I bought a bunch of bare roots from Fork and Spade at the very end of
their clearance sale in April. Many of them are still soaking, since
work and constant rain haven't given me the chance to plant them all
yet. One of the Oklahomas (I have several already, but I really love
this one, so I bought two more) was already forming buds right there
in the water bath. I finally planted it yesterday.

The biggest disappointments of the batch have been (one of the two)
Ambridge and the miniature Magic Carousel. Those were in sad shape
upon arrival. (I can't gripe too much since they were the bottom of
the barrel clearance sale items ordered on the very last day of the
shipping season, but otherwise I'd return them both.) The Ambridge
has three good canes, but the other canes were all very tiny and very
dead. The Magic Carousel doesn't look like it wants to break
dormancy at all. I doubt it will live.

Since I have all these new bare roots to locate, I'm banishing my
16-inch wonders to a "spare" bed in the back yard. Crimson Glory has
cranked out two nice flushes of blooms, but it's not even a foot tall.
Rather than new or larger canes, every bit of new growth has instantly
put out blooms. Nice to see strong productivity, but no growth
(hence no stems)??? Europeana is headed to the spare bed this
afternoon. That one's my fault. I moved it in early April, and it's
still pouting. Unfortunately, since it hasn't grown, it's now being
dwarfed (and shaded) by day lilies planted about two feet away. So
now I have to move it again, just to get it more sun.

I picked up a Melody Parfumee this season too. Mine's in a 3-gal pot
from a local nursery. Nasty case of black spot - seems odd to see
that coming from a reputable nursery. Once yours starts to grow, I
think you'll like the blooms. Nice fragrance.

Looks like we're both building up collections of fragrant purples to
go along with all of our fragrant reds !



On Fri, 23 May 2003 10:44:40 -0400 (EDT), "Shiva"
wrote:

torgo wrote:

Oooh, by all means keep us posted on how this one turns out !


Sure will, thanks.

It has been interesting watching the crop of S&W bare roots develop under
identical cultivation practices. In general, the bigger bare roots with
the most canes and longest roots did the best, no surprise. One exception
is Joseph's Coat, which was a big burly bare root but is taking its sweet
time. Royal Amethyst is way ahead of the pack, but Distant Drums is
amazing too--just full of blooms and only about 16 inches tall. (I don't
pinch buds just because I can't stand to! How's that for scientific
methods.) The big disappointments: Heart of Gold, Arizona, and Melody
Parfumee. I wondered if they were going to do anything at all, but they
have taken off, just in a very wimpy way, limping into bud, as it were.