Blush Hip

'Blush Hip'

Friends, ProfessorRoush had every intention of running another beauty pageant this week, perhaps one among red roses or irises or peonies, but I'm a bit addled by all the roses blooming and wanted to show you a surprise standout this year.  Most years I would keep her hidden in a closet, tending the stove or the boiler, but this year 'Blush Hip' is the debutante of the ball, Cinderella with her slipper.

'Blush Hip'

'Blush Hip' is an old Alba that's been growing and slowly dying in my garden for 20 years.  She's a small lass for me, never over 3 feet tall, and since she is sited next to a taller 'Therese Bugnet', she has always struggled for sunlight.   She has also been out-competed by an invasive Woolly Verbena (Verbena stricta) that grew up in her center and tried to smother her.  The verbena has roots that grow up to 12 feet down and it reaches 5 feet tall so it  competes for water and light and nutrients and I have a devil of a time exterminating it where it chooses to grow in the best of circumstances.   I pull it and pull it and it just comes back from those deep roots, and glyphosate or 2-4-D is not an option in the middle of a valued rose.  I wage a constant battle on behalf of this rose and last year I doubled my verbena-cidal efforts in an attempt to rejuvenate 'Blush Hip' and ensure her survival.

'Blush Hip'

Thankfully, it seems I'm winning at present because 'Blush Hip' has responded and bloomed its heart out this spring with only a small clump of verbena still hanging on.  'Blush Hip' deserves the victory, for she is a rare Old Garden Rose of unknown provenance.  She was known to exist before 1834, but introduced in Australia as 'Blush Hip' 1864.  Her flower is as described and as pictured, nicely double and light pink with a strong fragrance, but both helpmefind.com/rose and Peter Beales in his Classic Roses describes her as a 6-10 foot tall rose, so either I was sold a pig-in-a-poke or she simply doesn't like the Kansas environment.   She is reliably winter-hardy here and free of disease, so I'll take what I have, especially when she blooms like she is this year.   Despite her name, however, she doesn't form seed hips, just the "hips" or "buds" of flowers.   My Botanica's Pocket Roses, itself a misnamed 1007 page monstrosity that doesn't fit in any pocket, says that many rosarians describe her as the best of the Alba roses.   

'Leda'

I can't agree, however, with "many rosarians", if indeed 'Blush Hip' is what I have, for although the flowers are pretty, there's just something I'm not crazy about with the color of the "blush", the pink having a blueish tinge that leaves me cold.  Or maybe I just like my pink on the edges rather than in the center.  I much prefer the blooms of  her near neighbor, 'Leda', 3 doors down, another Alba blooming well this year, although I've also had my frustrations with 'Leda', truth be told.  Wait two minutes too long in bright sunlight and those ruby-edges fade to white and she's just a gangly white double rose.   Or catch her after a rain or a heavy dew and the edges of the petals are already browning and she inspires no love at all.  But, once in a moon, if you catch 'Leda' blooming just at the right moment, usually a newly-opened bud at mid-morning when its not yet too hot and it hasn't rained and you're very lucky, then she has no equal.   Like the jewel pictured here.   Beautiful, but one of only two or three on a bush with hundreds of faded blossoms present at the moment this was taken.

A Beautiful Blemished Rose

ProfessorRoush has waited for years to discuss 'Lèda', the classic painted Damask rose.  I've waited because she never seemed to have a good year; as a young bush she often had only a few flowers that would always be destroyed by Spring rains, fungus, storms, or various other environmental influences.  This year, I believed, was Lèda's year.  She was not hurt at all by our tough winter, keeping her three foot stature without dieback.  Hundreds of perfect buds followed, the bush loaded with the promise of delicate beauty about to be revealed for my world.  An early flower opened to tease me with a taste of heaven.


And then she disappointed me once again.  Rains in May, just as the photo at the right was taken, turned the rest of the ready-to-open blossoms to brown botrytis-blighted mops right as they began to open.  The few that opened completely were marred, beauty stolen in the night.  Hundreds were completely browned, with a very few only mildly disfigured, like the flower pictured below.  Even worse, I think her annual problems are entirely limited to me since she is raved about in every other reference I can find.  Perhaps the former Queen of Sparta is still mad about Zeus seducing her in the guise of a swan but for some reason she only displays her anger here on the Kansas prairie.



'Lèda', also known as the Painted Damask rose, is a near white Damask bred before 1827.  She has a strong fragrance and displays, when she's not marred, a very double, reflexed, button-eye bloom form.  Some sources say she has repeat later in the season, but I've never seen it.  That's too bad, because later blooms in my annual dry July or August might not be damaged.  In my garden, at 5 years old, she's reached 3 feet tall and across, a round bush with dark green foliage.  The foliage and bush, at least, are healthy.  

