How tough is a rose?
Posted By Firefox on March 9, 2009
Seems like I am thinking roses a great deal this week!
A lady that had come to my fire safe garden talk in San Diego recently contacted me. She had not spoken to me in person at the talk but had waited and emailed a few days later. She was indignant. “How could you, Mr. Egbert, recommend roses as part of a water wise, fire safe landscape?” she lectured in her lengthy email. “Modern roses” I countered, “are much more hardy and drought tolerant than we are led to believe.”
In fact I wanted to go much further with my discussion, but of course, like lots of fussy self –righteous garden experts, she wanted none of it. “Natives are the only answer!” she stated in no uncertain terms and promptly blocked my further emails. Now I love natives as well but I also understand that roses are the most loved of all garden flowers. And many roses trace their roots (literally) back to wild ramblers growing in the mountains and plains of Asia.
There, they adapted to harsh conditions, cold winters, and drought. When modern rose breeders looked to expand the uses of roses beyond the cutting garden hybrid tea, they turned to those wild roses for inspiration and genetics. The result was the landscape roses. Full of flowers but tough enough to live almost anywhere, landscape roses like the Flower Carpet group and many others have expanded the range of roses out from the garden bed into the harsh modern landscape of parking lots and freeway onramps.
I admire these roses for their disease resistance and repeat bloom but can be amazed at how tough they really are. I snapped these photos of some landscape roses growing in a very harsh environment indeed.
A landscape rose begins to stir in it's harsh suburban surroundings.
On a cold day in Wichita, these specimens are showing new growth even though it has not rained in months. The drying cold wind is constant in this exposed median strip and in summer the sun bakes the impoverished sandy soil while reflected heat from the concrete and asphalt roasts them all around. They all had strong green canes and evidence of a strong bloom last summer. So, roses are hardier than you think! Give them a try!!
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