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buford_gw

Be careful Rose Rustling....

buford
9 years ago

I was with a group of Rosarians at a local rose show. When we were at lunch we saw this magnificent rose in the parking lot. I thought it was multiflora, but not a wild one (It was part of a planting). We went up close and one of the group was taking cuttings. I decided to walk around to see how big the rose was (there may have been multiple plants, it was hard to tell) and I saw this:

{{gwi:270075}}

We all then put hand sanitizer on our hands! not that RRD could spread that way, but you never know. And of course, the cuttings were discarded.

Comments (6)

  • jerijen
    9 years ago

    !Que lástima! :-(

  • ingrid_vc so. CA zone 9
    9 years ago

    It's like beauty and the beast all in one! How fortunate that you spotted the beast part before someone took home cuttings.

    Ingrid

  • plan9fromposhmadison
    9 years ago

    I have to wonder how many old Roses have become infected by unknowing Rustlers, carrying mites on their clothing, or using cutting tools not disinfected between roses.

    As for rustling while AT a Rosarian's convention... I remember there being a Daffodil/Narcissus convention in Jackson, years back. I had seen a quick spot on the news about it. Anyway, I was driving along a newish highway, whose earthwork/grading was scarcely a decade old (as opposed to some old farm road somewhere), and saw a van from out of state, with a woman digging up a clump of Soleil d'Or (in full bloom), which someone had rather obviously planted as a highway beautification volunteer effort (there were many clumps there). Maybe she was not part of the Daffodil convention. But if she was, she was hardly being a good ambassador.

    I'm not saying that taking a discrete cutting from a bush that will surely be pruned in the normal course of grounds maintenance is the same as digging up a clump of narcissus. But it's good to be aware of what outsiders might perceive. Rustlers are responsible for the survival of most of our treasured antique roses. But impressions...

  • sammy zone 7 Tulsa
    9 years ago

    That picture is such a reality to me. I am in the process of digging up my beautiful rose because of those evenly spaced "RRD" growths.

    I wish there were some definite rules on how we can protect our other roses. Like you said, you used hand sanitizer, but I don't think anyone knows when the contamination stops or when the mites leave or die.

    Sammy

  • buford
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    The person who took the cuttings wrapped her pruners in a napkin and made sure she would clean them when she got home.

    We have so much multiflora near my home along the roadside. They seemed to have a really good bloom this year, that is the only time they are noticeable. The wild ones have much smaller flowers than this one did. So sad.

    I have one rose in my yard that had some symptoms on one cane, so I use separate pruners on that one. Actually I haven't pruned it at all since I took out the bad cane. I'm just letting it grow and watching it.....

  • anntn6b
    9 years ago

    "I have to wonder how many old Roses have become infected by unknowing Rustlers, carrying mites on their clothing, or using cutting tools not disinfected between roses"

    Something to know about the vector mites: they move on when they find they haven't landed on a rose. So the likelihood of them moving on someone's clothing is very slim.

    Only if someone were working with infected multiflora, and if it were the time of year when the mite populations surge, and if the mite happened to mistake a cotton or polyester for a rose cane...... odds are against this happening.

    The attempt to spread RRD (detailed in Doderick's MS and papers) by injecting fresh RRD-carrying plant material into rose canes failed. The thing about secateurs is that the cut is across xylem and phloem and may start as a crush of the cells. Crushed cells don't make good recipient spaces.

    And, once again, remember we can't prove a negative. We can only look at odds. We can't prove that no mite was ever carried on clothing. We can't prove cutting edge transfer of the Virus.

    So what is suggested remains a possibility, but IMO a very slight possibility.

    And, yes, I also clean my Felcos and my big loppers obsessively, just in case.