Okay, okay, what monster did I create? Maybe not a Killer Rose as Frances once grew in her garden but a MONSTER rose nonetheless. I am kind of like Dave in that I like to propagate my own plants. I take many, many cuttings. Anything is fair game for me and I am game to try just about every pretty flower I see.
Three years ago during a beautiful spring I passed by a gorgeous rose bush in full bloom on my way to work. I stopped and smelled the roses-so to say. The next time I passed the rose bush, I had my clippers and snipped three four inch cuttings. The cuttings remained in a vase on my desk at work all day then got stuck in some soil when I got home later. One cutting took and the result is to the left and above. Or actually I should say this is the plant after a severe pruning and taming. It is not supposed to look this way at all.
Coming from New England I tend to have romantic views of my garden. I envision pergolas draped with roses and tons of windblown perennials providing non-stop riotous color in my garden. The problem is that I do not have much sun in my garden. The only really sunny spot is located on this south facing wall where my garage and office is located. I have visions of a pergola shading my garage and providing support to a lovely rose-the one I propagated. Something kind of like this pergola (picture from this website) will do just fine. Do you see the cedar shakes? Typical coastal New England if I remember correctly. I love it! The problem for me has been time and the availability of materials has slowed down my plans for the wonderful pergola and it has not been built, however, my rose will not wait.
It wants to grow now!At first the rose stayed kind of small. It is a nice rose. It blooms once per year with small white blooms which are fragrant. The foliage is semi-evergreen and free from disease all the time. It grows fast and has flexible canes, just perfect for a pergola. But this rose has many thorns and is a vigorous grower. So vigorous it was growing into the nearby clematis arbor and across the sidewalk, onto the parking area, into the house and across the garage door. Ouch! The rose was never bothered by misplaced footsteps or errant tugs when an unsuspecting victim walked by. Nope, on it grew and grew.
I decided to take action to control the rose until Mr. Fix-it and I can build our pergola. What to do? I did not want to chop the rose all the way down to a manageable height, but also could not have it growing willy nilly all over the garden. At the same time the rose had to be in a position so that when the pergola was built it could easily be laid over across the supports.
Fortunately I had a few trellises laying around. I took two and also two long boards (left over from another project), joined them all together in a ladder fashion, pulled and tugged and pruned the monster, then stood up my new trellis. The tallest board worked perfectly as it fit under the eave, giving me a place to secure it to the house. Problem fixed. The monster rose is secured and out of our way (at least for now), and the garden is tidied up. The rose had to be a full 15 feet tall, if not taller. I cannot believe it grew so fast in not even three years.
The trellises hold it up for now, and it is blooming...for yet another year has come and gone, and no pergola yet....
in the garden....
Good morning Tina, your rose bush seems to be quite happy. Isn't it amazing how large those climbers/ramblers can go? I would have it too, fragrant roses are great!! For pruning's sake I am sorry it is so thorny.
ReplyDeleteHi Tina, thanks for the link love my friend! I believe this could very possibly be the same rose as Killer from your description, Alberic Barbier. Everything you have said about it matches up, especially the growth rate. Our final Killer was from a cutting too, a piece that had rooted in the leaf filled gutters! Once blooming, white with sweet scent, smallish flowers and the unmistakable growth rate all point to it. Make that arbor/pergola out of six by sixes! :-)
ReplyDeleteFrances
Hi Tina! Good morning. A nice fix for the possibly killer rose! I do love arbors draped with fragrant roses and clematis. Too many trees to get that look here! I remember when I bought my first garden book about roses...there was a photo of a climber that had climbed to the top of a very tall tree! Could it have been Alberic Barbier? Have a good day...looks like sunshine may be in the forecast! gail
ReplyDeleteGood idea for a fix until you can do what you want. I love that you have "a few trellises laying around" How perfect is that! :)
ReplyDeleteHave a great day Tina.
Morning all,
ReplyDeleteJanet, this guy can't be stopped. Not sure if that is a good thing.
Frances, I was afraid you'd say that. I am not so sure if I should keep it then. I passed on a few cuttings to others too. Uh oh. It's so pretty but so darn thorny! 6 x 6s it'll have to be:)
Gail, It might very well have been. This guy goes all day and then some. I hope a trellis corrals him!
Linda, The new trellis helps a bit. Of course the wind blew it down and I had to put it back up, but hey, at least we can walk by somewhat:)
Everyone have a great day!
The front of my house has cedar shakes under the two front windows--the guy who re-sided it wanted to remove them and re-side them as well, but I insisted they stay--it's the only thing of interest on my house--and he agreed in the end I was right! I know just what you mean about wanting riotous color but having too much shade. My shade/sun is all wrong--the front garden has full shade from the house in the morning and HOT FULL sun (facing west) in the afternoon. Ah, life.
ReplyDeleteSend a cutting my way, I have places all over for willy nilly.
ReplyDeleteTina -- you sound like you have the heart of a cottage gardener! I have those romantic notions about my garden, too.
ReplyDeleteYour rose trellis is working and your beautiful rose is blooming! I'd say the glass if half full, not half empty.... a real joy to see the blooms climbing up there in such splendor.
Have a great day!
(it got down to 40 degrees here last night and The Musician has declared this "gardening day" when he will dig up some shrubs we hate and do the mulching!).
Cameron
I've always been terrible with rose cuttings! Monster roses are okay with me, the bigger the better.--Randy
ReplyDeleteI certainly have zone envy when it comes to growing roses. When I lived in Alabama we had a Lady Banks cascading over the garage roof and ramblers over the porch. Up here, 8-feet tall is all we can get from a climbing rose. Kind of pathetic;)
ReplyDeleteMarnie
I wonder if the rose "cutting" my wife got from a neighbor is the same as yours? It's white, and very fragrant. I'll have to take some pictures once it blooms and compare them to yours. The dern thing is growin like a bean sprout! And geesh is it ever thorny too! OUCH!
