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| How bad were they early on and how good did they get? I'm mostly wondering about roses (or class of roses) which improved their disease resistance with a year or three (or more) maturity. It was speculated on another thread that this improvement might be related to environmental situations such as limited water--which would not be here where I get 47 inches of annual rainfall--that could best be addressed by the plant developing a bigger root ball with which to better access water. If you've got any other theories throw those out there too! This is a bit of a continuation of my thread on the Roses forum about when do you give up on a rose, but more disease specific and rose specific. Since everything I grow is OGRs I thought it might be a better to get into this over here. One thing about my own situation is that I'm not trying to grow a hundred different roses well; I'm trying to find a dozen or two that do spectacularly well in my own (mostly no spray) microclimate. I know that means I've got to be willing to shovel prune and I'm trying to get a sense of what my own indicators it's time to let one go should be. I'm more than happy to wait several years for a mostly healthy bush to get large and productive bloom-wise, (happy green plants make me happy blooms or not) but I'm not so sure I'm willing to wait as long for a mostly diseased rose to sort itself out if the chances are slim a mostly diseased rose can turn out spectacularly in a few years. Thoughts? |
Follow-Up Postings:
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| Most of my Teas increased their disease-resistance with maturity. Some to become disease-free, some to be acceptably disease-resistant. Mind, though -- I am in Southern California. Rain is increasingly rare, here. My experience is with rust and powdery mildew. Blackspot is rare here. Teas, as well, seem to grow low and spready for their first few years, and only start pushing strong, upright canes when they achieve some maturity. I can't assess their habit or their health when they're acting like groundcovers. :-) Jeri |
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| I've had several Austins that were quite wimpy their first couple years--didn't thrive, always seemed to be struggling, stayed small, rarely put out any bloom. During their weak, wimpy years, they often often seemed more susceptible to BS--I always assumed that was because their overall immune system was as weak and wimpy as the rest of the plant. In two cases that come particularly to mind, the Austins suddenly started putting out much stronger and more vigorous growth, with better blooms and reblooms-- after 4-5 years in the ground. At that point, they suffered considerably less from BS--because the plant was stronger and more resistant. My usual rule is to give a plant 3 years to shape up. However, if I really disliked the plant after I planted it, I'd probably get rid of it right away. And obviously, in the two cases mentioned above, I kept them longer than the 3 years because I kept hoping beyond hope that they would get better. Neither of those problem roses ever became heavy bloomers or strong resistors of BS, but they did finally achieve an "acceptable" state of blooming and BS resistance. (The roses were Anne Boleyn and Jubilee Celebration, if you are interested.) Kate |
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- Posted by poorbutroserich Nashville (My Page) on Sun, Dec 1, 13 at 20:23
| Hi Subk, All of my chinas, teas, HMs and Noisettes have been amazingly healthy from the get-go. Vigorous, beautiful plants. The OGRs that are "not healthy" for me seem to be the once bloomers needing winter chill. Gallicas look AWFUL in the Spring and then continue a cycle of "rust then defoliate" all summer. I have a few Damasks and they have done well. I have one Rugosa that has done well. My HPs have all been super suprisingly healthy. I'm trying some Portlands this spring and will be anxious to see how they do. I am like you, not trying to grow a bunch of roses but rather seeking to grow those that do their best in my garden. I'm in the "acquiring" phase primarily but I do have some that have been here a few years. Susan |
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| I planted Abraham Darby in the 1980's, and for years it was a blackspot magnet, but the roses it pumped out were beautiful, even during the heat of our Dallas summers. When I discovered alfalfa meal, I made a mixture and added that, and maybe it helped make it more healthy, it immediately improved; not perfect, but livable and being that the blooms are so gorgeous I can live with that! |
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| I can't really say that I've had the experience of a bad rose improving. When I first began gardening here six years ago my roses had no disease whatsoever and were disease-free for several years. As I planted more and more roses I began to have some mildew and then rust and blackspot. I live in a dry climate but the winter months and early spring are our rainy season and now there is always at least some mildew, although not all roses are affected. Badly affected roses that never improved, like Alexander Hill Gray, were removed after two years. I value roses like Le Vesuve, in spite of its vicious thorns, because of their disease resistance and ability to bloom in the dry heat. Some of my "good" roses, like Burgundy Iceberg, have deteriorated in terms of disease burden, in 5-6 years. I don't recall a single instance where a diseased rose has improved, but then disease has not been the main problem for me, but rather the dry heat. Tea roses that grow very quickly in a warm and humid climate grow much more slowly for me here. However, poor soil may also be a factor. In fact my experience is so atypical that I doubt that I've added anything useful to this discussion. Ingrid |
