I shoveled 'Tea Clipper' last winter after quite a few years. Outstanding disease resistance, big gorgeous flowers, but very, very stingy. I got maybe 5 flowers a year from a large, ridiculously healthy plant. It just never improved. Perhaps in your very different climate, it will bloom like crazy.

Bishops Castle grows wider than tall here. Place it where you can smell the flowers, which have a wonderful fragrance. That one is not stingy at all.

Caveat: my climate is much different than yours.

I only have Crown Princess Margareta and Teasing Georgia on your list. Both have been blackspot resistant so far, and fairly vigorous growers. Mine are own roots from DA US, so these on their own roots should have enough vigor here in New Jersey. My TG wants to be a climber and has long, flexible canes, resembling Burbons in growth habit to my untrained eyes. I might peg it next season. The color is not nearly as deep as what I have seen on the internet, and I would describe it as pale yellow/whitish yellow.

My TG has developed root galls. I will have to treat in March or April. I read that TG is suspectible to developing galls. None of my other roses has any galls and I knew nothing about them, so I gave the biggest gall to my 2-year old to play with and throw a couple to the compost pile....

If TG does not shape up after the spring treatment, it is going to be shovel pruned.

Thanks a lot for the replies! It's nice to hear how these roses act all around the world. I have a question though:

The austin roses I do have are planted around 18 inches apart from each other, is that bad? It goes in the following order:

Benjamin britten ... Jude the obscure .. Brother cadfael .. Lady of Shallott .. Golden celebration .. William shakespeare 2000

Each one of them is planted roughly 18 inches from each other. Is that bad? I remember Austin saying to plant roses of the same type 18 inches apart from each other to get a bushier look, but if they are of different types is it really that much worse? Haha. Again I appreciate the feedback, and hope to get a response on my worry about spacing. Thank you.

Drew

Parden my French, but David Austin is full of it when he says "18 inches apart". On what planet will these tiny Austin roses be growing? Jude the Obscure, Brother Cadfael, and Golden Celebration can become very large roses. Of course this will depend on your growing conditions and climate, but my Brother is about 10 X 8 feet; Jude is about 9 X 7 feet; and GC is about 7 x 6 feet. Even if these are much smaller in your climate, I don't see how 18 inches could possibly allow enough space for these roses. I hope some NJ forum members chime in on this with size ranges for their Austins.
I apologize if I've terrified, you, Drew. Everything will work out. Diane
Here are BC and Jude at the beginning of 2012's season. By August they were 1-2 feet taller. The fence/wall behind them is about 9 feet tall.

I have some of those.

My experience with Tea Clipper is different than hoovb. It did take awhile to get going, but now has at least 4 big flushes. It wants to be a large bush/small climber in my yard.

TG is definitely a climber, it can put out 20' canes in my climate. It will need support and much more than 18 inches.

Bishop's Castle doesn't get as tall, but give it room because it's beautiful and the fragrance is amazing. It does get blackspot in my yard.

I have Mary Rose, but I'm thinking of shovel pruning it. It suckers terribly (yours will be own root so you will not have that problem) and it's base was invaded by ants a few years ago. It can be very octopussy and a bit stingy.

I love CPM, I am going to have to dig her up and replant because the county is going to do a project in my yard. But I have her own root, so I'm going to try to save her.

I planted my 3 Molineux 18-20 inches apart to create the appearance of one larger bush, but Molineux is small by Austin standards--maybe about 2 ft wide. I wouldn't plant most of the larger Austins that close--probably as a general rule leave 3-4 ft (center to center of each plant) between most of them, but some maybe leave even more space. Shakespeare 2000 can get nearly 6 ft wide in the Eastern half of the US--don't want to crowd plants like that. On the other hand, I don't think most of the Austins, planted in the Eastern half of the US, will grow as big as Nana's, but a number of them should get 3-4 ft wide at least.

I usually figure plant them so that, at their mature height and width, there is a very slight space between them for a bit of air.

Sorry I can't comment on any of the specific ones you listed, but I don't grow any of those. They are certainly pretty in the pictures though, aren't they!

