Thinking about Charles XII, but can't find much experience with him.

Lynn

This is its third year, and I didn't cut back any canes except for minor frost damage. They grew up, then leaned, then went almost horizontal (but not flopping on the ground). Its first flush this year was rather amazing! So going by its parent, big flushes of blooms in Spring will come on laterals on old wood, with a few scattered flowers on new wood as well. Later in the season, flowers seemed to come on canes that were new in Spring but must have matured enough by Autumn to bloom.

Again, this isn't 'Charles XII' but its parent, 'Souvenir de Victor Landeau.' The other parent isn't listed -- it might even be a self-seedling. In any case, I thought perhaps seeing the growth habit of SdVL might give insight into CXII. And as far as blackspot goes, SdVL NEVER went naked, but did get minor spotting on leaves which were quickly shed. Overall, it stayed really clean -- especially for a Bourbon living in NJ and not sprayed with fungicides.

August 2012, four months after coming as a band from Vintage Gardens

April 2013 -- leafing out

First blooms May 22 and 23, 2013 were not fully double, but those on the next wave a couple weeks later were

June 13, 2013 -- look closely and you'll see the next wave of flower buds

Planted in the ground, August 31, 2013 -- it's just to the left of center, and its canes have naturally leaned to horizontal but stiff enough to keep from dragging on the ground. The whole plant is rather shaped like an octopus.

May 2014 -- 'Souvenir de Victor Landeau' stretches nearly the entire width of this pic, the base just behind its white name-tag

May 29, 2014 -- its first opening bloom

Flush beginning on right half of plant two days later

...and on the left half

...and on June 2, 2014 -- this is about half-way to full-flush (and the most recent pic I have of it, and yes, all those pink flowers belong to one plant of SdVL in its third year from a band)

Hope that gives an idea.

:-)

~Christopher

The way you document your roses is most helpful to me and I would guess others too. I hope you continue to show images of your garden as it continues to mature.

Lynn

I can add that the growth of 'Charles XII' is tendentially stouter than that of its parent 'Souvenir de Victor Landeau', so that--for me at least, in coastal So Cal--the thick main canes are upright, with the occasional lesser canes being more horizontal. The flower color and flower form are very different, however, between parent and child, with CXII having larger, more sumptuous blossoms.

The original specimen of CXII is still in my garden and productive. It also has a sibling, 'Gustavus Vasa', which differs in many ways and is a thoroughly likeable rose . . . but, try as I might year after year, I can't seem to get cuttings or layers of it to strike root, so it exists in only one ageing specimen, the original plant. GV's flowers are flat in form, and (unlike those of CXII) completely full; as you might imagine, it thus produces very few hips. The flower-color is a much deeper pink, approaching rose. The petals are narrower than are those of the lushly petaled CXII, and so more "old fashioned" in appearance. The habit is less "cane-y" and more "branchy," though still, like its sibling, a rose for against a fence or wall. I indeed had quite a large crop of vigorous seedlings, the crop which produced these two siblings. For lack of space, I had to discard before first bloom all but these two, when the crop was about three years old; since, once these two finally bloomed, they both were "winners," and each of the two different from the other, I've always regretted discarding all the other siblings, in which there were no doubt other fine Bourbons.

Cath