Saturday, May 2, 2009

A more recent miniature: 25-07-07


As I mentioned in my previous post, I don't use miniatures in my work to breed new miniatures, but to utilize them for some of their other characteristics. It can be a specific trait I am trying to obtain, or some general trait like compact growth habit. In the case of this seedling, I was aiming to capture stripes, as the pollen parent was 'Pinstripe' by Ralph Moore. While I did get a couple of striped seedlings from this group, I am still evaluating them and am unsure of their merit.

This seedling, number 07 from the cross of 'Midnight Blue' X 'Pinstripe', has been a rather pleasant surprise. Yes, its a miniature, but a rather unique one I think. In many ways it is a perfect miniature replica of its seed parent except that it has more of a tiny Waterlily bloom form. (I regard Tom Carruth's 'Midnight Blue' as a triumph of modern hybridizing in terms of its overall performance and remarkable purple coloring.) 25-07-07 is still only one year old and has not yet matured, so I don't really know much about its ultimate size or shrub form. It appears to be fairly upright but bushy, and it is going to bloom in clusters. Bloom size is about 1.5" and it has a moderate/strong fragrance reminiscent of its seed parent. (Somewhat Clove-ish) This seedling propagates readily from cuttings as well, which is always a good thing.

6 comments:

  1. OMG! I'll have 100 of them thanks :) I love this rose so much. Did the striped seedlings inherit the dark purple stripes too? How does the purple in this lovely seedling age?

    When 'Ebb Tide' arrives in a few weeks, as a dormant bare root plant, it is destined to be lined up with roses to do just this!!! I also really want to put it with 'Comtesse de Labarthe' ('Duchesse de Brabant'), 'Sweet Chariot'. I don't think my 'Veilchenblau' or 'Violette' plants will be big enough to flower this coming season (newly struck cuttings) but if they do they will be going onto 'Ebb Tide' too. As will 'Anne Endt'. In a few seasons time I'd like to see what happens if 'Ebb Tide' is put onto straight bracteata and gigantea too. So much to try...

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  2. Thank you Simon.
    This seedling ages remarkably well. The color holds till the petals drop, aging to a greyish purple color as some of the red fades out.

    The striped selection s were all pretty much crimson-red on white, none were purple stripes on white :-( However, that doesn't mean it might not be possible if I repeated the cross in larger numbers. I only had about 30 seedlings from this cross and could easily have generated far more if I'd wanted to. This was just a test crossing to see if I wanted to repeat it on a larger scale.

    I think 'Ebb Tide' is also an excellent selection to work with and is probably as capable as 'Midnight Blue'. Both set seed easily and seed germinates effortlessly. Putting 'Sweet Chariot' on it is interesting as is 'Violette', as both are in its ancestry. But keep in mind the odds are that using either will likely result in a reduction in bloom size again. I'm sure Tom had a struggle to get bloom size up to where he did.

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  3. I was thinking it would be a trade-off in flower size to try and acquire the large trusses like in 'Sweet Chariot', 'Violette', and 'Veilchenblau', and the overall effect might cancel out the reduction in size and make something of value in the landscape (hence wanting to put Tea into it too). Can you get the rose called 'Wild Rover' over there? This is one of my favourite roses in this colour range. I will try and get a good photo of mine to put on HMF. I would actually love to try and send you pollen of this rose next season (for freezing) to see how it goes on some of your dark purple breeders. It also sets hips easily. It's funny but none of the photos on HMF seem to have the same colour as my one does. The flowers are pretty small though.

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  4. I don't think there's anything wrong with aiming for large trusses of smaller blooms. I think total impact is important, and individual bloom size is far less important. 'Midnight Blue' never produces very large blooms and yet it can literally be covered in hundreds of blooms at its Spring peak. I think that is very impressive.

    I've never seen 'Wild Rover', but I think you can buy it somewhere in the US, yes. I looked it up; the photos show a rather dirty color thats neither red nor purple. Just poor photos?

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  5. Yes... poor photos... mine is a lovely deep purple with a yellowish centre. I am now on a mission to take a good photo :)

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  6. That is a gorgeous bloom. I'm glad I looked at the photo in full size. That way, I noticed the tiny white edge to the petals.

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