Questions about seedlings traits

Ihave a dozen seedlings I have kept from an unknown rose (never.did figure out it’s identity) I have a couple Questions, mainly about two seedlings that are a bit different from the others.

  1. Seedling has apple scented leaves (I know I read somewhere on here about that, but don’t know which plants may have that trait in their genes to pass on.
  2. Seedling (a different one) has bright golden leaves this fall.

None of the other seedlings from her have possessed these traits, so I was wondering if these might have come from the pollen parent (hopefully the cold Hardy ones)
These are the pollen parents that took (unfortunately all mixed together due to moving)
Martin Frobisher
William Baffin
Lady of Shallot
Othello
James Gallway

Do any of these look like a likely suspect for these traits?

Also, I ended up with several pink, no surprise, but also red and yellow roses from these crosses (I believe Othello and Lady of Shallot likely pollen parents. Is it normal for a seed parent to (pink) to give several other colors, especially when dealing with so few seeds? Is it valuable? Or is that a pretty normal result? Also, most flowers have been very double and fragrant, which I do desire.
Thanks for any thoughts!
Duane

It is not unusual for roses to give odd assortments of colors. Pollen parents contribute as much as the mothers, and tetraploids (like most of the English, HT, HP, and Floribunda types) can stir up fascinating combinations.

For a simple example, suppose that the pink seed parent is genetically RRrr (or RrRr). Even if this plant were selfed, it might give colors ranging from white to crimson. In fact, I once raised a few seedlings from a red floribunda (unlabeled). Of the two that bloomed, one was a dull pale pink, and the other a velvety dark crimson.

Strange to say, yellow can be recessive to fragrant. The most potent components of rose perfume are the “rose ketones”, that are produced by the oxidative degradation of carotenes. Thus, some fragrant parents give the occasional yellow offspring.

This association of color and perfume is most apparent in the Tea-Noisettes. The first yellow Tea-scented rose (Flavescens) was only a pale yellow. Crossed with a Noisette, it gave ‘Smith’s Yellow’, which was fragrant and nearly the same color as Flavescens. In later generations, the perfume was reduced further and the color intensified. Take a look at ‘William Allen Richardson’, ‘Crepuscule’ and ‘Chromatella’. The yellow parts of the coloring are largely Musk rose carotenes that have not been converted to perfumes.
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/Roses/Rose_Pictures/W/war.html
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/Roses/Rose_Pictures/C/crepuscule.html
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/Roses/Rose_Pictures/C/chromatella.html

thanks for the info! I have a lot to learn about color and fragrance, and to think they are interconnected will bring another dimension altogether.

I was thinking about the apple fragrance and wondering if perhaps the seed parent (the unknown) may perhaps have Applejack in its background. It did better than I expected in the cold, so perhaps it has something like that in its pedigree. And if that is not a notable trait for William Baffin to pass on, then it seems likely to have come from the seed parent.

Do we know if the fragrance in leaves is passed on through the mother or father? I read a little mentioned here on fragrance but either didn’t read that, didn’t understand it, or forgot.

I thought I read someone had the idea of different fragrances (at least discussion was about leaves and fragrance) mixing with Moss roses and fragrance. Is it possible to blend fragrant attributes (as in leaves and also mossing) or to mix or swap (as in pine scented leaves or apple scented mossing. I guess I figured they would be separate genetically.
Duane

It depends on the source. Most of the more common sourves for apple scented foilage are closely related to R.rubiginosa, it has the canina meiosis (4n+1n which means it passes 4 chromosome sets via seed and only 1 set via pollen) and the foilage scent there is in the 4n (seed).

Having said that it can be broken and Apple Jack is an example of that as the scent can be traced back to Magnifica which seems to have passed the genes on via pollen. There is an example of the meiosis being broken down in the F2 with a cross of Canina and Spinosissima so its probably just a numbers game to get the genes into a more workable parent without being diluted, but about to get off the train so cant dig that up but is posted somehwere on the forum.

Some other species with scented foilage behave differently though and can pass on scent via pollen or seed (like Fedtschenkoana, Setipoda, etc) but they also have a different scent to their foilage.

So, more likely seed parent from species (although not only or always from seed). So, is that more likely also in descendants? (So it was probably the seed parent.) Also, how likely if neither parent has that trait themselves. Fairly certain this is the first rose bush I have grown with that fragrance. I’m pretty sure I would have noticed that in the parent while watering and weeding. This seedling I can smell when I water. I first kept smelling it in the air after watering again and again before I finally figured it out, not having grown one with fragrant leaves before.
Thanks for the info!
Duane

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LEMON DELIGHT is a yellow-flowered mini-moss that has scented moss that some of us think spells of lemon. Maybe that’s just wishful thinking on my part, but it’s not the ordinary moss scent.

I found the following on another site:

REINE DES VIOLETTES has leaves that smell like roses and pepper. On sultry summer nights the foliage fragrance wafts quite a bit. Then there are the gorgeous soft purple flowers.

