If I have raved over 'Vanguard', it's only fair that I also list my biggest disappointment of the "new-to-me" roses. If I set aside my concerns over several roses from last year that didn't make it through the drought (and thus may not have been given a fair chance), my most disappointing new rose is 'Frühlingsmorgen'. 'Frühlingsmorgen' (or "Spring Morning") is a Hybrid Spinosissima bred by Wilhelm Kordes II in 1942. The large pink and white single flowers are very attractive on any given website, including helpmefind, but my young specimens do not resemble any picture I can find of this rose. I obtained two 'Frühlingsmorgen' from Heirloom Roses last year and while both have single blooms, the resemblance stops there.
Mine start as uniform very light pink (no "halo" effect of pink surrounding primrose yellow centers), and they fade very quickly, within hours, to white. More importantly, even though they are young roses and 2-3 feet tall at this time, the blooms are perhaps one inch in diameter, a far cry from the 4 inch diameter blooms that are supposed to come from this rose. My specimens also appear less thorny than other website pictures of this rose.
The foliage is healthy, although not very Spinosissima-like. These roses, whatever they are, were hardy enough without winter protection so I can't complain on that end. If they didn't start out pink, however, I would think that I had been given more 'Darlow's Enigma'. If anyone has any other ideas, I'm happy to hear them. Perhaps the very moist stigmas of these flowers will aid in the identification. I expect the female parts of flowers to be moist to collect pollen, but these seem almost overly....sticky. Gooey. I don't mean to be a prude, but they are almost embarrassing in an anthropomorphic sort of way (click the photos to blow them up). I've looked for similar roses on Heirloom's web site and nothing else seems likely there. I know that sometimes young roses don't resemble their mature forms, so I guess I'll wait this one out, although I've got a year now to wait, since 'Frühlingsmorgen' is a once blooming rose. Perhaps this rose will yet quiet my worries and have the yellow fall foliage that is characteristic of 'Frühlingsmorgen'. If I'm very lucky.
