November Roses

First, I would like to thank all of you who left good wishes for the health of my mom in the comments to the last post. I am happy to say that my mom is recovering relatively well from her current health issue, even though that type of problem will take time to heal.

I am sure that most of you can imagine that taking care of someone who is ill can get stressful at times and blogging is a welcome distraction and fun activity for me that contributes to keep my own spirit up. I am glad that I can do it from Germany as well.

So here comes the long overdue post about the roses that have bloomed in my garden in November. Following the "new" weather pattern in California, November was a relatively warm month, which prompted a lot of roses to develop nice flowers, even though it was already relatively late in autumn.

The most beautiful rose bloom produced 'Auckland Metro' in my eyes. I am simply in love with the ivory shade of this Hybrid Tea rose. It is such an elegant hue.

Bud of 'Auckland Metro' in the morning sun.

Unfolding bloom of 'Auckland Metro'.

'Mister Lincoln' is the only pure red rose that I am growing in my garden. The tone of red of this rose changes quite a bit with the temperatures. When the days become cooler 'Mister Lincoln' takes on a more cool, dark, wine red color, whereas when it is hot, it is more a warm medium red.

Even though 'Mister Lincoln' was already bred in 1964 by Swim & Weeks I think it is still one of the best red roses for a warm climate. The bush is vigorous and the rose comes with an extraordinary strong classic rose fragrance.

'Pretty Jessica' back lit by the sun.




As usual at this time of the year 'Pope John Paul II' is one of my most floriferous roses.

I never get tired off the lovely white blooms of this variety.

'Pope John Paul II'

'Pope John Paul II'

'Pope John Paul II' has a decent petal count and finishes up in a nice way, which can not be said of all Hybrid Tea roses. 

'Belinda's Dream' at her best.

I am still getting excited at the sight of a flower of 'Lavender Crystal'. This rose has simply a killer lavender color and I am happy that, even though planted in a difficult spot, it is producing blooms on a regular base by now.

The petticoat blooms of 'Mary Rose'. Just delightful!

Above you see 'Moonlight Scentsation', a Mini-Flora, whose flowers make themselves a bit rare in my garden.

I like the yellow center of the flowers and 'Moonlight Scentsation' can produce quite unusual lavender undertones, but...

...it suffers from powdery mildew, if the conditions are right. Unfortunately that is quite often the case in my garden. So I don't know if I will keep this rose long term, but I will give it at least another year.

Unfolding bud of 'Georgetown Tea'. I love how the softer autumn light plays with this emerging rose bloom. 

Last but not least one of my favorite roses 'Scepter'd Isle'. Sometimes the blooms look like powder puffs and I appreciate...

...how this rose shows its yellow stamens as the flowers are opening more. 

All in all a healthy, floriferous, romantic rose. What is not to love?

One more thing: Recently my blog reached 300.000 pageviews. A big thank you to everyone who stops by and takes a look at my posts. It feels so good to know that the blog is being read, your visits truly make me happy!

See you in the garden!

Christina

I am linking to

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Bernideen's Tea Time, Cottage and Garden

October Roses

Sorry for coming in a little late with the post about the roses that bloomed in October. My recent trip has delayed the writing and publishing of this post.

In general October is a good rose month here in San Diego. Because of the cooler autumn temperatures the roses are often able to produce very beautiful blooms. This year October was an unusual warm month though, but some roses still managed to flower generously.

In my eyes 'Pierre de Ronsard' beat all other roses by far with the extraordinary beauty of his blooms.

Each flower of this rose seems to be a masterpiece.

The blooms are huge, I would guess four inches (about 10 centimeter) in diameter.  

Here is the rose in her full glory last month. I would estimate that the bush is twelve feet wide (about 3.5 meters) and eight feet high (about 2,5 meters). No wonder that is it able to produce these good size flowers. I can't image how big the rose would be, if it wouldn't be growing in severe root competition with my Queen Palms from the right and the Pygmy Date Palm from the left. I also think that in addition to that our very humble annual rain fall in the last four years and the drastic water restrictions limit the ultimate size of the rose. 

The first set of close-up pictures of the blooms of 'Pierre de Ronsard' in this post was taken in the morning light and the colors of the rose blooms are much more muted at that time of the day, but when our intense sun hits them fully later the pink can take on a wonderful warm glowing hue like in the photo above.

I just love my 'Pierre de Ronsard'!

'The Prince' has been a very reliable rose for me in the last couple of months and was also not letting me down in October. 

