave her a Look Of Death (not to mention I topped her by almost a foot.. don't wanna piss off a 6' 300lb woman with 2 roses in her hands). She backed away from my cart & kinda ran over to her husband's side, who was loading soil onto a flatbed cart. I then repositioned the cart so that my purse was much much closer to me and was never more than 3 feet away from it. I limited myself to only 5 (!) roses from this section (all mismarked.. all marked as "Intrigue") and checked out. Of course these were still on sale for $8.88, PLUS! I had a $5 off of $50 coupon, so made out like a fat-rat there.

I had planned on going to a restaurant that was new to me (a American Indian eatery.. supposed to be Pueblo style & I miss home-style food like that as I don't get down to NM very often). So DH & I wander off in that direction to the restaurant. YUCK. Not only was it a bit overpriced ($21 for 2 fry breads & 2 waters), but it was also incredibly bland yuck food. DEFINITELY not going back there again.

From lunch wandered down south to Silver Sage Nursery. And, I was a bit disappointed there. They had gotten a shipment of roses, Tiffany, Touch of Class, and Chicago Peace. That was it. OK, so I'll get a lilac or two. All they had were the "chinese" lilacs, which I don't like (Chinese lilacs smell almost as good as a French lilac, but the Chinese lilacs don't make for good cut flowers and the flowers themselves are much much smaller and not as wide-petaled as the French lilacs). So struck out there. Hmm.. looks like this place carries mostly trees.. ok, so maybe they have a mimosa? Nope, the guy (who's incredibly cute) doesn't have a clue. Never even heard of a mimosa (other than the drink). Ugh!! Well, I have $30 to spend.. what to get? DH sees something, asks if they grow here? Sure, Salvia grows VERY well here. So got 2 Dark Knight & 1 Sensation Rose Salvia. Tada, spent the $30, no problems.

So all & all, had a successful hunt. Got some gorgeous roses, got to check out 2 new nurseries, and had fun buying purdy stuff. Spent the afternoon planning on where to put some of these roses and weeding.. and weeding.. and weeding some more. Ugh! It never ends!

The back of the van with the 3gal Weeks roses & 2 salvias. I had lifted the back seats out of their "stow'n'go" position so I had a well to put things into.


The side of the van with all the Blue Girls & one salvia / petunias.


Sunstruck (third picture you can see the Chris Evert in the back)


Ketchup & Mustard

Sounds like a good day to me, Toni!
You bought a very nice K & M, that's for sure! What a great photo.

Another beautiful day for me. Went to a different nursery this morning that I haven't gone to in years because they usually don't have any roses. But when I drove by them this morning, I saw that their front yard was literally covered from head to toe with blooms. So I made a quick U-turn & zipped right back. Big 3gal Weeks roses for $24.99. Limited myself to only 4. Sigh.... soooo many to chose from!! I ended up with a Colorific, Vavoom, Perfect Moment, & Royal Amethyst. Came home, took dogs to dog park, then came home again & started burying bodies.

In 2 days I ended up planting 26 roses: 4 yesterday & 22 today. And my back's letting me know that it's VERY unhappy with me. Not to mention my upper arms are slightly burnt (wore a sleeveless shirt today), as are my cheekbones. But I don't care, it's raining right now a soft drizzle & it's supposed to do this for the next day, too (all night tonight & all day tomorrow). Planned this perfectly... if I had actually planned it around the rain! Now I just need to mulch the living snot out of everything. Couldn't take pictures because my battery was dead, but hoping to get some pics tomorrow. Of at least Vavoom.. the others weren't anything to write home about.

Congrats on a successful hunt.

Don't have pictures available, but picked up 6 more today. I had three "bogo free" coupons, so I got one $23 Hot Cocoa & Tahitian Sunset (or maybe Tequila Sunset.. I think Tahitian). Then picked up a Princess de Monoco, Live, Orogold, & Pink Peace (got that one only for its scent).

Cool! It must be the Tahitian one because the Tequila one is Tequila Sunrise.

HMF has both. But I believe it is the Tahitian Sunset cuz the plant looks nothing like my Tequila Sunset.

You have Tequila Sunrise. The Tequilla Sunset in HMF is not available from any nursery and it's inexplicably spelled with two "l's." It's probably a good rose. I like J.B. Williams' roses, but only a few nurseries carry them and they certainly don't carry all of them.

Zuzu - this is the rose with the Weeks tag.


I think the tag says Tahitian Sunset JACGODDE

Yes, that's Tahitian Sunset. I was saying that you couldn't have bought Tequila Sunset because it doesn't exist.

JACgodde, Tahitian Sunset. Looks like a pretty rose. I wonder how it compares with, say, Medallion which is similar in color?

...

