Toni ...
>>>> one of my roses in the front reverted to Dr. Huey
I am going to take this as an opportunity to clear up a misconception about roses reverting to Dr. H that I see on a lot of rose forums. I hope you don't mind.
Roses never revert to Dr. H. When you plant a budded rose, let's say 'Henry Fonda', you are actually planting two roses. 'Henry Fonda' and the root stock 'Dr. Huey'. Let's say you did everything right in planting the rose, caring for the rose and winter protecting the rose. Then in spring all you see is Dr. H. What that means is that the budded rose, 'Henry Fonda', died and all that was left was Dr. H.
Instead of having two roses in the planting hole, 'Henry Fonda' and 'Dr. H.', you only have one rose which made it through your winter. It happens a lot no matter what rose was used for the root stock.
There are a lot of reasons for a budded rose to fail to survive. It may not have been budded properly, the budded rose was weak to begin with and didn't have the vigor of Dr. H and more. Not your fault because you did everything right.
>>> I think for every one rose I lose I'm putting in a salvia
I think that is a great idea. I planted my first delphinium this year instead of replacing a rose that just doesn't like the heat in this garden. Why fight it ? Of course, I don't know whether the delphinium will do well in that site, so I planted it in a container first ...
Smiles,
Lyn