APPLEJACK is another rose with fragrant foliage, which is redolent of green apples. It will sometimes repeat so is definitely worth investing.

The Floribunda COTILLION / PERFUME PERFECTION has fragrant foliage.

Lastly, the Moss rose SALET has mossy growth along the stems that smell like fresh pine needles. When the buxom pink roses open the combination is very sensual. She is new to me this year and I’m already in love.

Thank you Karl!
I saw a picture of Salet years ago and loved it in picture. I finally got to see and smell it in a garden this year and loved it all the more. Excited to hear how it works for you!
Salet has been on my list. Reine des Violettes just moved to the top of my list a bit ago, so hopefully that will work out soon. Interesting to hear about Applejack. I did not know it would repeat some, good to know!

Interesting to hear of Cotillion. Does anyone know where its fragrance came from? Genetics can be so interesting, so surprising, and so confounding all at the same time… keeps us guessing anyway. Maybe that’s what keeps every seedling so exciting.
thanks again!
Duane

There is nothing behind Cotillion that should lead to scented foliage. Wouldn’t you think it odd that if it had that characteristic, no mention of it has been made anywhere else? Nothing in any advertising and no mention anywhere in the comments nor reference section on HMF. I never noticed it having any foliage or other plant scents, other than flower fragrance, in the nursery. And, I SMELL everything.

I have not encountered ‘Cotillion’, so I can’t argue the point. I was quoting someone else.

BTW, I have never found the flowers of ‘Reine des Violettes’ to be especially fragrant. Not at all. The color is remarkably constant (plus), but the flowers shatter (minus). ‘Indigo’, to the contrary, is more fragrant, but less stable in its color. When I had it up north (SF Bay area) it didn’t even try to be “blue”.

I liked ‘Salet’ when I had it. I doubt that it would be happy here in the desert.

I wrote too soon. I went back through my ‘Reine des Violettes’ pics and found that it is as variable in color as ‘Indigo’.
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/Roses/Rose_Pictures/R/reinedesviolettes.html
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/Roses/Rose_Pictures/I/indigo.html

I did not have ‘Indigo’ long enough to form a strong opinion of it. I imagine that anyone aiming for this range of color would do well to try both, perhaps in a “double cross” style: crossing each with a Floribunda or HT, then combining the most promising progeny from each.

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My original Reine des Violettes was a badly virused plant from Viruses of Now and Forever. It was budded on Dr. Huey and even then, I had to heavily treat it with iron and Miracid to prevent the foliage from turning nearly yellow and the flowers so light lavender, they were nearly white. I did find the flowers scented as well as the growth tips, sepals, ovaries and peduncles. As long as I treated it as I would a camellia or azalea, the flowers were occasionally “blue-ish”, but most often, weren’t anywhere near those tones. It was very frustrating after having read Graham Stuart Thomas writing about how any time a new “blue rose” is introduced, he took blooms of RdV to compare and show that nothing bred in the prior hundred years came near to its color. OK, in a British climate it is “blue”. In a southern California mid desert climate, it was awful. That one taught me much about OGRs.

The “secret” is probably moisture, and cooler temps.

Scott-Montcrieff (1936) “The most interesting case recorded is that of the rose “Veilchenblau”, which appeared to develop less blue-red flowers in the very dry 1934 season than normally. The bluer petals were separated and found to contain complex as well as normal 3-5-dimonoside, while the redder petals contained less of the complex pigment. It is possible that acylation is an important stage in pigment metabolism.”

Geschwind (1864) on his ‘Erinnerung an Brod’: In not too dry summer and soil the large, densely filled, flat flower is almost purplish-blue or violet-blue, usually with a dark red heart.

As for me, I once saw ‘Baby Faurax’ an almost eggplant purple in a cool and damp autumn.
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/Roses/Rose_Pictures/B/babyfaurax.html

There’s one other, but I can’t find it just now … and the dog needs another walk.

Yes, I’ve played with the Veilchenblau (and IXL) blue tones as well as Mr. Bluebird, Faurax and my seedling of it, Lauren. IXL is the deepest slatey-blue here and likes the climate. It’s flowering for the fourth time so far this year!
DSCN8359.JPG
DSCN8331.JPG

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I found it: Louis XIV. Sometimes velvety crimson, or velvety violet, or rarely dark brown … depending on the weather.
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/Roses/Rose_Pictures/L/louisXIV.html

I was just thinking of the variability of fragrance (person to person, but also location to location) and wondering if that is true for leaves and mossing as it is for flowers?

Then I read the last two items and realized it is just as true for color.
I thought of Queen of Violets as, well Violette (or purple, mauve, etc.) Is it more blue when it fades? Or is that weather effect? Or is all blue they are referring to in roses a component of the purple or violette range and they are hoping to isolate it (thinking of Blue Girl)?

That Louis X1V is really dark. Is that normal?
Duane

Yes, the plant scents are also just as variable and for the same reasons. Both individual olfactory sensitivities as well as the evaporation or lack of expression of the oils and alcohols. There are times I didn’t smell the peppery cedar scent to the new growth of Grandmother’s Hat and others when it almost suffocates you. The same with R. Primula, R. Fedtschenkoana and all the other scented foliage types I have observed and grown. So, yes, it’s as true for leaves and some mossing as it is for flowers.