ReplyDeleteTina,
ReplyDeleteThe trellis you put together looks great. Of course you could always take a few more cuttings and start them when you have the arbor you want built. But you do have a good head start on that rose now!
Too bad you don't know the name of this rose--one that grows that fast in three years is pretty amazing. You've come up with a great solution to tame it until you can get your pergola built. I have dreams of a flower-covered pergola, too, but then, being married to Mr. Procrastinator, I have lots of unfinished project dreams:)
ReplyDeleteI can't believe it grew that fast. It's funny when sometimes you don't want things to grow fast they do and when you wish they would they take forever. I really like the idea of your new pergola, it'll look great when you have time to make it. Until then it sounds like you came up with a great solution.
ReplyDeleteI wonder which rose it is. It certainly looks happy and healthy!
ReplyDeleteIt looks great and I would also love a few cuttings of it.
ReplyDeleteMonica, I sympathize with the sun thing. It is one of those things we so cannot change. Cedar shakes? Love em!
ReplyDeleteDawn and Mom, You might hate me later when it takes over the world but I'll start you some plants soon.
Cameron, Oh yes! Awesome day in the garden. Hope you guys get much accomplished. I sure wish I could convince Mr. Fix-it to mulch! We unfortunately are still combining houses and hopefully I'll get to the garden myself one of these days. I'm still mulching too. Urgh!
J & R, This is a pretty easy rose once you get it going. Nothing special needed to root it but oh my does it grow!
Marnie, this particular rose may work well up there. I'll try to research it. Lady Banks are supposed to be so nice-no thorns.
TC, Very possible as this rose sure seems to get around!
Dave, That is really the smartest thing to do. Restart a rose but I keep saying I'm going to do this pergola. I have all supplies except the crossbeam and time. The most important part!
Rose, Oh yes, too many unfinished projects. Gee it is rough. The older I get the less I get done and so it goes. Hope you are planting today and feeling better:)
Catherine, I didn't even post a pic of the base but you would not believe the number of canes coming. Too many and I so hate to cut them out. Guess I'll start some cuttings.
SweetBay, Probably Alberic Barbieri based on France's 'Monster' rose she grew and how vigorous this is. Sounds like it. A beautiful one time bloomer and fragrant, but oh those thorns. I did not think they would be a problem on an arbor, but with it growing so vigorously they escape to snatch people and nearby clematis. Ouch!
Mom, You bet!
Hi Tina~ Don't you hate it when you get a vine/climber that just takes over everything? Then you have to deal with the guilt over whether or not you should get rid of it. Hope you get that pergola soon and in the meantime I think the trellis structure you made looks really nice!
ReplyDeleteThe rose and clematis make a lovely contrast to each other.
Happy gardening!
A great trellis and rose to boot! I do not have any rose's in my garden but should in my Granmothers name as she had a beautiful Rose Garden. But I have never had luck with them. This one sounds like it could be a winner in any garden though....
ReplyDeleteWhat a cool fix to your killer rose problem. I think it's wonderful that you were able to grow it from a cutting. Pretty awesome!
ReplyDeleteHow I wish I could grow roses. I've got only 3 in my garden and they are always in sad shape with either black spot or rose slugs. I spray, I fertilize and still not much luck. They bloom nicely for about 1 week and then they are a mess in the yard the rest of the summer. I don't think they have enough sun. I also don't think I have a disease resistant variety - I inherited these roses - so I'm thinking of pulling them out and trying a better variety. -Jackie
ReplyDeleteAnother creative solution from Tina! Have you ever read "People with Dirty Hands"? - there's a chapter in there about the Texas Rose Rustlers. This made me think of that!
ReplyDeleteit s one for me, I love monster roses ;-)))
ReplyDeleteTina, roses don't do well here so even a monster rose sounds nice to me. The blooms look lovely and on the pergola--they're going to look great! Btw, I like your trellis too!
ReplyDeleteI am with you on visions of rose covered pergolas Tina. I'd like them in my garden too but don't have one either. I think you have a better chance of actually getting one made than I do! You're pretty resourceful at coming up with solutions like this one. That rose (whatever it may be) is certainly vigorous.
ReplyDeleteHi Tina,
ReplyDeleteLove your solution to the problem. I too had illusions about roses on an arbor with a swing {maybe} under it. But no, I have my monster growing down the top of my chain link fence. It's at 3 sections now. I'm waiting to see if it will get any longer. I also have it on an arbor---had to trim severely last fall. Now it's full of blooms---looks great. Your white one sure would look good with my pink one.
That is one vigorous rose! I wish my climbing Bonica looked so healthy. She's a bit spindly this year. :( Clever you to use what you had on hand, hope you are able to get that arbor of yours built soon now that Mr Fix it is home for good. (hint hint, lol) ;)
ReplyDeleteOh good. I'm not the only one who has temporary garden fixes that live on for years. Isn't it amazing how time flies. But it looks good as it is, so nice work!
ReplyDeleteTina, I too would love rose draped pergolas in my garden. I am always envious when I see them in magazines. I guess I will just have to settle for seeing roses like yours. :) I think you have the beast tames-at least for a while. Great job!
ReplyDeleteI live in an area well-known for roses. Yet I have such trouble growing them. Haven't quite figured it out. But I've only lived here four years. Maybe I'll get the hang of it eventually.
ReplyDeleteBrenda
I once rescued a wild and crazy rose too, and it certainly took hold. But I left it behind at my old house, and often wonder how big and crazy it looks now!
ReplyDelete