| People's gardens are different from place to place; not all rose varieties will perform the same in every garden. For example, if you follow US rose thread on Garden Web, you'll probably see that Jude the Obscure is one of the worst repeating DAs in the US. But here in Oz, it grows and blooms like mad. Same rule works even in the same city; for example, in my friend's garden, just 1 mile away, some roses don't do well, although in my garden (she gave them to me) they grow like crazy. I believe that not a single rose of the same variety/cultivar is the same rose in the terms of her health, growth, vigour and overall appearance. Like us, she's an individual too. By judging the vigour and repeat flowering capacity of just one rose bush in our garden we cannot say that the whole variety will perfom alike. I've found that planting several roses of the same variety overcomes this repeat flowering "problem". Even if one plant is weaker and doesn't perform well in the beginning, the second and the third one just 2 feet away will probably do better and then together they'll perform a magnificient flower concerto before our eyes throughout the year. And then, the very nature of DA's roses is most probably the cause for our whingeing; as Mr. Austin underscored himself, it's extremely hard (if not impossible) for a rose to have perfect health, disease resistance, vigour, great foliage, beautiful flower shape, excellent fragrance, delicateness and be strong repeat bloomer, all at the same time. You have to sacrifice something to get something else. I'd rather have three slower repeating, beautiful and delicate DAs in my garden than three dozens of some excellent repeating hybrid teas with huge, cabbage-like, wrinkled, non-scented flowers in all impossible colours that fade quickly. But this is just my personal taste. -Tom |