I'm about to give up on 'Lèda'.  Her beauty is either not meant for this world, or at the very least not meant for Kansas.  To paraphrase Longfellow, "When she is good she is very very good, but when she is bad she is horrid."

Vie et mort dans le jardin

The Spider and the Fly is a poem by Mary Howitt (1799-1888), published in 1829. The first line of the poem, "Will you walk into my parlour?' said the Spider to the Fly," is one of the most quoted lines of poetry, although I would guess that most of us wouldn't know anything about the author or the rest of the poem.

The quoted line sprang quick and sure into my mind when I looked at this recent photo of 'Leda', the multicolored Alba that so vexes my rose-growing abilities.  The second line of the poem, "'Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy," certainly fits this blushing rose; so delicate and beautiful if caught at the right moment.  This spider set up shop on main street, following classic marketing principles of visibility, attractiveness, and access.  Business, it appears, is good in this neighborhood.

I don't think I knew the spider and the fly were there when the photo was taken.  Still, here they are, caught up in the struggle of life and death within my garden, a still life in my personal version of an NSA spy drone, the camera lens of my Canon capturing the moment.  I wonder, does the spider care that I've captured it in the moment of conquest?  No matter that the gardener thinks he controls the garden, I am reminded again that I am merely another tool in this garden; a tool to provide water and mulch and flowers for the vast symphony of life that ebbs and flows beneath the surface.

Howitt's poem is a cautionary tale to warn the unwary about evil creatures who use flattery and charm to draw us in, and she ends with the words "Unto an evil counselor close heart and ear and eye, And take a lesson from this tale of the spider and the fly."  She was obviously writing as an advocate for the fly, but once written and distributed, words and meanings are subject to interpretation and change by the greater world, much to the chagrin of many an author or politician.  As a gardener, I'm rooting strongest here for the maligned little spider.  This minuscule fly probably wasn't harming my garden, but if it sustains the spider until the first fat, juicy Japanese Beetle comes lumbering by, then it was well worth the sacrifice.  Predator and prey, dancing together through the cycle of life.

Disappointing Maiden

Warning: For those Old Garden Rose fans who just can't stand a bad review on any rose born prior to 1867, it might be best for your mental health if you stop reading NOW. 

'Maiden's Blush' at best, but a little balled up.

Okay, if you're still reading by this time, I'm going to assume that you either relish hearing about the deficiencies of a former queen of the garden, or at least that you've braced for the worst.

I confess that I was once in love with the venerated Alba 'Maiden's Blush', but the veils of infatuation have been lifted from my sight over time and she has fallen from grace.  Here in the Kansas climate, years of evidence has convinced me that she has turned out to be a faithless lass, cool and demure and virtuous in a rare year, but more commonly crumpled and nasty and worn. 

The soiled dove

Many readers here are likely familiar with Michael Pollan's Second Nature, and what he has to say about his experiences with Old Garden Roses and 'Maiden's Blush' in particular.  Michael waxed so eloquent, and marginally pornographic, about 'Maiden's Blush' that she was impossible for me to resist.  I've had her in my garden about 11 years and she is now a massive shrub in my beds, around 6 feet tall and broad.  In the early years of the 21st century, I had some good times with her, even including her in my own book, Garden Musings, as the seventh in a group of my ten favorite roses (pages 59-60).  But, over time, I've come to realize that, at best, a lot of her blossoms will be damaged by a little botrytis blight, and at worst, many of them turn brown and don't open at all.  Don't get me wrong, I treasure the exquisiteness of the occasional perfect blossom;  the creamy petals, blushed with pink in colder years, opening to a delicate picture of coyness.  But I would estimate only 10% of her blooms make it to that perfection.  The rest, well, let us just say that a soiled dove still has its beauty, if can you look past the blemishes.   Every year, I look at the buds coming on and think "wow, 'Maiden's Blush' is going to have a great year."  And then, even in dry years, a rain and a little cold weather comes at the wrong time during her budding and she simply molds at the edges.  To be fair, I think the same thing happens to many of my Albas, like, for instance 'Leda', but that's a story for another time.

Bush form of 'Maiden's Blush' at peak bloom 2012

When she's good, this ancient rose (prior to 1400) is very good.  Intensively fragrant, very double, and solidly hardy in Kansas, she doesn't suffer from blackspot or mildew in the southern exposure I've given her.  The bush is rangy, with occasional bare legs, and not very thorny, so there are both positive and negative aspects to her overall form.  She goes by many names, this one, so don't be confused if you see her listed as 'Great Maiden's Blush', 'Cuisse de Nymphe' (translates to "thigh of nymph"), 'Incarnata', 'La Virginale' or others.

I'm going to keep her as a part of my own garden because I simply can't give up those times when she is warm and friendly and gives me her all.  But I can no longer recommend to my fellow Kansans that she be allowed to trifle with the affections of any except the most dedicated rose fanatics.