With the cooler temperatures the color of the rose becomes darker and the blooms take on this royal dark red, which can even turn into a very dark purple red.

My favorite Tea rose 'Rhodologue Jules Gravereaux' gave me some of its perfect Tea rose formed blooms. What is not to love?

'White Meidiland' becomes more and more comfortable in its dark spot in my front yard. I am still amazed that the rose is able to bloom in so much shade and also that it is completely healthy there. I can't imagine how well it would do in more sun. You really look for such good disease resistance in a rose like in this one.

'Belinda's Dream' pleases with picture perfect Hybrid Tea bloom form. Unfortunately the Queen Palm close by seems to stunt the growth of the rose bush.

'Marie Pavie' always makes me happy with her delicate small blooms.

A rose of which I can post photos every month because it is so floriferous: 'Our Lady of Guadalupe'.

'Pink Pet' seemed to especially like the October weather and bloomed extra opulent.

The delicate porcelain like beauty of 'Heritage'.

Last but not least a stunningly beautiful flower of 'Lavender Crystal'. This miniature seemed to have settled in into its new spot in the front yard and bloomed a little more. You can't call it profusely yet, but I hope it is getting there.

That was it from my roses from last month. I hope you found some that were appealing to you!

See you in the garden!

Christina

September Roses

Something great happened, it has rained in September! For the ones of you not familiar with the climate here let me say, that rain at this time of the year is really unusual for Southern California. The dust got washed off my roses, they took a deep sip of the refreshing rain water and burst open into blooms. So yes, the rain drops that you see on the roses in this post are not from man made artificial watering.

'Lavender Crystal' is with no doubt my favorite Miniature Rose. And the photo above, I believe, is my best shot from the ones that I took last month.

Here is 'Lavender Crystal' on a dry sunny day. No matter what the weather conditions are, the rose always produces an outstanding lavender color. 

'Captain Christy' is a rose that I love, too, but it continues to be a very weak grower. It may need to be grafted on a more vigorous rootstock to be successful in my garden.

'Stephan's Big Purple' certainly enjoyed the hot weather that we were still having in September. 

'Bewitched' is another Hybrid Tea rose that really seems to like the heat of Southern California.

The reliable 'Pope John Paul II', always good for stunning white blooms.

'Belinda's Dreams' is struggling a bit in the location where I planted it. I placed it very close to a Queen Palm and the rose doesn't seem to be quite vigorous enough to put up with the root competition of the palm. But when it blooms, it is certainly beautiful.

The Tea Rose 'Georgetown Tea' stopped flowering completely during the heat of summer, but started again to bloom in September. If I am lucky and we get a good El Nino this year the rose might be blooming throughout the winter. 

'Auckland Metro' is another very reliable Hybrid Tea rose for me. I think her blooms are stunning, too. I particular like the warm light yellow glow that the rose has in the center of the blooms.




Another shot of 'Auckland Metro'.

'Pink Pet' is outdoing itself this year.

I love how it is growing into the obelisk and starts to flirt with the hummingbird. 

'Pink Pet' grows in dappled shade from a nearby Pygmy Date Palm and seem to really like that.

'Pierre de Ronsard' was gearing up for its third flush of the year by the end of September.

Raindrops look always so romantic on roses, don't you think?

'Reine des Violettes' also produced its third flush of the year. It was just a mediocre one, but definitively better than none.

My favorite Tea Rose 'Rhodologue Jules Gravereaux'.

In parts the front yard almost looked like in spring last month. This photo shows 'Old Fashioned Girl' in the foreground, 'Pink Pet' in the middle and 'Climbing Iceberg' in the background.

The tireless 'Our Lady of Guadalupe' doing what she does best: Blooming!

I am starting to worry a little bit about this rose, though. Since about two years it hasn't produced any new basal canes, which means the rose is not renewing itself. Old basal canes die, but they are not replaced by new ones. 

I hope that this lovely Lady is not blooming herself to death. 

'The Prince', always good for a star photo. 

'Marie Pavie' is getting a light pink hue, which indicates that autumn and with that cooler temperatures are close.

I led you go with this photo of 'White Meidiland'. This rose also grows predominately in dappled shade and seem to tolerate that. I love how the light plays with the rose in this image.

After having stopped the monthly rose posts over the summer, I hope that I am able to pick them up again and show you what roses are flowering in my garden each month even throughout autumn and winter. One of the great joys of rose growing here in Southern California is, that with a little bit of planning and choosing the right varieties, you can have roses blooming throughout the whole year.

Wishing everyone a fabulous week!

See you in the garden!

Christina