Mary Rose and Cuthbert Grant

Sometimes, even ProfessorRoush wonders if the real purpose of his blog is to herald the joy of roses to the world at large, to serve as an outlet for pompous written expression or fire-fanning frustration, or merely to sound the gong of life and proclaim the joy of breathing still.  Today however, there is no hidden message, no subtle cynicism to digest.  I simply love the photo at left and so I'll discuss the rose in the foreground as a pretense for displaying the photo here.

The floriferous subjects here, taller and deep red Canadian rose 'Cuthbert Grant' behind pink and demure English rose 'Mary Rose', came together in a moment of May, 2013 to form a photo engrained in my memory.  I don't know if it was the lighting or the quiet evening ambiance or the wine color of 'Cuthbert Grant', but it remains one of my favorite impromptu garden pictures, imperfectly composed  and focused as it is.



'Mary Rose'

I've discussed 'Cuthbert Grant' before, and he remains one of my best Canadian roses, but I haven't touched on 'Mary Rose' until now.   She was one of the earliest David Austin roses I ever grew, and while she is not my favorite English rose, she has earned a place by persisting in this shady spot, thriving some years and barely hanging on in others.  'Mary Rose', or AUSmary, is a medium pink shrub rose introduced in 1983.  She is cluster-flowered, with double cupped blooms that are infused with a heavy fragrance.  She blooms in flushes, not quite continually, and her only real failings in my eyes are those delicate petals, short-lived in the ravages of my prairie winds.  I don't get to enjoy these blooms long outdoors, so I cut them and bring them in as I find them.  She is stout, seldom over three feet high and wide in my garden, and generally healthy, although she can lose her skirt from blackspot in humid weather.  This daughter of 'Wife of Bath' and 'The Miller' does seem to be reasonably hardy in Zone 5, experiencing some cane dieback, but she is seldom nipped to the ground. 

Average roses on their own, together the colors of these two roses are perfectly suited partners, the strong hues of the regal gentleman and the coy complexion of his shy lady blending seamlessly to complement each other.  If all the tints of a garden and all the marriages of men and women mirrored the devotion and bond between these two, as strong as the connubiality of myself and Mrs. ProfessorRoush (publicly avowed here in the interests of my continued health), then the world would be a better place and the garden a more beautiful one.

Squatting Dark Lady

'The Dark Lady'

I suppose that ProfessorRoush could be faulted for ignoring many popular roses with my primary focus on Griffith Buck, Ag Canada Roses, Old Garden Roses and Hybrid Rugosas, but I do grow a few roses that are perhaps more widely known and viewed as "modern."  Among those are a few of the David Austin roses, but just a mere few because I find they don't always do well in my climate and I tire of wasting money on them.  Devoted readers know that I really like 'Heritage', and that I persist with 'Golden Celebration', and you may remember that I thought 'Benjamin Britten' was a nice rose until I lost it last year to Rose Rosette.  You may not know that I've failed with about 6 or 8 others.



I also grow an early Austin rose, 'The Dark Lady', on her own roots and she has survived a number of years to produce these big, very-double fragrant blooms for me.  In fact, I once moved her and she came back from a forsaken root, so I have two growing in my garden and both are passable representatives of their clan.  She does not need any preventative maintenance for blackspot in my climate, but I wouldn't call her a vigorous rose, and you can see from the photo at the left that our recent rains have left her a bit bedraggled.  According to one anonymous post at a website, "feeding her bananas" will take care of the weak necks, but I'm a bit skeptical of such an easy fix.

'The Dark Lady', otherwise known as 'AUSbloom', is a shrub rose bred by Austin prior to 1991, and she throws dark magenta-blue flowers of 100 to 140 petals for me, although Austin describes the color as "dark crimson."  Helpmefind.com lists her as having a bloom diameter of 3.25 inches, but many of the flowers in the photo above are around 4 inches in diameter.   She does repeat with several flushes over a season, but I wouldn't call her a continuous bloomer.  The poor woman is described as being 4'X 5', a little wider than she is tall, and I would agree with that unflattering shape description with the exception that she seldom gets more than about 2.5' X 3' for me in a season.  She is moderately cane hardy here, with some dieback each year but usually not to the ground.   Her heritage is a little perplexing;  helpmefind.com/rose lists here as a cross between 'Mary Rose' and 'Prospero', but Austin's website says she has a R. Rugosa parentage.  The latter, if true, would help explain the hardiness and the somewhat rough matte foliage.  And perhaps the color.

According to the David Austin Roses website,  Austin named 'The Dark Lady' after "the mysterious Dark Lady" of  Shakespeare's sonnets.  In those somewhat heated sonnets, we learn that Shakespeare's mistress had black hair, dun-colored skin, and raven black eyes. In several places, Shakespeare suggests that she wasn't that pretty ("In faith I do not love thee with mine eyes, for they in thee a thousand errors note"), and that she also had bad breath ("And in some perfumes is there more delight, than in the breath that from my mistress reeks").  Always the contrary, cynical professor, I think Austin misnamed this rose because she is a very beautiful rose and her fragrance is strong and sweet.  At least, in my opinion.

