Has anyone used this rose in breeding? "Secret Garden Musk Climber" Rose
Last night at the Twin Cities Rose Club meeting Lois Ann Helgeson talked about fragrance and brought cut stems of a lot of different roses from her garden as examples that she passed around. She grows this rose in a pot because it shouldn’t be reliably hardy in zone 4 and it makes a nice large shrub versus a climber like in CA and it blooms all summer she said. The fragrance is wonderful. She shared that stem with me to try to root as a cutting.
Does anyone grow this rose and know if it sets hips and is fertile? I’m really excited for these cuttings and hope some root. It’d be fun to try to bring in its wonderful fragrance to new rose hybrids.
David, I think you will find Kim Rupert does.
Thank you David. Kim, your hybrids look great and from your descriptions it looks like they rebloom well. Does ‘Secret Garden Musk Climber’ only work well as a pollen parent, or does it set seeds too?
I was coveting this one several years ago based on some of things I read about it, but it has since fallen off my radar. It purportedly is rather easy to root, but you might have cold-hardiness issues in your neck of the woods. Paul Barden had a write up on his blog about the plant:
http://paulbardenroses.com/musks/secretgarden.html
(I hope Paul is well. I miss hearing his input on this forum.)
I don’t know that I had ever seen Kim’s babies from that plant. I’m quite surprised by the coloring from IHTXLBXSG (the successful typing of the name of which required me to learn the pedigree!.. LOL) I gather that it affords the possibility of moderately decent-sized blooms as well.
(At any rate, David, it might make an interesting subject for a student’s genetic testing skills…)
I hope you have success rooting and playing with it!
I would like to try it…sounds like a delicious fragrance. I would keep it in a pot and cross with hardier roses.
Hi Joe. I apologize for not seeing this sooner. Secret Garden sets hips with very few seeds. Even fewer germinate and those which do are awful, addicted to mildew and extremely weak. It hasn’t accepted any pollen I’ve applied to it, but it’s pollen sort of works…sometimes. I sent a ton of it to Peter Harris who reported back that he found “very few cells” in it. The best results I have had from it were six (or seven?) seedlings of Miss Lowe X Secret Garden. All are single, pinks to whites, one or two phototropic and most are scented. That was the last I wanted to try with both of them so I dumped Miss Lowe and gave Secret Garden away. SG has a tremendous scent, but required far too much room for my space. I had it for years.
Cydney & Art Wade of Rose Petals Nursery sell Secret Garden Musk. I believe Dr. Malcolm Manners grows it quite well in his garden. Here in GA and down in FL PM is not our biggest malady. I sometimes go a whole season without seeing it at all.
Stephen
SG itself, only mildewed with water stress. It will black spot when that’s an issue. It’s the few self seedlings it may (but usually not) produce which are addicted to mildew. It smells wonderful and here, it flowers all the time. IF I had the room, I’d have it as large as it would grow. I don’t, so I don’t.