As many on this forum may already know, Viru Viraraghavan of India has been working for more than 20 years with R. gigantea and R. clinophylla to produce “evergreen” roses to extend the range of the rose into year-round warm-weather and tropical regions. His program also has promise to create new blackspot resistant roses for the U.S. South and warm West.
I just received some of his R. clinophylla x R. bracteata seeds which I can share until I run out of them.
Email me with your mailing address and I will send a small packet. (There will be no need to stratify them – if they are like R. clinophylla itself, warmth and moisture will be all that is required to get them to germinate.)
Viru wrote as follows regarding these seeds:
"The (Clin x Bract) seed is from open pollinated hips of a form of (R. clinophylla x R. bracteata) plant selected from about 10 plants which I have planted out in a
row as a hedge on our Hosur farm. [Hosur is on the edge of a hot desert in southern India.]
“This form has very beautiful evergreen foliage and forms a very dense bush 15 feet high and as wide, with large single flowers in the R. bracteata mould. Absolutely no disease. This is obviously a superior form as it has reached the dimensions mentioned without any manure, fertiliser or spraying. Merely watering in the dry spells in the hot climate of Hosur. Flowers intermittently throughout the year.”
Gene Waering
You’re so right, Gene. No stratification required. I shucked and planted these seeds on 12/29/04. They began germinating on 1/18/05 barely 3 weeks later.
Judith – Yours are the first to germinate, so far as I know. Congratulations –
Gene
Gene, I had them outside - 70-80 in daytime, 50ish at night.
I had 2 germinations here today–just checked by chance before finding this thread revived. I left them on the windowsill in my kitchen for about 2 weeks–and have had them in a cool garage for about a week. From their size, I’d guess they sprouted in the past 2 days–surely no earlier than Sunday.
Congratulations, Peter!
Clinophylla sprouts very easily, so I’m not surprised the hybrid is the same. For your information, I understand Viru Viraraghavan’s large bush of clin x brac stands 15 feet high by about the same width!
(1) Percy Wright suggested in an American Rose Society article from about 1970 that the “diploid side” of roses was not being sufficiently explored and that it held a lot of promise. (The Tea roses and Noisettes of the 19th century were all diploid.)
It is my understanding Viru is exploring this side again, but using clinophylla and gigantea, too, to produce roses that will grow year-round – “evergreen” roses. The evergreens could be expected to do well in subtropical and tropical markets, like increasingly affluent India, but also including – in the U.S. – the Deep South and warm Southwest and Far West, about 1/4 of the country.
(2) Viru is coming to speak in the U.S. the first couple of weeks of June. On June 1st he will be at my rose society (Manhattan Rose Society) in New York (we meet at the Horticultural Society of New York on W. 58th Street), but the second week of June he will be in the South. I will post his full itinerary here when I get it for anyone interested in attending any of his talks.
Gene
\
I’d love to see him. Maybe someone can tape his speech?
http://www.rosesunlimitedownroot.com/new_page_10.htm
Found that searching around looking at Buck roses. Some have pics.
Oh my, what a germinator. I’m getting innundated with seedlings! Now, assuming they’re all healthy how do I determine what to cull or do I keep these all until they flower???
I have started to make some crosses with pollen from one of the rose-- I call this my “Banana” seedling because-- first… the buds comes out like banana peel sepals. It’s a sepal within a sepal, but the first one reminds me of banana peels.
And the dried pollen smells really good… like ripe bananas.
Right now, I have only crossed the pollen on Chapney’s Pink Cluster. And, if I don’t leave for Mexico by the 20th, hopefully I can make a few crosses with Perle d Or and the bush form of Cecil Brunner.
I’d love to see a photo Enrique.
I had a bunch of these seedlings. I kept only two and gave the rest away to a local auction.
I’m running out of space to explore large species so I might not utilize them after all.
A flower has bloomed yesterday… if I catch it early enough tomorrow-- I can get a pic of the flower before the petals drop. (No thrills… I’m pretty sure you’ve seen it. Pure white. 5 petals…)
This maybe an envasive rose if it’s not handled-- I yanked out the original plants and whatever root that I left in January has created new plants.
One of them roots very easily in water.
In fact, I’m pretty sure this is the banana one.
I have crossed it with the possible swamp rose. I’m not sure if this is the swamp rose-- the clones I’ve seen sold are much more saturated and a bigger bush. The one I have is a light lavender hue and grows in a thicket-- and blooms by the middle of July. But it’s fits much more closer to the picture of Martin and Rix book of pics.
I remember your seedling-- do you have a picture of your swamp rose? My didn’t come from a nursery. I recieved it years ago from a trade. The person was from Richmond, Virginia… and the rose was growing at a construction site in the soil that held up a telephone pole. That’s all I remember.
I’m curious, have the Clinophylla x Bracteatas been as healthy and dense as advertised. And is this still available somewhere.
Healthy yes, but the habit tends to favor one species parent or the other though all are intermediate in some regard. Dense? Somewhat. Available? Several of use got seed. Now there are many versions.
I was sent 12 seeds in 2005, and 7 germinated. Three of the seedlings bloomed last year–single white, much like R. bracteata. They got a lot of blackspot in the late summer and early fall here in Charleston, WV. I left them outdoors over the winter. Only one, the most vigorous, survived. It survived despite being in a pot exposed to the cold. The canes lost only 6-8 inches. We had about two straight weeks of subfreezing weather in January after a warm December. Our low temperature was -5 Fahr. This remaining seedling is making good growth and will probably bloom. It is also, unfortunately, suckering from beneath the pot.
Peter
Peter said,
“It is also, unfortunately, suckering from beneath the pot”
Yes, and they tip root like crazy.
Robert, I noticed you have used Viru’s ‘Silver Dawn’ Clinophylla hybrid. What do you think of it? Would you consider it a better and more refined starting point? Does clino still seem worthwhile or is it more of just a novelty? So many questions.
Silver Dawn, Ganges Mist, descendants of Out of Yesteryear, are largely why I am abandoning working with clinophylla and bracteata directly.
They all have their shortcomings but it would be foolish not to utilize them.
Rose breeding takes decades and none of us are getting any younger.
That’s good news. I agree, sometimes it’s not necessary to go all the way back to species, no need to re-invent the wheel as they say.
I am putting together an order for RU, so I’ll get Silver Dawn ( clinophylla plus sempervirens through Bonica, which I also don’t have), your Riverbanks for banksia, and Buxom Beauty out of curiosity. Thanks for the help.
Charles, I did a cross of Riverbanks x Silver Dawn last year. It’s an amazingly fertile combination.
I’ll probably register at least one of the seedlings but beware as 80% or more of the seedlings will be susceptible to mildew.
Silver Dawn is moderately PM susceptible. (Something one would not expect from it’s lineage.)
Riverbanks mildly PM susceptible in a bad year.
Riverbanks is triploid and will accept both diploid and tetraploid pollen.
Silver Dawn is very pollen fertile and appears to be seed fertile once established.
Here are the seedlings I kept from the cross. These were free of PM last season. I will continue to evaluate them.
The double white will probably be registered.
Buxom Beauty would probably produce some interesting things.
Btw, Riverbanks does carry yellow.
Link: www.helpmefind.com/rose/pl.php?n=49891&tab=10