Seed Bearing & Worthwhile Parents...?

General Discussion
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Hello RHA members, my name is Duncan, and I am a new member of your group…and a newbie to hybridizing roses. I am based in Tauranga, New Zealand- the climate here is a less extreme version of California…coastal, mild and humid.

I am developing a small part time nursery specialising in miniature and mini flora roses…and I wish to dabble in hybridizing as well.

So far my hybridizing efforts have been limited to a very few intended crosses, and playing with some OP seeds - with some success in germinating (it is early spring here).

My challenge is trying to identify seed bearing plants that provide a reasonable germination and offer the hope of getting something half reasonable out of them…

I have listed below the cultivars that I have growing, and am interested in working with, and would appreciate your comments about their potential. I have done a reasonable amount of research on HMF, but feel I need some guideance to focus on potentially good parents.

Dinky Pinky

Summer Dawn

Glowing Amber

Baby Boomer

Ivory Silk

Barndella’s Pearl

Fairhope

Chelsea Belle

Pink Pettiecoat (I know she is a great parent)

Patio Jewel

Radiant

Jean Kenneally

Beehive Gold

Hot Tamale

Irresistible (I understand is a poor seed parent)

Tapestry

Patio Prince

Luis Desamero

Pierrine

X-Rated

Soroptimist Int’l

One variety that I do know is excellent is Cal Poly, and I am trying to source a plant as soon as I can.

I am sorry if this feels like yet another plea for help from a newbie, but if you have 2 minutes to contribute to this “discussion”, I am sure I would not be the only one interested in your opinions and experience.

Many Thanks,

Duncan

Tauranga

New Zealand

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G’day, Duncan :slight_smile:

Have you met Mike Athy (see: http://www.mikeathyroses.com/index.html). He’s a fellow New Zealander with a wealth of knowledge at nice guy… I’m sure he would be happy to talk with more as well.

I guess it depends what kind of minis/mini-flora you are hoping to breed. From your list the only ones I have experience with are ‘Benardella’s Pearl’ and ‘Jean Kenneally’. Personally, I love ‘Benardella’s Pearl’ and have tried to use it in the past because it sets loads of OP hips and is one of the better mini roses, health-wise, here in my Tasmanian garden. Unfortunately I have never been able to get anything to stick on it. I’m sure this is because most the crosses I do are very wide crosses and it may prefer more modern pollen on it. I’ve not tried to germinate any of the OP seeds but that is only because I have too many to deal with as it is without collecting these as well. ‘Jean Kenneally’ has never set any op hips for me and I’ve never tried it as a pollen parent either. It’s a fairly tall upright plant for a mini and will reach 3ft tall without too much encouragement. It is like a classic hybrid tea in mini and so is not something I am focusing on. ‘Jean Kenneally’ has 30 first generation descendants, however, so it should be ok as a breeder and it has been used as both a seed parent and a pollen parent.

A lot of the more conventional minis seem to be relegated to the short-term/throw-away pot plant market and seem to be losing their popularity. On the other hand, big breeders like Kordes are still producing new minis but they are of a different kind and these are the type that I am most interested in. I firmly believe that if minis are to regain any of their popularity they will need a certain amount of re-inventing. Kordes are focusing on two main lines to make their new minis. One is based on ‘The Fairy’, and the other is on ‘Immesnee’ which is also derived from ‘The Fairy’ but, more importantly, is also based on R. wichurana. These new minis include roses like ‘Medeo’ and ‘Little Wonder’ and some look more like ground cover roses than minis. Sam McGredy did work with ‘Temple Bells’ in NZ so you should be able to find a plant there with some searching. It is very much like ‘Immensee’ except that one of its parents is a mini and many of its progeny are also mini. These tend to be quite healthy and range from being micro minis to sprawling ground hugging minis. I can totally recommend this rose for mini breeding and I wish you were closer so I could give you a few plants of it to help out. I also believe more work needs to be done to incorporate new species into minis.

I know Kim uses ‘Pink Petticoat’ a bit. He sent me some OP seed last season and it’s starting to germinate but I seem to kill all the seedlings from it (brown thumb).

‘Rise ‘n’ Shine’ and ‘Sweet Chariot’ also get a bit of a work out here too.

Good luck with it. I look forward to sdeeing some of your seedlings in the future.

