Morning Vistas

A "Vista" is defined as "a pleasing view, especially as seen through a long narrow opening."  This morning, ProfessorRoush was simply content to take Bella on a walk around her garden, and taking photos of the broad pleasing views of his garden through his narrow (phone) camera lens.  I'm not going to write a lot about these pictures today, I'll just note a few of the particular roses visible in them and leave them to speak for themselves.  Before you blow them up to look closer, you must promise not to feel smug about all the unpruned deadwood in the roses and the weeds at their feet.  A gardener only has so much time and Spring came at me fast this year.

Roses, from left to right, are tall 'John Cabot', crimson 'Hunter', pink 'Konigan von Danemark', and fading 'Marie Bugnet'

The irises are spectacular this year.  You can see Bella running ahead to the right, sniffing the ground.

Peony 'Buckeye Belle' sits maroon-ly at the feet of bountiful 'Blizzard' Mockorange

One view of a rose bed looking east as the sun rises.  The near border, left to right, is 'Leda', 'Rosalina', and 'Blush Hip'.  The nearly red rose just behind those is 'Duchess of Portland'.

Front to back, these roses are pink 'Duchess de Montebello', bright red 'Survivor' with 'George Vancouver' to it's left, and behind, tall, and pink 'Lillian Gibson'.

I have been hacking around and reviving this bed and 'Lillian Gibson' looks about as poorly as I've ever seen, but I still think she deserves a photo all to herself.

As does this second 'Survivor' specimen, with mauve 'Hanza' and single 'Fru Dagmar Hastrup' following behind it.

Seasonal Musings

'Bric-a-brac'

I don't know what your idle times are like, but ProfessorRoush has but a few minutes in his busy life to devote to random and usually nonsensical mental meanderings.   When he does, it is usually in his Jeep during the 10 minute drive to work, and that time is, fortunately or unfortunately, where the ideas for a moderate number of these posts originate (the equally long drive home is devoted to musing back over the events of the work day and transitioning back to home).

'Parfum de l'Hay'

Last Thursday morning, that thought process, just after a quick walk around the garden that morning with Bella, was "how boring  it must be to live in sub-tropical Florida"...or Hawaii, or the Caribbean islands.   Essentially anywhere without seasons.  With seasons come variety and with variety come all the real joys of the garden.  And joy in the garden is in the seasonal change (and, of course, in the floral pornography that graces this blog).

You people with your Birds of Paradise and massive everblooming pelargoniums and hibiscus and Live Oaks may think you live in paradise, but you'll never know the joys of a clump of blooming peonies, of a long line of flowering lilacs, of the seasonal transition from daffodil to peony to rose to daylily to aster.  True gardeners would trade the changes in their gardens due to the progression of seasons about as easily as a badger would give up its den.

'Buckeye Belle' 

All of the pictures from today's blog are from my own garden, Thursday morning.   The peonies and roses are about to come into full bloom and with them, the beating heart of my garden.  Iris are dotted around and accent the many green clumps of growing daylilies.   Tall Orienpet lilies wait in the wings, wait for the once-blooming roses to exit stage left, anxious to make their own debut.   

'Lambert Closse' (new rose to me)

Would I ever give up the onslaught of peonies, breathtaking in their bounty, new varieties ever expanding the color choices and contrasts and combinations with their neighbors?  Could I live without the anticipation and addition of new roses to my garden (like Canadian 'Lambert Closse' at right), roses that, admittedly, replace weaker roses lost to disease and cold, but even the latter are welcome experiments and witnesses to change?  

'Festiva Maxima'

Daylilies, with their fleeting bloom lives know not a minute's rest before their petals drop.  Roses and peonies see only a few weeks of the garden's cycle, but the gardener sees and rejoices in it all; seasons blending one into another, chill to pleasant to hot to frozen, drought to rain to snow, brown to green to color.

'Lillian Gibson'

And I, both master of and slave to this garden, wouldn't consider trading a single season for the comforts of paradise, of life in a place of never-ending moderation and temperate climate.  Wouldn't I?  Well, maybe in winter.

 

Front door view 05/08/2025.  Lots of columbines!

Yellow World Domination

This week is the peak bloom of Hybrid Rosa spinosissima 'Harison's Yellow' on my "rose berm", the latter a slightly-raised (domed to about 2 feet high) area of transplanted soil that was a birthday gift from my mother in the early days of my garden.  According to my notes, it was planted there in 2003 from a sucker of another earlier transplant from my first garden in town.  'Harison's Yellow' is easy to root from suckers, at least if you treat it right, although my early attempts to gain "wild" suckers of this rose were failures.  I'm trying not to wonder if those previous failures reflect on my talents as a gardener.

