Tuesday, December 8, 2009

All America Rose Selections

...chose this picture of the roses on the corner of Congress and Henry Street in Brooklyn, to illustrate the urban rose. They were nice enough to ask for permission to use it, and linked to 66 Square Feet in 'payment'. It's one of my favourite pictures, so I was happy share.

I often wait for a cab to pass in New York before taking a picture. It instantly 'certifies' it...

Now I'm sure the roses I photographed are David Austen's, and I see none on the site, rose.org, which is apparently run by a not for profit association of rose growers, and is not the official site of All America Selections. Bit confusing. Their selection for the Northeast runs to five roses, all rather dreary, unless that is blasphemous. I have New Dawn, indeed (below), and have used The Fairy in a garden, en masse, but I am a little confused by their criteria.

What makes a good rose for a region?

Where do you live, what are your favourite roses, and why?

5 comments:

  1. Believe it or not, we can grow roses at this altitude. But just Ragusa roses. They are very small but beautiful. The only colors I have seen them in is pink, yellow and white. The bush is bigger than a miniature but much smaller than other rose bushes.

    I tried growing them in the front one year, and in the back the next year, but the elk found them every time.....even when I surrounded them with daffodils, which the elk hate! So, they are on big 'ol pots on my decks.

    The one thing I really miss about living at altitude is my rose garden and my veggie garden. I have always had lots of hybrid tea and floribunda bushes where ever else I have lived.

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  2. That second picture, the soft pink rose, is breathtaking. It looks like something out of a fairy tale.

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  3. The first rose that comes to mind is the miniature, fragrant pink rose that my great grandmother has had for ages. She is now 102 years old and still picks several buds every weekend for her friends.

    To answer your other question, I would have to say the Northwest! But that is only because I am most familiar with that region so far...

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  4. I don't have your skill with roses, that's for sure! My New Dawns struggle against all the odds in my little concrete yard. But the rose I love for its beauty and resilience is the old Albertine in my friend's windswept garden on a hill in Prudhoe, Northumberland. Impossible to pick a favourite though, in this country of passionate rose growers!

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  5. In recent years, I've sent many people to nurseries to buy Iceberg as it seems almost indestructible. In the Brisbane (Qld) area we pruned ours twice a year, with pick-pruning and dead-heading pretty much constant. Now, 300kms into the tropics and just a few hundred metres from the sea, I see quite a few Icebergs around town. My own climbing variety finally succumbed to 2' of silt in the Big Flood.
    In short: for a Mediterranean climate, try any of the Alister Clark roses.And many of David Austin's later roses (like A.Darby) are troupers. Look at the breeding and if there is an old cold-climate parent in there you should be Ok as far north as the southern parts of Canada.
    Wow! I almost hi-jacked your blog! Sorry, Marie.

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