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Hi Duncan, welcome! I’m not familiar with most of your list. I’ve always avoided any rose which exhibitors adored. I know, snobby of me, but there it is. Pink Petticoat and Cal Poly appear to accept pretty much anything put on them. Both are wonderfully healthy, vigorous and ever blooming fools here.

I grew Jean Kenneally primarily because I knew and admired Jean. The plant performed well with the only issue being its rangy growth in my overly long climate. I didn’t breed with it because Party Girl has a double dose of Little Darling in it, something I attempt to avoid like the plague. Little Darling was a break through rose and has many desirable qualities. BUT, it is rangy, semi climbing and rather floppy as a plant. Too much of her produces that in her offspring and I don’t like that habit. Selfing her results in too much black spot here. You’ll have to determine how the black spot issue is there as we probably have very different strains of it.

If you can’t obtain Cal Poly, would self set seeds of it work? As long as your Ag. restrictions are the same as for Australia, they can easily be sent. Though not identical to Cal Poly, Golden Gardens (thornless seedlings), Joycie and Work of Art are from the same cross, if you can easily obtain any of them. I would offer seeds from 1-72-1 but the rodents have already stripped all of the hips from it.

Good luck, you’re going to have a ball!

1 Like
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Hi Simon, Kim and others…

Thank you for the replies…plant breeders the world over seem to be the most generous of people - willing to share their knowledge and experiences…

Ok - Goals?

First and foremost: A true “miniaturised” HT- that is a compact plant (no more than 1 metre/3 feet) with genuine HT characteristics, and a bloom that is in the 2 - 3 inch range. A disease resistant bloom machine. Colour is not critical, however, I do like blends, and (forgive me!) stripes.

In considering where to start with this challenge, I have considered whether using an HT in my crosses would be a better approach- if I select a compact growing HT with attributes that appeal and cross it with a minflora/patio then perhaps that would be a better approach. I would be interested in your opinions about this angle.

So perhaps I should use an HT as the seed bearer…more seeds?

The steep learning curve has started - yesterday I potted up the first 50 or so OP seedlings, and there are certainly more to come. I hope this year to learn the “mechanics” of the breeding process - germination, potting, growing and selection so that next year I am reasonably well versed with the basics.

Any thoughts about an HT that may fit the above criteria?

Duncan

NZ

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Duncan, using HTs with minis is a very tried and true approach. Take a look at Dee Bennett’s list here on HMF. She loved the HT Futura and raised quite a few roses with it. I would check to make sure what HTs are already behind what you want to use. I’m not one for selfing much.

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I know Hot Tamale sets seed well.

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Hi Duncan,

Along with the others, I welcome you to this group of generous, and knowledgeable rose breeders/enthusiasts. And though you call yourself a “newbie”, your observations and experiences will be a help to others, so please join in other discussions to share your experiences.

With regard to your list, I have only grown a handful of them. ‘Jean Kenneally’, is a rather tall grower, but has nice smaller mini exhibition blooms. It does cooperate well in producing viable seed and pollen. I have used ‘Hot Tamale’ and ‘Glowing Amber’ mainly as pollen parents. ‘Fairhope’ was one of my favorite mini seed parents. It sets hips very well, and germination is good. All of these however, lack the cleanliness that you may be looking for. It depends on your climate. If these roses appear clean in your climate, without spraying, they will probably work for you. But, if you would like your seedlings to have a wider distribution into other climates, you may want to know how these fare outside of your climate zone.

Minis are very easy to work with, and I will always have them as part of my breeding program.

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Duncan, I’ve grown some of the ones you mention, mostly rather a long time ago. In my climate (central U.S.) cold hardiness is a serious consideration. That in conjunction with blackspot has mostly eliminated all my minis after a few years. I’d say the closest to a clean mini that I purchased was popcorn which isn’t much use as a parent. But it does well unprotected down to 0 F, or below. In those long-ago days I grew a few mini-floras of my own by crossing Rise N Shine on to Carefree Beauty and New Dawn. Only one of those proved useful as a parent itself. But a good rather small mini will give the size range you are looking for if you find a HT type rose that you like for its form and substance. Even better if like Rise N Shine it has those qualities itself. The Benardella roses have good flower form, but I didn’t find them hardy or B.S. resistant.

