I spoke too soon… Ross Roses (South Australia) do sell ‘Brown Velvet’ but it is konwn as ‘Colourbreak’ here…maybe some one more local to me also sells it… 
Yes, its often available as ‘Colorbreak’, and it is worth acquiring for breeding, trust me.
You stated: "
‘Ebb Tide’ x ‘R. Bracteata’ (I just did several of these crosses…I got a bucket-load of pollen with a lovely scent from just a couple of R. Bracteata flower buds…what a magical species this is!!!)
I have canned the idea of ‘Ebb Tide’ x ‘Stanwell Perpetual’ (not very practical, and I can jsut see a lot of pinks coming out of it, I don’t like pink much at all…)."
If you don’t like pink, then putting R. bracteata on ‘Ebb Tide’ is not going to make you happy. I hope I’m wrong, but I very much doubt I will be. Still, curious to see the results. Remember that Ralph’s first successful Bracteata hybrid came out of ‘Guinee’, which is an almost black-red, and yet the resulting selection was only a light pink. Subsequent generations of offspring are also almost entirely pale colors, a trait that has plagued the Bracteata breeding lines out of ‘Muriel’ for generations. I suspect that R. bracteata will have a persistent “bleaching” effect for several generations that may be inescapable, but when you do get a darker seedling, emphasize selection for strong color and move forward with two of the darkest selections you can find. That is what I am currently doing with my Bracteatas; this year I emphasized a cross that is:
174-02-17 (‘Sheri Anne’ X ‘Out of Yesteryear’) X 33-03-03 (‘Twilight Skies’ X ‘Muriel’)
Both of these seedlings are a medium red, the darkest selections I obtained from their crosses. Both have tested as tetraploids (fortunate for me) and both are fully fertile in both directions. By mating two different lines of ‘Muriel’ descendants I hope to see some unique Bracteata traits emerging while strengthening the color of the group. An added bonus is that with any luck, the tetraploidy of the group will be stabilized at this point and fertility will persist. (You probably know from reading the article David and I wrote that ‘Muriel’ is a tetraploid that produces both 1N and 2N pollen, and ‘Out of Yesteryear’ is a triploid that produces abundant fertile pollen that is both 1N and 2N also, making results rather unpredictable. ‘Out of Yesteryear’ offspring are usually a mix of diploids, triploids and tetraploids!)
I would suggest finding some diploids to mate with R. bracteata, as I feel that many of the problems with the current Bracteatas we have to work with might be avoided if you stick to diploids in the first generation. Either that or work with the ones we already have and hope to jump quickly to stable tetraploidy. I don’t suppose you have access to the Moore Bracteatas there, do you? I ought to see if I can arrange to export (legally, of course) some of my own seedlings for you to fiddle with. 174-02-17 is proving to be a worthwhile breeder to move forward with and I have already propagated this one for a couple of friends to use. I’ll see what I can do.
Oh, and don’t be too quick to cross off ‘Ebb Tide’ X ‘Stanwell Perpetual’. If you can get seeds from a cross like that, I would go ahead and grow 'em. I think that any time you get seeds from ‘Stanwell Perpetual’ it will be worthwhile to grow them and see what happened.
Paul
George, if you do get Brown Velvet, dont plant it at the front of the border. It is kind of a round, tall and fat floribunda. The blooms like to nod cause the peduncles are long, which give it a charming look to it.
Hopefully you dont get much mildew there.
Hi Paul, and Hi Jadae.
Yes Jadae, we do get powdery mildew here, the most prolific example I have seen this season has been all over a beautiful specimen of Rosa Laevigata…I have also spotted PM on the long canes that sucker at the bases of tree-grafted roses, (some sort of hybrid rugosa rootstock, I believe). However that said, PM doesn’t seem too-frequent a problem in Sydney. I hope ‘Brown Velvet’ doesn’t get PM too badly here like it did for Robert-N-R 
BV is coming by post in the winter, so no play with this one until next breeding season. Paul, thanks for your steering towards BV also. Jadae, thanks for the cultural tips on BV
Paul B here are my replies to your multi-faceted posting-
- Preferentially creating diploid F1 hybrid Bracteata-
I have read some of your published notes on this issue, and the things you and David Zlesak researched in this matter…it is fascinating, and it is what prompted my recent posting about finding a diploid mini.
My ‘Sweet Chariot’ is gearing up for lots of ‘R. Bracteata’ pollen to be applied onto it, en-masse, as soon as flowers come on. This blackspotted mess-of-a-plant I got last week already has new glossy green shoots, a flower bud and it is heavily mulched in a big pot, with all blackspotted leaves plucked out…it is saoking in the warm morning and midday sun, no afternoon sun, and it is already looking like it is up to the job soon… cool
BTW, since I can do seed extractions, I guess my near vision is likely good enough to handle emasculation of small flowers like ‘Sweet Chariot’. If emasculation of ‘Sweet Chariot’ proves easy for me, am I better off doing this rather than pollinate without emasculation (to avoid the confusoin of selfings)?