I don’t disagree with Baby Faurux, its often one of the first to indicate i need to water more often., no drought tolerance to it.

Blue for you seems straight up temperature related though, it crisps without much effort where most things are fine. Eyes for you is similar. Both are very spot free here though so despite the significant flaw probably still alot of value.

It depends on how the purple is formed. There’s a few distinct ways it occurs. I mean Ebb Tide doesn’t really get more blue for me, if anything it generally goes more red. Meanwhile I have seedlings from Ebb Tide that become more blue as the red tones fade with age.

Its probably worth doing a search of roscyanins on the forum, you’ll find posts by Don or Karl K (maybe both) that go into more depth on how these and bluer colours come about avi’s, co-pigments, etc

I took the picture of ‘Louis XIV’ around 20 years ago. It was a cool and rather damp autumn day. I have not seen that color since then, which is a pity.

‘Blue Girl’ is one of the rosacyanin types, ultimately descended from ‘Grey Pearl’. These are more lilac than purple. The color may be pale, like ‘Winter Magic’, or more emphatic like ‘Blue Chip’.

This link is for a bibliography of pigment-related papers, including details on rosacyanins, AVIs, co-pigments as well as optical properties of petals.
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/KKing/RosePigments/RosePigments.html

I edited my Pigments biblio, putting a box around the Rosacyanin articles, and another around the AVIs papers. I only had two of the latter, so I went in search of another. It’s a good one.

On another thread I wrote about rosacyanins and noted that when the gene-splicers persuaded roses to produce delphinidin, the roses also produced a delphinidin-based rosacyanin that was a duller, gray-tone than those we already have. I looked at the molecular structure of the various rosacyanins and could see no reason why there should not be one or more based on pelargonidin. A little googling turned up just the thing, in strawberries. So there is a pigment we should have, but which has not yet been identified in roses.

Today I learned of a pelargonidin-based AVI found in a “carnation where the normally pink pelargonidin pigments produce a blue-grey colouration.”

I can’t say for sure what color such a thing would be in roses, but it may be out there already.

Has anyone tried crossing ‘Rhapsody in Blue’, ‘Bleu Magenta’ or ‘L’Evêque’ with ‘Tropicana’, ‘Gloria Mundi’ or ‘Baccara’?

And more info on AVIs:

Molecular Plant 3(1): 78-90 (Jan 2010)
The Formation of Anthocyanic Vacuolar Inclusions in Arabidopsis thaliana and Implications for the Sequestration of Anthocyanin Pigments
Lucille Pourcel, Niloufer G. Irani, Yuhua Lu, Ken Riedl, Steve Schwartz, Erich Grotewold

ABSTRACT
Anthocyanins are flavonoid pigments that accumulate in the large central vacuole of most plants. Inside the vacuole, anthocyanins can be found uniformly distributed or as part of sub-vacuolar pigment bodies, the Anthocyanic Vacuolar Inclusions (AVIs). Using Arabidopsis seedlings grown under anthocyanin-inductive conditions as a model to understand how AVIs are formed, we show here that the accumulation of AVIs strongly correlates with the formation of cyanidin 3-glucoside (C3G) and derivatives. Arabidopsis mutants that fail to glycosylate anthocyanidins at the 5-O position (5gt mutant) accumulate AVIs in almost every epidermal cell of the cotyledons, as compared to wild-type seedlings, where only a small fraction of the cells show AVIs. A similar phenomenon is observed when seedlings are treated with vanadate. Highlighting a role for autophagy in the formation of the AVIs, we show that various mutants that interfere with the autophagic process (atg mutants) display lower numbers of AVIs, in addition to a reduced accumulation of anthocyanins. Interestingly, vanadate increases the numbers of AVIs in the atg mutants, suggesting that several pathways might participate in AVI formation. Taken together, our results suggest novel mechanisms for the formation of sub-vacuolar compartments capable of accumulating anthocyanin pigments.

We rosarians don’t have to wait for a 5gt mutant. The 3,5-diglucosides and 3-monoglucosides rely on different enzymes (genes). So, we could select for 3-monoglucosides only, and let the AVIs happen.

Now I want to know whether the 3-monoglucosides in the chameleon roses would also form AVIs. That is, could we have a lilac rose that develops a violet border instead of the ruby edging of ‘Angel Face’, ‘Paradise’ and ‘Blue Chip’?

Purple on tan/brown would be another interesting possibility.
http://bulbnrose.x10.mx/KKing/RosePigments/RosePigments.html

It seems I commented too early on this point. Checking the available data, the only rose that comes close to have little or no 3,5-diglucosides is the Rugosa ‘Salmon Pink’. This one contains lots of peonidin- and cyanidin-3-monoglucoside, as well as some cyanidin-3-sophoroside, which tips the color just a bit towards the orange.