With tetraploids you get reasonably blended inheritance. So you will get a range of colors between that of the two parents most often. Rarely you will get something brighter or paler. Unfortunately it seems that disease resistance is mainly a blending process and the offspring are rarely better than the parents. So if you need resistance you either have to start with something like a Knock Out (which are rather sterile), or you have to do some really heavy selection and likely two generations of crosses. The Buck roses have fair resistance/tolerance for B.S. which with luck will end up in the offspring. I have one example of that when crossed with a Brownell rose, which also are pretty good in the disease resistance department at least for the older ones. New Dawn carries good B.S. resistance but may bring in mildew susceptibility to its offspring. And while some of the plants from minis are near mini, a lot are rather lanky and sparse repeaters.

Sweeping over-generalizations I’m sure, but that’s sort of how it looks out here.

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To All Of You Who Have Responded: Thank you very much.

I have read all your advice and comments…and I really appreciate them.

I knew that a few of the varieties I listed were seed bearers…but getting others feedback is most helpful.

I am going to persue the HT x Patio/Miniflora type of cross, as well as a few Mf x Mf, I also have a few good Floribundas that I believe could contribute quite a lot (Absolutely Fabulous, Sexy Rexy, Scentsational etc)

One HT I have identified (but have yet to source) is McGredy’s Papageno: Here’s what Simon Voorwind said on HMF

"In north west Tasmania, Australia, it does nicely in a spray-free garden. Gets some blackspot. Haven’t seen mildew on it. It’s fertile and sets OP hips easily. I have OP seeds in the fridge now and they have just started germinating. Hoping it passes on stripes like its Ferdinand Pichard ancestor.

EDIT: Seed update: ‘Papageno’ seeds germinated as fast as my multiflora seeds at a rate of about 90%. Promising seed parent.

EDIT 2: Has thrown striped seedlings. Lots of variation in OP seedlings."

So this may well be a good start towards the striped smaller form HT I wish to persue.

I was aware that Jean Kenneally, Sorop Int’l and Pink Pettiecoat were all viable breeders…and I will be using them this summer.

Also, the OP seeds I am currently germinating are showing me that Barnedella’s Pearl, Radiant and Dusky Dancer are reasonable seeds setters and germination is fairly good.

So I have the makings of an interesting season ahead of me…and a few potentially useful parents to work with.

I’ll let you all know when I strike that one in a million seedling that we all yearn for!

Thanks again for all your advice…

Duncan

NZ

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Duncan,

Welcome to the forum and the RHA. You will find that the posters here are most generous when it comes to offering advice and help that will get you to attain your goals! Most of them can truthfully say “Been there, done that”. Don’t ever be hesitant to ask a question. Regarding your goal of a “miniaturized HT”, generally what we have found over the years is that if you use a HT/FL as a seed parent and a mini as a pollen parent you get more seedlings that are of a typical of a miniflora size, whereas if you reverse the parentage you end up with more minis. Crossing two minis gave us a larger numer of micros. As always, timing of crosses and compatibility are factors that are the biggest part of the process. Some of the most fun we ever had in this wonderful hobby of ours is when we tried something different, which we can do as amateurs that are not under any pressure to come up with marketable seedlings. One of the most memorable was using one of the most prolific gigantic climbers as a seed parent and a micro as the pollen parent. There are still a couple of those offspring still lurking in one of our seedling beds. Maybe I will use those as seed parents and see what happens. Make those crosses, what ever strikes your fancy, and let us know how you do.

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I still use ‘Papageno’ a bit too but only have two of those seedlings mentioned in the thread above left. They have poor root vigour and require grafting. I have two new seedlings up right now that I’m looking forward to seeing. I put Rosa wichurana pollen onto ‘Papageno’ to try for a striped wichurana hybrid that I can then use as a jumping point to make striped landscape roses with wichurana health and vigour. I keep ‘Papageno’ around only as a donor for striped genes. Now that I have ‘Stars n Stripes’, ‘Fourth of July’ and ‘Oranges and Lemons’ (and possibly some striped seedlings from Kim… won’t know for a while about these… from his “44 striped NOT” plant) I may get rid of 'Papageno… HT are not my thing and I like a stronger root system on my roses.