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Thanks for steering me back to the ‘Stanwell Perpetual’ idea…Will put it back on the list then, and see what comes out the other end…
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I just planted two happily flowering ‘Hot Cocoa’ plants… As I only have the one ‘Ebb Tide’ to play with, I might just remove the pollinations I just did on ET with ‘R.Bracteata’, and leave the “Bracteata work” for diploids only (Sweet Chariot)…This will free my ‘Ebb Tide’ up to re-flower sooner for a play with ‘Hot Cocoa’ and ‘Stanwell Perpetual’ and ‘William Shakespeare 2000’ pollens.
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Paul, there is no source for Mr Moore’s bracteata hybrids in this country, as far as my searches go. Simon, if you read this, have you found any Moore hybrid bracteata here?
Yes, I’ve seen some specimens of laevigata mildew here as well.
So far the clone I have been working with is clean for me.
Of the laev. hybrids I’ve created two are clean and one mildewed, at least last season. This season so far the mildewed one is clean.
I think some seedlings outgrow susceptibility to PM, for whatever reason.
Fortuniana will also mildew here when conditions are just
right.
So far Basye’s “86-3” is clean.
No George… as far as I am aware there are none of Mr Moore’s bracteata hybrids here… which is why we need to make our own… a task made easier with the support of Viru and other members here. I am enormously excited about the clinophylla x bracteata seeds Viru is sending us… I’ll be sure to send you some out as soon as they arrive.
They germinate very easily.
Simon, this is an exciting development, and I feel privileged to be offered seed. Lets see what it brings to roses here…
I am only looking at breeding roses for our hot climate zones here, I see nothing but good sense out of adding this hybrid to the menu.
Roughly when do you expect to take delivery?
Not sure… but I will keep you posted …
thx Simon.
Paul I like your 119-06-01. Thanks for sharing.
I think ‘Pennies From Heaven’ would also be fun to try as pollen parent on a muave.
Regarding using bracteata as a pollen parent: I think I read somewhere that Ralph Moore found bracteata pollen very feeble on other roses & his successes came from using bracteata as seed parent.
Hi Malcolm.
Maybe Mr Moore was mixing a lot of tetraploid with ‘R.Bracteata’, to attempt an immediate jump from diploid species (‘R. Bracteata’) to tetraploid ‘R.Bracteata hybrid’…and in doing so the diploid ‘R.Bracteata’ pollen was hard to mate onto the tetraploid seed parent, however he got the success the reverse way (‘Muriel’).
Following the above scenario then, I am thinking that if ‘R.Bracteata’ (diploid) pollen is used on a fertile diploid seed parent (like ‘Sweet Chariot’), it will be more likely to be successful than if ‘R. Bracteata’ pollen is applied to ‘Ebb Tide’ (tetraploid) as seed parent. This is another (minor) reason I am thinking about dead-heading the ‘Ebb Tide’ pollinations I have just done with ‘R. Bracteata’ pollen (the main reason of course is what Paul Barden talks about, in trying to get more genetically ‘stable’ F1 Bracteata hybrids out of diploid x diploid F1 progeny).
Of course it makes sense to try the reverse cross anyway, (‘R. Bracteata’ x ‘Sweet Chariot’), however I can’t as I do not have a mature ‘R. Bracteata’ at the moment…I do now have a few ‘R. Bracteata’ seedlings that were started off by embryo extraction when we had severe heat in late spring, and the poor things are having a lot of trouble getting past the two true leaf stage because they just cant handle the heat atm…LOL
Paul
My experience is different from yours.
If most bracteata seedlings are white or pale flowered there are strong exceptions: orange or red from the pollen parent may be expressed without any dilution. At (supposed/probable) diploid or triploid level. Bracteata being the mother and its hips quite unmistakable.
Among ample progenies, white or pale flowered bracteata seedlings pollen gave me very few white or pale progenies. Majority were in the mother parents color range. To the point I backcrossed many to white bracteata derived seedlings.
BUMP… “Have we actually had a confirmation of 'Sweet Chariot’s ploidy?”
Pierre, do you have any photos of orange or red bracteata F1 hybrids? It’d be great if you could post them here.
I would like to see some of your hybrids also, Pierre!
I can only speak to the behavior of most of the Ralph Moore Bracteatas, which all have a tendency to breed pale colors, generation after generation.
Is the primary goal of using bracteata to instill blackspot resistance?
…and form/architeture… and remontancy… and own root vigour… and beautiful foliage… and landscaping potential… and easy cutting propagation… and heat/humidity resistance, these are why I like it.
Bracteata is among the most evergreen of species too.
That’s a great advantage in a climates where Winter flowering is important.
Much of the world’s population lives in climates where such a feature would be desirable.