The garden is buzzing with life, and the roses are spectacular in every direction. The best news is that the roses have only just started to open, which means many more weeks and months of blooms are yet to come,
Spring: a lovely reminder of how beautiful change can truly be.
One of the first to adorn the garden is this gorgeous rose that is, in fact, aptly called Gorgeous. This one is a Hybrid Tea rose, part of the Paramount ® Collection bred by L Pernille Olesen in Denmark and introduced into Denmark as ‘Gorgeous’ in 2012. Rosa Gorgeous features a deep pink colouring with yellow undertones on a substantial double cluster-flowered bloom form but with little scent. Last year I had a few roses from this Hybrid Tea; there are so many more this season. It will grow between 70 and 100 cm in height and continue to bloom with healthy green foliage all season.
Tom Clothier
To garden, you open your personal space to admit a few, a great many, or thousands of plants which exude charm, pleasure, beauty, oxygen, conversation, friendship, confidence, and other rewards should you succeed in meeting their basic needs. This is why people garden. It can be easy but challenging, and the rewards are priceless.
So, the garden year is off to a sensational start. After years of nurturing and hoping for a spectacular spring display, there are now multitudes of roses, more than I could have imagined. So much so that the laden branches find it challenging to stay upright because the stems are too heavy with the number of blooms. I’ve been busy staking roses in the garden to ensure they are not lying across the garden beds but up where the air can circulate and the roses more visible.
The rain has pelted down recently but usually from afternoon storms. Thankfully, the days are bright with sunshine, which helps dry out the sections that are too wet. The ground is sodden in one area, and the garden has lost several plants, at least five roses, lavender struggling from too much water and, have been either pottered up or moved to a drier area. It is nothing considering the devastation of the floods in my region, where water has inundated hundreds of homes and businesses. We are fortunately not flooded, only isolated from the town.
After so much rain, I’ve trained myself not to look at the prolific weeds that have appeared magically whilst the wet week kept me inside. So now there are many tasks, but even the usual tedious ones are enormously satisfying and rewarding because of the hundreds of magnificent roses.
Pamela Lord, American garden writer,
I’m tired of hearing so much about maintenance-free gardens. If you aren’t going to get out there and live with it, including taking care of it, then what’s the point of gardening anyway?
The eclectic array of climbing roses growing here all require tying down like the new Cecile Brunner on the front arch that is billowing everywhere and would be better attached. The Twilight Glow roses below ( top left and centre) have taken off since being attached in Autumn, proving the theory that climbing roses need to be tied horizontally. Once the central cane is horizontal, new lateral shoots thicken the vine with new shoots over the trellis or archway. The other climbing roses pictured are- Guy Savoy, Sally Holmes, Cecile Brunner, Quicksilver, Westerland and Pinkie.
Joseph’s Coat rose growing against the water tank is enormous this year and doing well in the new position. This is a vigorous growing rose with many prickles and thorny stems, but it rewards with deep colour and an extraordinary number of buds and large green leaves. Joseph’s Coat loves extra fertiliser to maintain the size of the blooms and the intense colouring. Overall, it is a challenge to have looking good all the time but I’m hoping as it becomes established it will be less difficult to train.
French essayist Joseph Joubert, 1754-1824
All gardeners live in beautiful places because they make them so.
Like its namesake, the lantern rose ( MALClanter ) is tall, narrow, illuminating and upright with orange-apricot high-centred blooms and lighter colour undertones that fade to soft peach. Bred by Samuel Darragh and McGredy IV and introduced into the USA by Weeks Wholesale Rose Grower, Inc. in 1999 as ‘Lantern’.
Lantern is a Grandiflora rose that grows between 120 cm to a height of 185 cm. I love the colour of this rose and the fact that it has upright, straight and narrow growth that is a respite from the more wild, sprawling roses. Lantern is well-behaved, and the blooms are easy to reach for picking cut flowers.
Thalassa Cruso
Once we become interested in the progress of the plants in our care, their development becomes a part of the rhythm of our own lives,“ and we are refreshed by it.
My Yellow is an Australian-bred Floribunda rose bred by Bruce Brundrett in 2014 and introduced by Treloar Roses in 2018 as My Yellow- BRUNsam. It will grow up to 150 cm tall and wide with glossy dark green foliage. It has excellent health and disease resistance, beautiful bloom form, and rich golden two-toned colouring; hence is a reliable multi-award winning rose.
My Yellow is always in bloom from Spring onwards and a consistently magnificent rose that fills a wide area with roses all season long. The colour deepens in cooler weather and is a standout in the garden amongst densely growing foliage.
There are many beautiful roses named to honour particular charities and organisations. The beautiful colouring in the ruffled blooms of this stunning rose is from the Transplant Australia Thank You Rose. A growing symbol of thanks and gratitude.
Since 2012, 25, 000 Thank You roses have been sold by Treloar Roses in Australia. Ours sits proudly at the back door visible from the inside ( country homes, it is actually the front entrance ) but has only just been planted, and this is the first bloom.Bred by Tim Hermann Kordes in Germany in 1997 and introduced to Australia in 2012 as Thank You Rose. In Germany and Switzerland, it is known as Glendora, in the USA as Plum Perfect and in South Africa as Vodacom.
Thank You is a Floribunda rose in lavender to plum colouring with a delicate fragrance, ruffled petals and pointed buds, and it blooms in clusters. A short bushy, upright modern rose to 120 cm. Winner of multiple awards, including the “Best Floribunda Rose” at the 2011 National Trial Garden Awards. The Thank You rose is a wonderful idea as a gift to send someone your appreciation and gratitude.
When at last I took the time to look into the heart of a flower, it opened up a whole new world a world where every country walk would be an adventure, where every garden would become an enchanted one
Princess Grace of Monaco
Lastly, the Princess de Monaco Rose has almost finished the first blooms, and now after growing for two years, it looks terrific. These are standard roses that only had a few flowers last year, and it was cut back hard in winter, and now the roses are enormous. Princess de Monaco is magnificent at all stages of the rose, from bud to open bloom.
Also known as Grace Kelly, Princess Grace, Princess Monaco, and Princess de Monaco this beautiful rose is a Hybrid Tea rose bred by Marie-Louise (Louisette) Meilland (Paolino) in France and introduced in France by Meilland et Cie in 1981 as ‘Princesse de Monaco’. The features are white blooms edged with soft to brilliant pink, mostly solitary in a cupped bloom form and glossy, dark green foliage. It is a robust, upright, sturdy rose, and the blooms are significant. It should grow to 90 cm and have a mild fruity scent.
Content Di Baker 2022
Photography Di Baker November 2022
Title quote by Sondra Fay
Beautiful content, love the photos and quotes. Thank you