Honestly, who could want, or even dream, of a sunnier or more vibrant yellow rose, bright in the shadows and brilliant, nearly eye-searing, in full sunlight?  The blossoms are nearly perfect, never fading until the petals fall to the ground,  unblemished by rain earlier this week, and each with fragrance to rival the finest efforts of professional perfumers.  In case you're wondering, "perfumer" is the correct English term for such experts in fragrances, and it is so much more appealing than the French term, "Nez" (nose).  

If 'Harison's Yellow' has a flaw, a snag in its character, it is its quest for garden, or perhaps even world domination.   Although I found it difficult to transplant in my first few attempts, it suckers and spreads just fine if left to its own merits, crowding out less vigorous plants to form a vast impenetrable hedge if you allow it.  In this bed, it has, over time, smothered a 'Souvenir de Philémon Cochet' and, more recently, an 'Adelaide Hoodless', and currently it has a young 'Roseraie de l'Haÿ' surrounded and threatened.

This, a view from the other side of the berm, better shows its unchecked spread, the mass of the previous photo extending out of the picture to the right.  Four feet high, thorny and straggly and sparsely-leafed this early in the summer, at times it seems that only a true rose-aficionado could really love it.  The bush is crude and its manners are rude, but then it blooms and all is forgiven.

But, I ask, why not (love it)?  It's extremely winter hardy, drought-resistant, and the hailstorm, just 6 days ago, pictured at left, didn't seem to damage it at all.   'Harison's Yellow' was first blooming on April 23rd this year and now, over 10 days later, it is the eye-catching focal point of my garden.  Really, who cares if it takes over the world and drapes the hills with yellow?  Not me, not at this moment.   There's no room in my world for any other rose than 'Harison's Yellow', at least for now, and it can grow anywhere it chooses.  I can move the 'Roseraie de l'Hay' if it isn't up to the fight!  

Lord Help Me, I Bought a Knock Out® Rose!

Long-time readers of this blog are doubtless aware that ProfessorRoush hates Knock Out® roses.  I blame the Knock Out® line for the collapse of many rose nurseries and the rapid decrease in rose varieties available at local nurseries.  I blame Knock Out®s for knocking the Queen of Flowers off her pedestal and coercing the public into treating roses as mere utilitarian shrubs.  I blame Knock Out®s for their lack of grace, lack of fragrance, and their easy susceptibility to rose rosette disease.  Heck, I'd blame them for global warming if I could reason out the slightest plausible logic chain that might link them together.  

And yet, while I was "saving big money" at Menards today (or so their advertising jingle tells me), I ran across 'Petite', the so-called "first miniature Knock Out® rose," and I fell for the hype, hooked and cleaned out, as it were, right there in the store.  What can I say?  I was weak at the moment, it was priced right ($17.95), it was healthy, the back of the plant tag said it was hardy to Zone 4, and I was disappointed at all Menard's other seasonal rose offerings at the store.  My hypocrisy on full display, I swooped it up and brought it home before my conscience kicked in.

Here at home, I transplanted it to a larger vacant pot and watered it in.   Despite its "fire-engine red" color I'm not confident it will be noticeable planted alongside the large shrubs and shrub roses of my greater garden, and besides, I can always move the pot and hide my moral failure and disgrace if any discerning gardeners are coming over.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush, of course, will love this potted rose wherever I place it, but her tastes, as always, are suspect in regards to plant aesthetics.  Thankfully, her discernment is better at choosing husbands, or so I'd like to believe. 

In my defense, 'Petite', otherwise known as Zepeti®, is not really a Knock Out® rose, at least not one bred by Bill Radler. Yes, it was introduced in the US by Star Roses, the parent company promoting all things Knock Out®, but the registered variety name is MEIbenbino, indicating it was a cross by the House of Meilland, in this case by Alain Meilland in 2011.   Alain is, by my count, the 5th generation of his family to be engaged in rose culture, but he was evidently turned by the Dark Side of the Force and used RADtko ('Double Knock Out') as the pollen parent of the cross resulting in 'Petite'.  

I did notice an unexplained oddity during my research around MEIbenbino.  Helpmefind\roses says that 'Petite' is the "first rose covered by a U.S. Utility Patent, which protects the introducer by restricting any party from hybridizing with it."  A utility patent restricts breeding, propagation, reproduction from or development of this variety as well as propagation.   And yet, helpmefind/roses also says that 'Petite' is a verified triploid.   Since triploid plants are usually sterile, I'm a little perplexed about the "superpatent" afforded this rose, since logically it should, as a triploid, be the end of its own genetic line.   Regardless, in the event that it ever develops hips and seeds, one should keep it to oneself and not notify the patent police.  Or, like Bella here, just avoid this rose altogether as a safety measure.  My conscience will thank you.