Kate

I have to chime in and say Mary rose is one of my favorites. It was usually first to bloom in my old garden. Didn't lose all of its leaves over blackspot. I love the color and had a nice fragrance too! Interesting how they really vary in performance by garden!
I also had teasing Georgia and really liked it !
I totally agree with everyone regarding spacing .. 18 in is far too close. Mine were grown in pa ... And got pretty darn big !
Good luck ! I'm sure you'll enjoy them all.

I have had the Crown Princess since May 2012, bare root from Austin, so she hasn't really had a chance to show me yet what she can do. I ignored DA's 18". It just doesn't make sense given the size potential on the plants. I can tell you that her first year was normal for an own root baby, except she surprised me with four blooms early in July, about 6/7 weeks after planting, each with tons of petals, and fragrance that caught my nose from about 6 feet away, and about 2" across. They were absolutely adorable, as much because they were unexpected the first year as for their teeny tiny beauty. I have high hopes for her!

Thank you very much for the responses! I really appreciate the tips. Alright, so in January or so I'm gonna dig all of the roses in that bed out and move them farther apart from each other. I might actually move some around, now that they'll be out.

Diane - thanks a lot for the tip and the beautiful picture, if I must admit, I put cadfael and jude next to each other because of how beautiful yours looked! You are a great gardener (along with everyone else on here) and I always look forward to seeing your pictures.

Buford - thanks for giving me hope on TC! I almost regret getting it after buying it, THEN deciding to read reviews on it, which were about 75% mentioning his terrible rebloom. I'm hoping mine will do as well as yours.

Kate - always a pleasure to get advice from you, thank you! I have molineux as well planted next to Tess. She's still very small though (I got a smaller plant from chamblees so I'm sure it will take some time)

Lily finch - thanks for the advice! I can't wait for Mary rose. I also cannot wait for teasing Georgia, although I am worried that I read a lot about it being very pail, as opposed to the dark yellow pictures.

Thedogs - thanks for your advice, I cannot wait for CPM. It's weird, at first I always passed it assuming it wasn't my kind of rose and I wouldn't think twice about purchasing it. Then, I saw some other pictures of it, and loved them so much I bought 2 of them! However they are from heirloom, so I'm assuming it will take a lot longer to catch up to the size of your rose. It's alright, I'm sure it will be worth it. No one ever talks about the scent really, so I'm happy it wafts for you. What does it smell like?

Great talking with you guys, thanks again.

I will add a little to the comments. I have the white version of Mary Rose, Winchester Cathedral. It does well here, but is quite blackspot prone. It also sometimes reverts to the pink Mary Rose. Tea Clipper for me is only a once-bloomer. It does not repeat at all. It is a pretty apricot at first, but it turns to a dirty dishwater color, not attractive at all. Sir Edward Elgar is a must have in my garden. It is a bright, deep pink not too different from the color of the HT Electron if you know that one. It is my favorite pink Austin. William Morris has an attractive color, but I had to transplant it to a different location, and it is trying to re-establish itself. It has not been a very ambitious bloomer, but it is a bicolor. It wants to get lanky in growth.

From your second list and regarding the 18 inch planting distance, I would say no way to the 18 inch distance. I try for about 2-1/2 ft, but for many that is too small. Benjamin Britten is a monster here getting about 10 ft tall and 8 ft across if you let it. Lady of Shalott gets about 5 ft tall and about 8 ft wide if unpruned. William Shakespeare 2000 is also a lanky sprawler that wants to grow more sideways than tall. He can take up about 4 ft tall and about 8 ft wide if unpruned.

Drew -- to my allergic nose, CPM has a bright, fruity smell. It has to be strong as otherwise there is little chance I would be able to detect it.

