121-06-14: impressions in year five.

Breeding roses is not a game for the "instant gratification" crowd. Patience, for us, is not a virtue, it is a requirement.

Cross #121-06 was created in Spring 2006; that is when I selected pollen from Austin's 'Tradescant' and placed it on blooms of my own seedling, 174-02-17 ('Sheri Anne' X 'Out of Yesteryear'). The foloowing year, probably April 2007, this seedling first appeared in a tray of seed mix topped with a generous layer of Perlite (for Damping Off suppression, did you know?) Although I do not have any notes to indicate when I first saw it flower, chances are it bloomed for the first time in June or July of 2007. The first bloom probably did little more than hint at bloom color and form, but apparently it was enough to make me select it for potting on for further observation.

In later Winter 2008, however, this seedling was almost destroyed by a week's worth of hard freezes that went down into the low teens every night. It was still in a 5 gallon container and rose roots don't like freezing solid while in pots. Long story short, it did survive, although it took more than a year to recover its vigor. 2010 showed me what a potential jewel this seedling was, with its deep garnet/purple swirls of petals, reminding me sometimes of 'Charles de Mills' or some such anachronistic creature. But unlike its Gallic brethren, this lad blooms in flushes through the growing season; pretty much a requirement for modern hybrids. (Although I am often found arguing for the merits of the elegant once bloomers)

I'm not done passing judgement on this seedling; it has yet to tell me much about ease of propagation, or its ultimate disease resistance out in the open test bed. It isn't yet as big as it will get when fully matured, and so I need to be quite sure this dark Swan doesn't turn rabid in year 6 or 7 and produce all manner of rank growth, breaking from its compact grace and going all "Audrey" on me. Time, as they say, will tell.

From the archive, #3

121-06-14 = 174-02-17 (Sheri Anne X Out of Yesteryear) X Tradescant.

Once again, I am indoors by the wood stove on a cold and foggy morning, sorting through my photo archives as part of a dual effort: catalog the photos, and locate pics appropriate to use in the new database I am building to document my breeding program. The seedling pictured here is currently under evaluation for its garden-worthiness, and it has great potential so far.

Speaking of databases, any of you hybridizers working with plants of any kind, looking for a great way to document your breeding plants and seedlings, I would like to recommend Tap Forms for the iOS platform. (iOS is the operating system that runs the Apple devices: iPhones, iPad, etc) Tap Forms has turned out to be the ideal tool for documenting in great detail every seedling I am using, and includes a way to include full sized photos, Web URLs for external reference, and all the stuff you'd expect to want to record, like growth habit, fertility, parentage, etc. etc. It also provides multiple ways to back up data, including an easy-as-pie sync to DropBox, where you can export the database as a CSV file. There is a free "lite" version available for the iPhone if you want to try before you buy. Check out Tap Forms in the iTunes App Store.

Old dogs and new tricks, part IV

A big part of what I do involves experimentation; trying unlikely combinations and testing proprietary seedlings to see what they can do. Often, this also involves dredging up very old cultivars to throw into the mix. Today's post is a creature that covers pretty much all of these territories.

120-06-02 = 174-02-17 X "Grandma's Hat". The seed parent is discussed here in a previous post. This cross was done to do several things: 1) determine what qualities the seed parent was capable of passing on, 2) to see how two extremely different roses would behave when mated, and 3) to determine if any of the health aspects of "Grandma's Hat" could be transmitted to offspring. "Grandma's Hat" is an old Bourbon/Hybrid Perpetual that was rediscovered a number of years ago, and much speculation exists over its true identity. For the most part we can only make guesses. Whatever its true identity, it is a superb rose that in many climates is one of the healthiest of repeat blooming Old Garden Roses one could wish to grow. It repeats generously, has good vigor and an outstanding fragrance. Whats not to like?!

The seed parent is a cross of a miniature and the Bracteata hybrid 'Out of Yesteryear'. I have not used it a lot in breeding till 2006 when I decided it was time to explore its qualities more aggressively. I got three seedlings from it with "Grandma's Hat" as the pollen parent, and the seedling pictured here interests me a great deal. The color is richer than the photo suggests, being deeper and more of a true crimson than pink. The plant has good vigor and best of all, it is not getting any Blackspot (or Mildew) in the test garden, even with another seedling towering over it, raining down Blackspot spores. It also has an appreciable "old rose" fragrance. I am now testing it as a pollen parent with some of the better disease free roses I grow, like the Robert Basye hybrids.

Searching for better shrub architecture: 119-06-01

As the years go by and my experience with rose breeding accumulates, I have come to really appreciate the sage advice of Ralph Moore, who said to me: make the plant first and then hang the flowers on it. When Ralph said this, I suddenly realized how many roses in commerce are all about the flower and not about the architecture of the shrub. I don't know many Hybrid Teas that make good landscape shrubs. They're bred to produce cut flowers: solitary blooms on top of tall straight stems. That doesn't exactly add up to being a good shrub for the landscape. With this philosophy in mind, I have sought more and more to breed for attractive shrub growth habits. The native American species are beginning to play a role in this pursuit now, as are some of the Rugosas and some of my proprietary hybrids.