Heritage of Blooms

'Heritage'

It occurred to me last weekend, and I find it incredibly hard to believe, that I've somehow overlooked blogging about David Austin's 'Heritage' rose before now. 

'Heritage' has a prime spot in my landscape, right out in front of the house towards the right corner, next to the driveway and walkway.  That site is on the west side of the house and she gets a little less sun (maybe 8 hours/day at the height of summer) than some of my roses, but she seems none the worst for the partial shade.  She is about 8 years old, own root, and she's a tall vase-shaped rose (about 6 feet tall) with a lot of presence in the border.  That first bloom, with all those shell-pink delicate blossoms, is a stunner.

'Heritage', or 'AUSblush', has always been a healthy bush for me, with little blackspot and no mildew.  I don't spray her healthy, glossy dark green foliage, but I do provide a little extra water to this bed at the height of summer because it tends to dry out fast with the hot afternoon sun.  She has strong erect canes, never slouching or breaking to the wind, and I commonly go into Spring with between 10 and 15 healthy strong canes on this rose after pruning.  Winter hardiness in my formerly Zone 5B climate was and still is very good, with no dieback noted in most years.


'Heritage' was released by Austin's English Roses breeding program in 1984. Classified as a shrub rose, like many of Austin's creations, she bears light pink, fully double flowers of up to 40 petals that are 4 inches or so in diameter. The flowers are, as advertised, very fragrant when you bury your nose in them, but this is not a rose that I've noticed perfuming the air around it, no matter how prolific the bloom.  I've also found that she doesn't last very long in a vase, but her initial beauty keeps me bringing those blooms inside to stay in the good graces of  Mrs. ProfessorRoush.   She keeps her few thorns to herself (the rose, not Mrs. ProfessorRoush), and is ladylike in her manners, and so she is safely placed near my walkway to the front door.  A tetraploid rose, her parentage is described as a seedling X 'Iceberg'.  Knowing that, I'd like to add that 'Heritage' is a much healthier rose in Kansas, in my experience, than 'Iceberg', who seems to be a better rose everywhere else than here.

I only grow a few English Roses, among which are 'The Dark Lady', 'Mary Rose', and 'Golden Celebration', but so far 'Heritage' would be my pick for Kansas, since the bloom form, hardiness, and health of the bush are more dependable than the others.  It is not an accident that this rose is likely the first that a visitor to my house would encounter. 

Golden Celebration

If there has been a bright spot in this rainy May of rose floriferousness failures, it has been the way that the English rose 'Golden Celebration' has begun to grow on me.  I've never been a great fan of the English roses, but this year I would be hard pressed to tell you why.  'Heritage' has always been a standout in my front garden, but after 'The Dark Lady' sulked for several years, and 'Mary Rose' dwindled in the shade, and 'Benjamin Britton' failed to wow me with color, I was less than enthusiastic about adding more of that tribe to my garden.  This year, all these and more have perked up to be the stars of my garden, perhaps not coincidentally in a year where May has been as cold and rainy as the British climate they were bred and chosen for.  Could it be that simple?

My 'Golden Celebration' is beginning its third year in my garden and it is quickly becoming the blooming apple of my eye.  It is about three foot tall and wide now, completely free of blackspot to this point, and it blooms like a cup-shaped sunbeam in the midst of the dreary rain-soaked garden. Yes, very double 3-4 inch flowers bend over with each rain, but a little sunshine perks up them back up to face the sky.  That bright golden-yellow color, reminiscent to me of 'Graham Thomas', does not seem to fade from bud open to the fall of those hundreds of notched petals.  One reason for my change in heart about this rose is its fragrance.  I knew 'Golden Celebration' was a fragrant rose, but I had occasion to compare it this week against 'Variegata de Bologna' and 'Madame Hardy'.  To my immense surprise, there was no contest.  'Golden Celebration' now gets the prize for the strongest fragrance in my rose garden, a heady fragrance like  fruity tea.

'Golden Celebration' (AUSgold) is a 1992 introduction by David Austin but it was slow to cross the Atlantic. It is supposed to mature at four feet tall and I expect it to reach that height this year.  This child of 'Charles Austin' and 'Abraham Darby' seems to be cane hardy here in Zone 5b and I saw no dieback at all this past winter.  I've never grown 'Charles Austin', but this specimen of 'Golden Celebration' seems much more vigorous and hardy than 'Abraham Darby', of whom I killed several before I gave it up as a lost cause.  Right now, as 'Golden Celebration' takes its rightful place as a star in my garden, the only drawback I can see to it is that I planted it too close to an own-root start of 'Double Delight', which it threatens to overwhelm soon.  I'll undoubtedly move the 'Double Delight', since I now can't risk losing 'Golden Celebration'.

Addendum 6/4/12;  I feel obligated to add that in July of 2011, and now in June of 2012, Golden Celebration has proven to be somewhat susceptible to blackspot and may not be suitable in a non-spray garden.  The lower leaves have dropped and a fair portion of the foliage is affected.