Just to put in another 2 cents, in general, I find china markers (grease pencils) outlast “permanent” markers for UV resistance. (Pigments tend to outlast dyes in that regard in general. Henry’s paint pens might be better still. Graphite pencils are totally UV resistant, and generally don’t wash off of anything that has enough tooth to write on, but that wouldn’t work on a rose hip!) THat said, china markers are a tad chunky and writing info on a hip would be awkward. Of course, any writing on a hip seems awkward to me! And I would avoid a system that requires returning to relabel hips after they grow a tad. Seems unecessarily involved.
I have used a technique of color coded tags, though the phone wire thing sounds brilliant – a huge improvement over my system. Never bothered dating any of the pollinations myself, and don’t know why I’d bother, but then I have a very long season. I do notate how long a cross takes to germinate from initial stratification, etc.
I once tried Henry’s tiny ziplock bag thingy which turned out to be a rotten idea in my climate. The hips got stewed, shriveled, abscissed, or otherwise met their demise in the sun and rain in very short order. It sounded great, but if you have hot sun, I highly discourage such. I was cutting up the bags so much to allow adequate ventilation that I wasn’t sure why I bothered with them. It’s a shame though – it really would be a good system were it not for stewed hips…
I still prefer aluminum foil to plastic bags - it avoids the problem of steaming the hips alive and they tend to stay fairly dry unless the hip is hanging down (although foil, too, can be perforated for drainage). This would allow you to write on the hip without worrying about UV fading, too. My only word of caution is that repeated removal of the foil covering will subject it to tears and metal fatigue, and you might find it hard to read your writing if it gets overly crumpled in the process. However, where I did most of my crossing, there was no other way to protect hips from marauding deer and squirrels so effectively (plastic doesn’t seem to bother rodents much), so the foil was the best possible choice for me.
Actually, writing on the hip isn’t awkward at all. I give my crosses a two digit number, so for instance, Nancy Jean x Incognito is 24, and that’s what gets written on the hip. I haven’t found the ink to fade like it does on a metal tag, either. Perhaps because the hip doesn’t get as hot as the metal. The only time it’s a problem is when the hip dries, shrivels and turns dark brown. Then it’s unreadable… but then, the seeds probably are toast at that point anyway.
Some years ago I wrote in the RHA newsletter about my maximum laziness approach. I bought tagging (flagging)tape from a nursery supply place in about 15 colors and combos like stripe or polka dots. Assigning 1 per pollen parent takes care of it. You can write on that with a nursery pen and it will last 2-3 yr without fading. My pollination season is 3-4 weeks at most for most CVs so who cares of dates. I don’t write anything on the 4 inch long tapes and I reuse them 2-4 seasons, depending on color and material. some fade, others get brittle after several yr. Usually I’m doing very low efficiency crosses with only 10-20% taking and I’d never get done in the limited time I have if I kept many notes. I think the nursery pen will also write fine on hips. I have used it occasionally. But many of them are rather small to get much info on with a coarse pen.
The Box on the china markers says:
Sanford Peel-OffChina Marker
Works on all-surfaces. Resists up to 3,100 degrees F (wow lol). non-toxic.
I love them. I wouldnt use anything else. I especially like them because I can use my tag from crossing the roses as a seed tray marker for that cross, too! Im lazy like that 