Drew,
Thank you so much for ordering from Heirloom Roses. We're confident that you'll love our roses. There are some great comments and I concur on the comments regarding the planting distance. We would recommend no less than 2 feet and preferably, 3 to 4 feet. Our roses will seem small when they arrive but they grow really fast, 3 feet their first year, more with the climbers

Please feel free to give us a call if you have any questions: 800.820.0465

Thanks,
Ben Hanna
President, Heirloom Roses

Here is a link that might be useful: Heirloom Roses

I think there may be a misconception about Austin's recommendation of planting distances. It's my understanding that in order to make one big bush from some of his smaller roses (smaller in England, that is), he recommends planting three of the same variety in a sort of circular shape in order for it to look like one much bigger rose. I don't think he means that all Austins should be planted 18 inches from each other.

zone 6, don't worry about Teasing Georgia. The pic below was taken in May of this year (the beginning of its 3rd year in my garden.) It grew at least another 2 feet over the summer. It's my most prolific bloomer; it has tons of flowers at a time.

The color is apricot, not yellow, in my garden. Absolutely gorgeous rose bush. I just checked the Austin catalog, & you're right! It does show a bright yellow flower. But when I look at all those flowers blooming, I really don't care. It's an amazing rose. Hope you'll feel the same.

Thank you all very much for the replies! I understand that he wanted to have only three of one variety planted 18 inches apart from each other, but I figured since he did that, what if I planted a bunch of different roses next to each other, giving a bush effect of different roses. Now that I think about it, and after all what I read from comments and saw in pictures, I definitely will not be doing that! I have a question though, let's say I plant them 2 feet or 3 feet away from each other, but I get an occasional cane that's growing into another bush, so I just cut it back to the length of the bush, or peg it or something? I have a hedge along my fence in the backyard and definitely want to grow my roses there as well, different varieties of course, and figured 2.5 feet is good enough.

I can probably say my climate it similar to England, we do get real cold in the winter, however this weather has been very inconsistent lately. A week ago it was probably 10 degrees, and today it's 70. However my roses definitely don't bloom now, they are fast asleep after 2 heavy snowfalls in the past month.

Also, I understand some people say some roses fade, but is there any way to prevent fading? Maybe having the rose in partial shade? With my backyard it's tough, because a majority of it is full sun, but then you have those weird spots, that will get shaded towards late afternoon as a huge honeysuckle plant on our fence blocks the sun in the afternoon.

Last thing I want to mention. In the front of my house I have a long stretch of dirt, like maybe 8 feet long along the entrance to my house. I wanted to plant roses there, but it's only like 2 feet wide. I don't mind if they hang off a little because it's just my lawn on one side, and concrete on the other.
The back of the stretch only get direct sun (as in, the sun touches the plant) for probably 3-4 hours from like noon to 4 pm.

Which Austin's would bloom nicely in the back? I really want WS2000, jude, or golden celebration there, but at this point I want anything that will bloom nice There. I don't mind spraying or pruning. Any experiences?

Thanks again guys, I will give you pictures in the spring time to let you know how it goes!

This post was edited by zone6-nj on Mon, Dec 23, 13 at 21:50

Teasing Georgia was a blackspot mess for me. It grew like a climber the first year, with minimal blooms. The second year, it didn't grow at all, It didn't come back the third, and I didn't care.

18" isn't going to be enough space. The typical recommendation is 3' on center, meaning 3' from the center of one to the center of the next one, but it really depends on the growth habit of the plant. Also, many of the Austins have climbing habits that are kept in check by trimming or pegging.

Thanks a lot for the advice Diane, since TG is on my list of ordered roses I definitely appreciated the advice of how it grows in my own state. Hows the scent on Teasing Georgia? And does it tolerate shade?

I had purchased 20 DA roses from this company in Oct this year. They were tiny when I received them. So far they look healthy en have grown about 1'- 2' tall. I still have them in 2 gallon containers though since the weather here is very humid and wet. I was thinking to plant them in the ground when they are 3 feet tall.

I didn't get enough blooms to tell you about fragrance on TG, and mine was in full sun. I am reluctant to recommend any plantings in part shade, but your mileage may vary.

Thanks to FarmerD for answering the fragrance ? on CPM - and I totally agree. Very fruity, but a bit of musk also. I should say that I have a very hard time describing rose fragrances, but I do know what smells really, really nice and CPM has IT! At least, for me it does. I can't wait for spring here so I can see what she's going to do.
LynnT