Roses today-

That last picture, with the dark blue iris, is really stunning. I love the color combination!
Here, roses and iris do not bloom at the same time--except this year, the wacky weather year---so I never pay attention to the iris/rose color combos. Yours is just wonderful, Rita.

Well, that color combo was not on purpose as roses and Siberians don't usually bloom together here either. The iris were really set up there so that they would bloom with the clematis. All sticking to the pink, white, purple, blue and red tones.

Remember when my 'September Song' bloomed in pink and I sent Heirloom an e-mail with the photo attached to inform them that they had sent me a pink rose instead of the orange-blend rose listed in their catalogue? Well, they never answered.

The same thing has happened when I've sent Rogue Valley photos of the mislabeled roses they send. There's never a response, not to mention a refund or replacement. Do these nurseries really think I'm sending them pictures just for the hell of it?

Well Zuzu, your pictures are very pretty. No doubt they saw the picture, printed it off to put in the catalog and never read the letter.
I just don't understand mis-labeled roses. It's not like they grow together the way daylilies and iris do. They don't hybridize and drop seed while you're not looking, either.

Speaking of seed...is it normal for a DA rose to develop seeds? My Evelyn actually has a nice pod growing, and has been for a couple of weeks. I'm curious to see how it was pollinated and leave it be to see what develops - but I have no idea when they should be harvested?

Plus, with the lovely rainshowers we had a couple of weeks ago, Evelyn is getting ready to flush again. My scraggliest, spindliest rose bush, but always my over-performer.

At the end of May the roses are comming on strong.



Sunsprites


Legends


Braveheart


The Gift (white) and Carefree Delight along the side of the garage.

Love that Braveheart! Never seen it locally! May have to do some searching for that one...

Its a Clements rose from Heirloom.

Any advice on what to do for roses that have been shredded by hail? I'm wondering if I need to cut everything back since there's an imbalance of leaves/roots now. Many of them are just bare thorny stems.
The worst damage was to the hostas. They are left with just skeletons of stems. The trees that shaded them lost most of their leaves, so now the hostas will suddenly be in a sunny spot. Not sure if hostas can leaf out again this year or not?
The daylilies and lilium were at prime, loaded with big fat buds. They are now tall green sticks. Probably they will not bloom this year. Some of the daylilies are rebloomers, and some are late bloomers, so I may get sporadic bloom later in the season. I have over 2000 daylilies, so hopefully I'll see some color eventually.

Cindi - Awww.. On the few occasions where I've had problems with shredded roses, I've trimmed them heavily & then fed them LOTS weekly until I saw them producing new leaf pimples. I'm no help with the others. Thankfully I've never had a hailstorm come through my neighborhood that bad.

In my typical laissez-faire manner, I would leave all of them alone and see what happens.

Our area gets hit with hail pretty often, but weirdly enough, my yard usually gets bypassed. At least this year I'm not on any kind of garden tour. I've talked to a few gardeners and nursery owners this morning, and have cause for hope.
Word is, the vegetables should bounce back stronger than ever. Roses also. Hostas---not sure.
Bayer 2 in 1 rose food was on sale at Lowes so I bought enough to feed the worst hit areas. A few people said we just have to cross our fingers that plants can grow new leaves and get them hardened off before the extreme heat sets in. Hail compacts the soil, which leads to bigger problems with watering later on in the heat. Most of the flower beds had mulch or groundcovers to lessen the impact.
Young trees and shrubs with damaged stems are at high risk for insect and disease, so I may spray them if the wind ever stops.