I was fortunate to be a volunteer at The Huntington Library in the eighties and nineties, "specializing" in propagation. I've worked in the nursery business for a number of years, both wholesale and retail and had the "pleasure" of actually working the rose harvest in Wasco with the old Ashdown Roses one year. It was colder than a personnel manager's heart! (no offense to any personnel managers reading this!) I've haunted public and private rose collections as often as I could since the early 1980s and studied every variety I encountered, taking thousands of slides "back in the day" prior to digital photography, to document as many as I could so I'd remember their particulars.

My last, large garden had something over fifteen-hundred varieties pass through it in its 18 year existence. If you're interested in seeing what grew there, I've included the link to the list on Help Me Find-Roses below. Several of my rose articles are also on Help Me Find, as are my named (and a few unnamed) roses, and my current rose garden listing. I've imported several times from Britain; traded cuttings all around the country and Canada; sent bud wood to Europe on several occasions and seed to Australia a few times.

I've spoken to a number of rose societies over the years and at one of the old Huntington Symposium on Old Roses. My articles have been printed and reprinted in newsletters across this country and a few times in Europe. I've had the pleasure, and honor, of knowing some very knowledgeable, wonderful rose people and the great honor of having Ralph Moore, the rose breeder who lived in Visalia, California, who bred roses for nearly 80 years, as a good friend for nearly 25 years. I traveled to play in the roses with him as often as possible and learned a great many things from those visits. He introduced my first commercial seedling, Purple Buttons. I'm active in The Rose Hybridizers Association and learn of many new, fun and exciting things there. I trade seedling varieties with a number of other "amateur hybridizers" who also go in for the "esoteric".

I've gardened in the mid desert here in Southern California and worked with roses virtually on the water on the edge of the Pacific Ocean. I currently garden midway between the two with more humidity, more fog, a bit less heat and cold and much more disease than the desert, but many fewer issues than on the coast. That's given me a unique perspective of how greatly they can vary in appearance and performance from one climate to the next. I guess I've always been programmed as a 'diagnostician" as it has come very naturally to me. There is always a logical reason Natural things happen, whether we can see them or not.

I've actively tried to preserve and reintroduce as many obscure and rare roses as I possibly could for the past nearly thirty years, funneling the old, odd, rare and obscure varieties through any nursery which would take them on. Many have gone to Vintage, Ashdown, Pixie Treasures, The Rose Ranch, Sequoia and several others. A number of my roses are now commercially available in The Netherlands from Bierkreek and are finding their way across Europe. That's a fun thing to watch!

Currently, I make every effort to limit the roses to fewer than three hundred, not including my own, unnamed seedlings. I think by now, I've pretty much done everything possible with roses except exhibiting. That's just too much "work" for me. Kim

At times the guys at home depot have asked if I want an apron since I spend so much time there for the day job...so of course I had to park by the garden dept today. (and yes there is a $6 2g Sexy Rexy in the back of the truck-I have a section in the yard I was planting annuals or daylilies because I have dreams of a future project-guess I will have a Sexy Rexy in those holes for now)

After he loaded my work purchases, I loaded a few roses. One being....J. C.'s Rose, the others a Perfume Delight and Blue Girl.

How did your JC Rose turn out so far DustyRoseAZ?

The sprays are big enough to fill a vase and hold on the bush for what seems like forever. So far mine is a mannerly size and had had a spray or two for the past month.