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| Some roses need to establish themselves and "get up a good head of steam" in order to strut their stuff. In my very first order of old roses was 'Jacques Cartier'. With high expectations, I planted it one Spring, not expecting much that year, because "the season" was already over; but I anticipated lots of flowers the next Spring. Au contraire. Though lots of buds formed, every single one aborted at a late stage and fell off the bush; the plant was still too small to support those lush full blossoms. Every year subsequently, however, it has been full of bloom. Another sort of improving with maturity would be the category of those which don't show their characteristic color(s) until well established. Many Teas are like this; but I notice it also with many "purple"-toned roses. And another sort would be those roses which are prone to disease or pests until they (a) get big and strong, and (b) develop a sort of biodiversity on themselves such that the bad fungi or bad insects can't take hold. Coincidentally enough, it was just this morning I was reflecting on all the roses which I now think I disposed of too soon, before they had a chance to settle in and show what they had to offer. Patience . . . patience . . . Roses which have at least some repute are owed your patience . . . |
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- Posted by mendocino_rose z8 N CA. (My Page) on Mon, Dec 2, 13 at 9:14
| Yes! Roses which have at least some repute are owed our patience. This is so true. I have grown so many roses of so many different types. I'm growing again now roses that I gave up on too soon in my early growing years. |
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- Posted by jeannie2009 PNW 7/8 (My Page) on Mon, Dec 2, 13 at 9:40
| Marchessa Bocella hardly grew for 2 years and had a chloratic (sp?) look. So I just treated it like the rest. Manure spring and fall and water once a week during the dry season. This past summer was her fourth season. Oh My. The fragrance is to die for. Her next door neighbor, Julia Child will have to be moved as The Marchessa's vigorous growth is crowding her out. Probably I should ignore all new roses and stop stressing about how they are doing. |
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| "...And another sort would be those roses which are prone to disease or pests until they (a) get big and strong, and (b) develop a sort of biodiversity on themselves such that the bad fungi or bad insects can't take hold..." Yes! This is the advice I often hear around here and the point of my original question is to find out some more specifics about roses that gardeners have had this improvement with. Can you talk to me about specific roses that have shown significant improved disease resistance in your garden with maturity. How often has a young rose that has more than 50% defoliation from disease turned out to be a very disease resistant mature rose in your garden? If I'm going to be patient I'd like some anecdotal evidence that what I'm being patient for has actually happened to someone. |
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| It depends a lot upon your own personal temperament. For myself, I try not to judge a plant negatively until: it's been in the ground, in a good location, with well prepared soil at least 3 years. And most plants I get are probably at least a year old to start. Some plants are exceptional from a band baby. But many really need that maturity time. I don't have any scientific data, but my observation is that even many HTs seem to improve in performance & disease resistance with maturity. Old garden roses like Chinas & Teas are very gangly awkward looking 'teenagers' for those first couple of years until they get enough cane growth to fill out into graceful shrubs. Besides being able to throw & support more blooms, the plants have larger & noticeably more fragrant flowers as they grow up. Just my anecdotal observations. Finally, in addition to giving the plant itself time to mature, a several-year trial gives a rose a better chance in your climate. (Hey, I want my 2" of rain EVERY month & 76 degree average temp. all year) |
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| Oh, specifically, Baronne Prevost, General Jack, Souvenir de la Malmaison, Contesse de Rocquigney, Reine des Violettes heck, MOST HPs & Bourbons start out for me with a few bare-nekkid canes topped with a fistful of cruddy leaves. But they seem to improve noticeably a bit each season until, by year #3, they have healthy leaves most of the year & those big fat wonderfully fragrant blooms that made them famous. |
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- Posted by Nippstress 5-Nebraska (My Page) on Mon, Dec 2, 13 at 16:31
| The obvious class of roses that clearly improves with time for most of us would be climbers. That's a class that needs more than 3 years before you give up on a given rose, and it's not just in the size that my climbers seem to improve. In early years, they can look like sickly little twigs, and I often wonder if they'll survive the summers, much less our winters. Needless to say, most of mine don't bloom much in their first years (Nahema and The Prince's Trust being notable exceptions for me), so it's too early to give up on them even at 3 years. For the shrubbier roses, the greatest improvement with maturity in an individual rose is in winter survival. I can't count how many hybrid teas and floribundas I've had to nurse through our zone 5 winters with the barest of hair-breadth survival, only to laugh off subsequent winters for the rest of the time. I suspect it has something to do with the cane structure being more substantial to withstand the winter, as well as a more well-established root structure if it's not remotely cane hardy. Along the way in their first summers, I'll notice the relatively wimpy HTs seeming more devastated by blackspot in their first year, but that's because you notice defoliation a lot more when the rose is only big enough to have 6 or 8 leaves to start with. That might be some of the improvement in disease resistance we see in our susceptible plants, though Paul Zimmerman quotes research saying roses do build up some resistance to BS as they age. The truly wimpy plants that don't improve over time are the ones where they were a weak specimen of that particular rose, like for me my first Memorial Day, Ebb Tide, and Valentine. Those have never gotten above 6 inches tall in about 5 years, but a more recent planting of a different specimen of Memorial Day is already 2 feet high and doing better. That's why I never give up on a particular variety of rose if I really want it until I've tried it under different conditions and different sources for specimen plants. I also agree that my HP plants tend to look spindly and blackspot ridden in their first year or two but grow out of most of that over time to be fairly trouble free for me. Cynthia |
