A WEEK IN MY GARDEN 31 MAY - THE FIRST ROSES

The first of the roses are here and they are looking good.  The weather has turned a little cooler, wetter and windier so they aren't pumping out the perfume, although there is a pleasant waft now and then.

Miso the cat welcomes you to the Rose Garden

There are over 100 roses in the garden; some are modern floribundas, some were bred many years ago (the so-called Old Roses), some are the English roses bred by David Austin and there are quite a few climbers as well.  I think this year I'm going to try to feature them all in the blog - good and bad, with a few notes on what I think of each of them.  Hopefully that won't get too tedious for the reader, but you can always scroll to the end if it does.

So lets begin with the first rose to open.  It's 'Roald Dahl', an apricot coloured David Austin rose, and it's a very good one.  It's smothered in flowers from head to toe, and it's on the shorter side as roses go at about 3ft. Mine is in a slightly raised bed, so I can appreciate it's blooms at eye level.  Most importantly it is healthy with lots of glossy green leaves.

I am exceptionally fond of an apricot rose, but if that isn't your cup of tea, then perhaps 'Olivia Rose Austin' would be for you.  It is a silvery pale pink.  It's qualities are similar to 'Roald Dahl'.  It grows to about 3ft, is scented, very healthy and covered in flowers.  They probably tie for being the first to flower as well.  Both roses have exquisitely pretty cupped flowers. 

Three bushes were planted to produce this effect

Next to bloom was 'A Shropshire Lad'.  This one is a climbing rose, but not a very tall one.  There are three in the garden growing up pillars which are about 6ft tall, and they seem happy to be that size.  The flowers are a subtle delicate warm pink, opening from coral buds.  I saw this rose growing in the David Austin display gardens and fell in love with it.  Now for the downside - over the years it has begun to suffer horribly from rust.  So much so that David Austin no longer sell it.  

It looks Ok in these photos, but later in the season it won't, and it must affect the flowering as well.

Having said that I had a mixture of roses in the garden, I realise that this selection of the earliest to flower are all by David Austin, except for this next one - Madame Alfred Carriere (or Mad Alfie as it was referred to by a blogger may of us remember).  It was introduced in 1879.  It certainly can put on a lot of growth in a year.  It will grow to 25ft, and of course I planted it somewhere that maybe 12 - 15ft of rose would be sufficient which means I'm constantly cutting it back.  And what happens when we cut something back really hard?  It stimulates growth.  

So would I recommend this rose?  Possibly not.  The flowers are pretty enough.  It gets some blackspot, but nothing too dreadful, but it is often suggested for a more shaded situation, and in my experience it just goes on growing, looking for light, and not flowering all that much.  I have an experiment underway as I have planted one on a south facing wall to see if it will be better behaved there.  I will report back next year.

In the photo below it is the orange rose that I'm going to be talking about.  It is 'The Lady of Shallot', and it's another David Austin rose. 

 I received it as a gift as the giver knew we had a print of this Waterhouse painting.

The Lady of Shallot by John William Waterhouse

This rose grows to about 4ft high and the plant below has been in for two or three years now.  As a bush it is a little bit looser and more open than the ones mentioned above, and the orange is much more definite than the apricot of the Roald Dahl.  So far it has been healthy and robust in its growth.

I'm going to wrap up this selection of roses with another one bred by David Austin - Rosa Chianti.  In fact it was one of their earliest, introduced in 1967.  As you'd expect from the name it is wine red.  

It is a large shrub, spreading as wide as it is high and almost weighed down by its mass of flower.  I haven't had to stake it, but some years it does get propped up a little.  It is reasonably healthy, with a bit of black spot.  It does only flower once, but what a display it makes!  So it you only had room for a few roses you probably wouldn't choose this one, but if you have a larger garden, and like a deep red rose, then I would find room for this one.

If you weren't interested in all the ins and outs of these roses, and took my advice to scroll to the end instead, you can start reading again now.  We have strawberries.  Not as many as we would have done if we had netted them earlier, but plenty for us to enjoy.  The blackbirds have started to take the micky now though and the nets are up.

They may be all sorts of odd shapes and sizes but they do taste so much better than the shop bought ones.

That's all for now, but my phone is briming with more rose pictures, so I think another post will be winging it's way to you soon.  In the meantime thank you for reading.  Until next time x