‘Bishop Darlington’ seems like a healthy diploid shrub. I note on HMF (see Jedmar’s photos) that it forms hips yet there are no descendants listed. Has anyone used it at all? Why do you think it has no descendants? I’m not a huge fan of its flower form and am wondering whether this trait passes on strongly and is the reason why people don’t use it?
I think I was told before that it like a lot of wonderful roses is a genetic dead end since I was interested in that one as well. Apricot-yellow blends are my weakness and my goal (a cold hardy tea-noisette look-alike).
Quite a number of roses descended from ‘William Allen Richardson’ are like that, like ‘Buff Beauty’ among other apricot-yellow musks it seems end to end up sterile or very limited fertility. It is very frustrating because they are so appealing and beautiful and healthy. You might want to try at the least.
If you don’t have Crepuscule you should probably use it for apricot, it’s supposed to have super fertile, very powerful pollen that tends to work on everything. Paul Barden put it on Joycie and got a very attractive ragged robin petaled yellow polythana type plant I think.
Danae works well, but it has to be crossed with something with mildew resistance.
No goals or plans involved with this… just curious really. I have plenty of other hybrid musks here to use if I want to. ‘Bishop Darlington’ just seems like it might be nice and healthy and photos on HMF show that it forms OP hips (at least). I was just wondering whether anyone had tried it and what the reason might be for its lack of descendants. I’m also curious about ‘Bishop Darlington’ for the wichurana in it through ‘Aviateur Blériot’. I’m planning a similar cross this season between ‘Trier’, ‘Penelope’ and ‘Thisbe’ x ‘Leverkusen’.