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| Powdery mildew is the usual problem which roses can escape - although I suspect there are several factors at play rather than just maturity. Zephirine Drouhin had horrendous mildew until it raised its head above the level of the brick wall whereupon a clear demarcation between clean and mildewed foliage appeared at exactly the top of the wall. Improved air ventilation and a different way of growing it banished PM rather than a more efficient immune system. Blackspot and cercospora are changeable and seasonal but, as a rule, roses which are badly affected are always affected (and can get worse as they get older). |
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| I know my Riene des Violettes improved it's resistance to powdery mildew once it was fully mature. As a new plant it suffered from mildew dreadfully but it's 6 years old now and in the last two years for sure I haven't seen any mildew on it at all. |
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| The most notable change was perhaps with the Floribunda 'Fashion', a notorious rust-bucket. A French friend of mine aired the theory, which he had found borne out by experience, that if one stops spraying and leaves the plants alone for enough time, they'll develop resistance their own way. I thought that there was no better test of this attractive theory than 'Fashion', a rose with which I had had many years of experience and with numerous specimens at one point--rust and powdery mildew were inevitable, it seemed, even with ample spraying. I put my sprayer away to test this theory. The first year, I had my doubts. But then, over the next couple of years, to my complete astonishment, 'Fashion' indeed did become all but completely fungus-free. If you don't know 'Fashion' as I do, you won't realize what a complete miracle this is. I now no longer spray any roses at any time. Well, maybe if I see some touches of powdery mildew, I give the roses a stiff spray of water; but that's it! Some roses--I'm looking at you, 'Yolande d'Aragon'--will have their month-long fling with rust or whatever; but then the affected leaves drop off, and the new ones are fine. Give Mother Nature a chance to take care of things, is what I've learned. |
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| odinthor, if only it were that simple in my garden. I've never sprayed and yet my roses are now more affected by diseases than ever before. My roses all started out without any disease and stayed that way for several years. No one anywhere near me was growing roses. As I began to grow more I believe I introduced blackspot, mildew and rust into my garden through new roses I bought. This year more roses are affected than last year, and blackspot is a lot more prevalent. It's not so bad that it disfigures the garden but it does create a certain level of annoyance in me. Ingrid |
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- Posted by happyret65 w/wa (My Page) on Tue, Dec 3, 13 at 16:00
| I agree that it probably is better not to spray. When we are creating a new garden and each year more rose plants show their hopeful blooms, it's hard not to bring in the bad. I didn't spray last year and what a mess. In the future if I bring in a new plant it will be sprayed for the first year. |
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| Ingrid, going by the "theory," the implication would be that your newer plants introduced newer strains of the various diseases which thus weren't controlled by existing counter-forces, and that "in due course" the appropriate biodiversity will develop to control (not necessarily eliminate) the problems. happyret65's idea of spraying new-to-the-garden roses (to eliminate new-to-the-garden diseases) is a good one for those who want to go medelvägen ("the Middle Way")--that is, who want to spray a little now to pave the way for future non-spraying. |
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- Posted by kittymoonbeam 10 (My Page) on Tue, Dec 3, 13 at 21:36
| Papa Meilland had less powdery mildew as he grew taller and had better air circulation and sunshine. The same is true for Sterling Silver. The most changed rose is Crepuscule. This little one sat and sat until this year when she finally started growing long canes. I know that's not disease related but what a difference a few years made with this rose. I'm glad I had the patience to wait. |
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- Posted by sherryocala 9A Florida (My Page) on Thu, Dec 5, 13 at 23:54
| General Gallieni. Definitely most improved. So glad I hung in there. Sherry |
Here is a link that might be useful: If only sweat were irrigation..
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| I still can't bring myself to spray, no matter what, so the roses will have to battle the diseases the best way they can. Hopefully in a few years, if I don't bring in more new roses, the good will win over the bad and I'll have relatively little disease. Ingrid |
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- Posted by gnabonnand Zone 8 Texas (My Page) on Fri, Dec 6, 13 at 20:15
| Seil mentioned Reine des Violettes. I will too. Mine seemed like a delicate plant for the first few years and was occasionally a little chlorotic. It quickly became one of my favorites due to its unparalleled fragrance, lack of any thorns, unique bloom color, and flat smooth blue-green leaves. What I didn't expect was that after a few years, when fully established, it's become one of my toughest rose plants. I will always grow it. Randy |
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