"Shiva" wrote:

I'd like some ideas on roses that grow well together.
Good colors, the right height together, etc.

Oh. ComplEmentary.

I thought you were giving them away for free.

The standard shtick is blue clematis with anything-but-blue
roses, but an all-rose solution seems better to me. Clematis
need cool, shaded, well-mulched roots at least in my
climate (8b, North Florida; today it's 25 F outside as I type
and it doesn't strike me as a warm climate, by damn), and
of course some sort of trellis; I've killed every clematis I've
owned, even though they're supposed to be hardy through
zone 9 and though I wasn't trying to kill them. Maybe the
drainage wasn't good enough either.

As for complementary roses...I'm useless here; I just
responded because of the malaprop spelling. I mean, the
usual color-contrast and size-contrast things...get a low
grower like Cardinal Hume in front, then a contrasting
medium-grower in the middle (say a pink vs. the Cardinal's
ruddy-purple-whatever, or one of the quieter Floribundas
like Iceberg), and a tall Austin in the back. Or some
sprawler in front even more prostrate than the Cardinal...
one of those tough Kordes things. Red, white, mauve;
pink, pinker, pinkest; mauve, gold, mauve; light green,
dark green, light green again leaves; rugose, smooth,
rugose. Or...oh, you might not have room for that sort
of triple-row setup. Sorry.

I just plant roses any bloody way I like and hope and pray
that they thrive and that the deer don't eat them. I am dumping
mounds of composted yard waste every couple yards and
planting a formerly-potted rose in the middle of each mound;
this is to keep heavy rains that I sometimes get from drowning
the rose's roots. The soil is none too fertile apart from a mess
of phosphate, and I completely lack aesthetic appreciation,
apart from appreciating the qualities of an individual plant.
It helps that I have lots of room.

Mark., just being an a**hole on a cold frosty morning