The label has some minor errors. Tony Lord in his book "Designing with Roses" takes much of a chapter dealing with the official typographic conventions to be used when referring to roses. The trade moniker - the one used around the world regardless of the names under which a rose might be sold in one nation or the other - has a special typographical format. It consists of three capitalized letters representing the company that introduced the rose and is followed by any arbitrary number of small case letters representing the rose within that organization. In this case for example, JAC means this rose was introduced by Jackson and Perkins. The letters godde refer to which of JAC's roses it is. If I remember correctly, HMF complies pretty well. Too many other places do not. How funny that Week's Roses does not. The label also states PPAF; but according to HMF the patent was granted in 2008. Two mistakes on one label. Let's hope they were better with associating the right rose with the label at hand.

At a certain point (I don't remember the year), they stopped capitalizing the first three letters. When I began working on the rose database, I assumed the ones without the first three letters capitalized in their registration names were errors and I capitalized them when I added them to the database, but I've since learned, from something someone wrote on the HMF site, that it stopped being the convention at some point.

What a confusing discussion! I had to go out in the dark with a flashlight to dig out the metal tag on my rose to see which Tequila or Tahitian rose I had. I know I have Tahitian Sunset, but I remembered buying a Tequila something in California in November. My new one is Tequila SUPREME. It is short right now, but I think that is because it is still a new rose in my yard. i was wanting a shorter shrub rose to go in a row with Happy Chappy, but i'll end up moving Tequila Supreme because when I just checked the Star roses site, I learned it will get 4' tall.
The tag on Tequila Supreme says MEIKOKANV or maybe M at the end. i'll try to remember to post photos of the blooms tomorrow because we don't have any on the database. The only photos on HMF are from France. I don't know why my tag has an extra letter on the name.

I guess I haven't ever seen the naming convention done otherwise by an entity that I trust. Following the convention makes things easier to comprehend, IMO. Even roses introduced for the first time this year are treated with the original typographic convention at HMF.

Regarding the rose introduced this year as Tequila Supreme by Edmunds' Roses, HMF lists the registration name as MEIkokan, and says the rose must be exhibited under the name Jean Cocteau. Its raiser Meilland also reserves Charleston as a registered trademark for this rose. I have to wonder if this is all completely necessary. Four names plus a patent number associated with a brand new rose.

I'm finding the info on this rose very confusing, too. The description says that the average diameter of the flowers is 3.5 inches, but the several flowers depicted by Arlekino are about the size of a walnut.

But Jean Cocteau is a 2007 rose. HMF is the very place where I heard about and saw the new typographical convention. If you look up a more recent plant, you'll see it too. Stormy Weather's registration name is listed as Orafantanov, not ORAfantanov.

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

And here's the list of the 2012 introductions. The only ones with the first three letters capitalized are the ones bred and registered earlier.

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

My Tequila Supreme, or Jean Cocteau, has walnut size flowers or a little bit bigger. They do look like the photos on Star's page. It wasn't sold in the US until 2012, but I got one when the nursery got their bare root delivery in November. It looks like it will be a good shrub rose.
In searching for info on TS, I found a picture of Tequila, and it looks just like the drift rose-sized mystery rose I bought the other day at Lowes. Lowes had labeled it 'Westerland' but there was no way that was correct. It might possibly be Tequila. i couldn't find any way to contact the grower to call and ask.
I'll leave it without a label for now.

While "Hunting" on Saturday evening, I came across this:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

It's a Achemon Sphinx moth that had just pupated in a plant that HD just got in. I thought it was quite beautiful & had to take video of it. I was tempted to buy the plant & bring her home, but I didn't know if that was wise. I've seen sphinx moths at home before.. quite gorgeous IMO.

I see what you mean Zuzu. Now I understand that the convention has been changed. I happen to think the previous one is so much better that I am sorely tempted to completely ignore the change. I found it to be much easier to parse a name using the older convention.

That's one big, fat moth, Toni. I would be afraid that the larvae from just one of those fellows could strip all the leaves from my garden. I'm sure it's completely unfounded. This spring as the daffodils bloomed my garden was visited by a lot of tiger butterflies. I think one day I saw three at once. Recently there have been a lot of black wooly caterpillars. Not sure I've identified much damage from them, though.

Picked up a George Burns & Dream Come True.

Here's why I cry when I look at Sue/Zuzu/PPal's roses... Look beyond the George Burns in the middle. This is almost 100% of my back yard as far as growth. The back yard doesn't get as much snow as the front (more wind, so the snow blows away), so the roses take way too long to establish & grow like in the front yard (more protected, more snow from my throwing the snow from the driveway onto the yard..). Upper right is Ebb Tide, left side (dead black stick) is Cajun Moon from RU, and then just various other roses here/there.


Dream come true.


Royal Amethyst is happy & already sending out new blooms!


Chris Evert is also blooming, but didn't get a pic of her.

Adding this here 'cuz it seemed appropriate. All day today, something told me to go to The Gardens in Highlands Ranch. So I did. This is what I found:



So Neptune, InkSpots, & Easy Does it came home


They had a bit left still. :)