This is one of the ‘Papageno’ seedlings about two years after the above post was made:

[center][attachment 1087 OPPapageno1.jpg][/center]

The flowers are a bit larger than 'Papageno’s and it is less thorny. I’m going to graft this one this year to see if I can get a bit more oomph out of it and may use it in breeding to donate some stripes as well… but all-in-all it’s a bit of a dog really.

I also have a rugosa ‘Alba’ x ‘Papageno’ seedling that I am hoping will flower for me this year that has surprisingly good health and vigour.

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Hi Duncan

I do not have a lot of experience with breeding miniatures but may have some advice for you to consider.

From your list I have used Ben’s Pearl which as you have noticed offers good germination but I never found anything I liked from it, the main problem being the low petal numbers and uninteresting colours. Many of Mr Benadella’s plants have great flower form, but health is not a strong point here in NZ. They are mostly good seed setters especially Gold Ambience and Perfection. Always Special is another goodie in hip production and germination.

I used Papageno many years ago and found nothing to carry on with. The growth was often long loose and whippy. You might like to consider some of the newer Delbard roses to introduce stripes into your seedlings particularly if you are aiming for more compact results. I have also found Oranges and Lemons to be very difficult to work with.

I feel that you may find in time that it is necessary to inject genes from more disease resistant varieties into your pool in order to strengthen the local mini’s (flower carpets, knock out, the fairy, grouse etc) This may also add the punch to your flowering machine goals.

I like your idea of using floribunda’s and those you mentioned will do the job well. Research on HMF will give you a good idea of a particular plants potential. but it is all trial and error and a lot of fun.

All the best

Mike Athy

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Hi Mike, Simon & Others…Thank you for the responses…and the helpful advice.

Mike, do you mind if I contact you off the forum?

I have located the following HT striped roses at a nursery not too far away.

I was wondering what experiences you may have had with the following:

Claude Monet

Henri Matisse

Paul Gauguin

Twist & Twirl

Ivan Crowther

Oranges & lemons

I have not yet had time to check out HMF - as to whether any of them are particuarly good parents…or indeed whether they set seed very well.

Hopefully amongst them is something worth working with…

Any comments?

Thanks,

Duncan

Tauranga

NZ

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Hi Duncan

Here is my number if you want to give me a call.

06-8625470

Cheers

Mike

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Duncan, Warren Millington here. If you want a good variegated rose which is healthy and passes its health to its offspring try Scentimental Tom Carruth (1997). For minatures , you have one bred in NZ called Wendy ( Schuurman) It is a real doozie and expect alot of very good things to come out of it. When I crossed these two Wendy X Scentimental I got a floribunda , mid pink variegated , with large flower clusters.

[attachment 1100 DandyAndy1.jpg] Dandy Andy

[attachment 1101 dandyandy62.jpg] This pic was taken by a friend of mine and the high lights blew out a bit , way to contrasty. It gives you an idea of the bloom cluster.

Wendy has given me bloom clusters of up to 180 buds per canes on some roses which I have bred. Look it up.

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Dandy Andy is striking, Warren. Another we can’t get here.

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Thanks Kim, its is in the trial garden as we speak. The repeat bloom on this one is frightening and healthy to boot as well.

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Warren, that is one impressive rose…well done.

And a stunning bud count.

And the good news is I have both of those parents, Wendy I picked up (discounted) late summer as a “mini” standard, and it is bursting into growth now, and we have Scenimental in my wifes main Rose garden…excellent!

Thankyou for the info about such a good cross…

Spring is well on the way now, growth on the roses is excellent, the days are warming up, and despite a couple of cool nights recently, night temps are climbing…

As a matter of interest, germination on the seeds has been pretty good. The standout for excellent germination is the mini “Heidi” which I suspect must be up around 75%.

Thanks again to all for all the help and great advice.

Duncan

Tauranga

NZ

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Duncan, here are two crosses I did with Wendy and the variation that came out of each cross, keep in mind that for each cross all these different bloom colour and structures are out of a single hip. Have you used Wendy yet? Seed germination is very fast and the % rate in seed germination is very high.

The first cross Wendy X Abraham Darby.

[attachment 1104 068182b.jpg]

The second cross Wendy X Altissimo

[attachment 1105 06881.jpg]

Duncan go into HMF and go to Wendys (Schuurmans) lineage and click on descendants by generation and you will see what this little rose is capable of.

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I love your photo collages, Warren. It’s fun to look at a bunch of blossoms from a particular cross all on the same page.