I recently mentioned 174-02-17, one of my Hybrid Bracteatas that I use for breeding. It isn't a very attractive shrub in itself, with its wild, wiry horizontal growth and somewhat sparse foliage and small blooms. But it does breed some very good things, particularly attractive shrub architecture. The seedling pictured above is one of the best offspring I have obtained from 174-02-17. ('Hot Cocoa' was the pollen parent) 119-06-01 is the only seedling I got from this cross, and its quite remarkable. At two years of age now, it has built into a very full 3 foot wide shrub with excellent form. The plant is densely foliated with dark glossy leaves and the plant is full right down to ground level. No bare knees on this rose! New basal shoots tend to be quite horizontal, a trait from the Bracteata parent, and they grow more upright as they develop. This makes for a very well rounded plant outline. Blooms are 3" in diameter and quite full, globe shaped. The petals drop cleanly, and there is a pleasant "modern rose" scent. The soft orange blooms are produced in clusters of three to 25, opening sequentially over a long period. Happily, this cultivar is easily propagated from semi-hardwood cuttings.

For me, this represents a nearly ideal shrub in terms of its architecture, bloom presentation and overall effect. I am now using 174-02-17 (its seed parent) extensively in breeding to further explore its capabilities. Funny how you can ignore a seedling for years and not consider its potential as a parent. It just goes to show you that its smart to try out many of your seedlings as parents before you dismiss them as "near misses".

Bracteata line breeding.

It seems to me that line breeding is rarely pursued in the breeding of roses. In part, I expect this is because undesirable recessives start to show up and loss of hybrid vigor becomes an issue as well. Still, many of the Canadian Explorer roses rely heavily on line breeding, making extensive use of the 'Red Dawn' X 'Suzanne' line and the 'Kordesii' line, and with great success.

Well, I have been working with the Moore line of Hybrid Bracteatas for several years now and it has become very clear that the biggest battle with these is getting decent color out of them. Ralph Moore's most attractive hybrid of the group (for me) is 'Out of Yesteryear', whose parentage is 'Sequoia Gold' X 'Muriel'. 'Muriel' is Moore's first successful cross using R. bracteata (crossed with 'Guinee') that was fully fertile and able to carry forward the line. 'Muriel' is a tetraploid, as is 'Sequoia Gold', but when these two were crossed, 'Out of Yesteryear' resulted and it turned out to be a triploid! How two tetraploids mated to produce a triploid is a bit of a mystery, but there you have it. Even more interesting, 'Out of Yesteryear' is a fully fertile triploid, contrary to the mytholgy of triploids being infertile. You can use its pollen on pretty much anything and get loads of seedlings from it.

I've done plenty of crosses with 'Out of Yesteryear' over the years and there are some excellent traits it passes on, and some not so great ones. Its offsrping tend to have excellent vigor, beautiful foliage and often very beautiful blooms packed with petals. Many are often fragrant as well. However, seedlings can be very thorny, the petal texture too thin and rarely do you get anything with strong coloring. Many seedlings are just white. So when I get a seedling that has decent color, I'm inclined to explore it as a stepping stone towards Bracteata hybrids with good color, which leads me to these two.

174-02-17 = 'Sheri Anne' X 'Out of Yesteryear'. One of its siblings tested as a tetraploid and I suspect this is also. It is a thorny plant that is more horizontal than vertical, with smallish glossy foliage. It blooms at many nodes along the previous season's canes and can bloom in large clusters sometimes. Blooms have a vaguely HT shape when in bud (see photo) but open to a flat 2.5 inch shape. Color is a medium red in bud, fading to a pale red/pink. It sets seed with most any pollen, but seed fertility is low at about 10-20%. However, when it does produce seedlings, a high percentage of them has something about them that warrants further evaluation. Offspring tend to bloom in big clusters with compact, graceful architecture and good color. One of my favorite new shrubs came from a cross of 174-02-17 X 'Hot Cocoa'. (More about this soon)

33-03-03 = 'Twilight Skies' X 'Muriel'. Why, you might ask, did I select the mauve miniature 'Twilight Skies' as the parent for this cross? Because it was there! I had grown it for two years when it was new and it set seed readily, bloomed like mad, so I thought why not? It was untested and might have qualities that would make it worthwhile as a parent. The seedlings from this group were mostly lavender/pinks with one coral colored one in the mix. Several were grown for two years and all but 33-03-03 were discarded for poor vigor or unattractive blooms. 33-03-03 is a semi-climbing plant with dark green glossy foliage and 2.5" medium red blooms that fade to a reddish pink with age, about 25 petals, cupped in form. It blooms in clusters all along the arching canes, repeating in flushes through the year. David Zlesak kindly did ploidy tests on some of my Bracteata seedlings for an article we were co-authoring*, a few years back and it turns out that 33-03-03 is a tetraploid. It is fertile in both directions and should be compatible with most other tetraploids.

174-02-17 and 33-03-03 happen to be growing side by side in one of the greenhouses, both descended from R. bracteata through 'Muriel', and both were selected for their relatively strong coloring. Yet it never occurred to me to cross the two together....until now. The idea (and hope) here is that some of the more interesting Bracteata traits might be reenforced while retaining the vigor, repeat blooming habit and red coloring of each. Anything could happen of course. I might end up with a load of diseased seedlings with no vigor and no rebloom. Its possible the seeds might not even germinate, assuming I get seeds at all! We shall see.

*See: Bracteata Gene Counts Article