On 18 Apr 2005 12:37:34 -0700, "Rachel" wrote:

Hey all,

After much research, I just planted the very first of my rose garden.
I purchased a Cecil Brunner Climber (along with 3 rugosas) to run along
a fence in our backyard, in the tidewater area of VA (zone 7A/B ish..
we're right on the edge). Can anyone tell me what to expect in the
first few years in terms of growth?

Thanks so much!

Rachel

You can expect very vigorous growth. This first year will lay the
groundwork for the coming years, but it won't be HUGELY dramatic. You
will probably get some nice 6 - 8 foot canes. But it won't look really
impressive until next year. That's the year that you will start
getting more really thick basil growths. You'll be amazed at the third
year. You should have a very full growth with LOTS of 15 foot canes.
You can see the progression he

http://www.pbase.com/teleburst/cecile_brunner

The first pic is about 3 months after planting. The second two are
from year two. The last is from year three (last year). I haven't
taken any shots this year yet. However, the tree fell late last year,
so now I'm going to have a huge shrub. The canes were stout enough
that I didn't lose a single cane, but I was lucky that the tree fell
in the direction of the growth of the canes and not against it.

While you can certainly train the canes horozontally along the fense,
and this will encourage additional offshoots from the major canes
(when you bend them slightly, this seems to do the trick), this plant
wants to grow upwards. If you want a REALLY impressive plant, you
might install a teepee type arrangement of poles somewhere near the
planting. I'd make them about 15 foot poles and spread them out so
that there's a nice framework for them to grow. That way, you'd have
something like you see in the last photo as well as good coverage of
the fence. If you want to get REALLY industrious, you could install a
large 10 foot tall lattice about 10 feet wide. You'll have some nice
15 -20 foot canes thatwill start to arch when they get taller than the
lattice.

BTW, depending on the kind of climber that you got (apparently, CB has
both blooming and non-blooming varieties), you might have almost
continuous blooming from about May until November. Some CBs are
once-blooming, but mine blooms all of the time with only a few pauses
for rest. You probably won't know that until the second year though.