Praise for one of my favorite roses.

I am so pleased when I read reports like this. 'Marianne' is one of my all time favorite once blooming roses, and I say that not because it came from my efforts as a breeder, but because it is truly such a fine rose and offers so much. This year, for the first time, I have found and collected sufficient anthers from my two mother plants to be able to pollinate a good fifty or sixty blooms on a few roses. I have no idea whether or not the pollinations will result in seed production, its too soon to tell. If I can obtain a rose as fine as 'Marianne' but with remontancy, I will be very pleased indeed.

'Marianne' = 'Duchesse de Montebello' X 'Abraham Darby'. Registered 2001. Available from Rogue Valley Roses.

Wretched

By growing a population of self pollinated seedlings from a
prospective breeder, you discover that it has some serious genetic
flaws that disqualify it as a breeder. This would be one of those
times :-/

77-07-12: update.

I have been so busy trying to keep up with the hundreds of tasks that all have to be done in May and June and regrettably, blog posts often get dropped from my "to do" list. Tonight, however, I will make an effort.

This is one of about six selections I have now culled down to from the cross made in 2007 of ('Penny Ante' X 'Tradescant') X L83. The seed parent is a proprietary hybrid of mine that I often use for breeding to get both good color and vigor into my work. It turns out to have been an excellent choice with which to mate L83, the AgCan Kordesii breeder.

Seedling #77-07-12 is my favorite of this group, with its heavy, dark glossy foliage and the 4" double red and purple blooms, reminiscent of a slightly less double 'Charles de Mills'. It has a modest "modern rose" fragrance that is neither strong nor remarkable, but pleasant just the same. The foliage has so far been completely immune to Blackspot, whereas other seedlings immediately next to it have lost 80% or more of their foliage to the disease. While I am considering this as a "finished" variety (IE: headed for market) I am also working on proceeding with it as a breeder, crossing it with its siblings and one of the yellow L83 hybrids, the idea being to improve further on the excellent disease resistance of these L83 seedlings.

Westerland shows promise as a breeder.

I'm beginning to wonder why Kordes' 'Westerland' hasn't been used much in breeding. I can say that my own experience demonstrates that it makes some very decent offspring, so maybe its just a style thing? It appears to be inclined to make large, climber-ish shrubs, and for the most part, large roses are not currently in vogue, so maybe that is part of it.

Anyway, lets look at this example. This is 'Westerland' X 'A Shropshire Lad', the latter being one of the more recent Austin roses, which, like 'Westerland' is a large shrub that can be trained as a "climber". (I put that in double quotes because, like so many similar modern shrubs of a certain stature, this rose is often referred to as a "climber" when in fact it is nothing at all like the true climbers: the Ramblers, Hybrid Multifloras and others bred from true climbing species. Of course, it can be argued that no rose is a climber in the true sense, as they have no tendrils or tools to grasp with. They are simply "opportunistic climbers", relying on chance that their prickles will latch onto something supporting as they grow towards the light.)

I saved this seedling at the last moment, only because it had such excellent foliage and a glimmer of pleasant color. I almost culled it because in the first two seasons the blooms were less full than I would have liked. This Spring, however, the blooms are reasonably full and quite attractive. (Certainly more petals than previously) It is showing excellent vigor as well, and appears to have excellent resistance to disease (so far). The fully expanded bloom shown here is about 4" in diameter. Larger canes are blooming in clusters of three to five, while laterals often have only one or two. Half open buds are yellow brushed heavily with flame, expanding to more of a "Peace yellow" with splashes of pink and red at the petal edges. Yes, it has a pleasant scent, though not intense. I'll be watching this one more closely now, I think ;-)

So, in case you were considering using 'Westerland' as a breeder, I would say yes, go ahead and see what it can do for you. It might not do exactly what you want, but I believe it is worth exploring.

74-07-01: Tuscany Superb X R. arkansana

I made this cross in '07 with the idea of working the lovely native R. arkansana into my work, without resorting to using modern China-derivatives in order to preserve tetraploidy. And so, I turned to an old favorite: 'Tuscany Superb'. (FYI the Gallicanae are almost all tetraploids by nature) I am particularly interested in R. arkansana because of its exceptional Winter hardiness, its complete immunity to disease and the fact that my specimen (seed grown in 1999) blooms at least three times a growing season, with long rests between flushes. Could this be a remontancy trait that can be incorporated into new species derivatives? We'll see.

I obtained only four seedlings from this cross and unfortunately, all have been *ahem* a tad weak in the vigor department. Mind you, that isn't going to prevent me from using this selection in breeding. I can always abandon this avenue should the offspring turn out to be wusses: nothing ventured, etc, etc. It does, however, have a rich and complex "wild rose" fragrance that can undoubtedly be capitalized upon. I'd be interested in crossing this with 'Therese Bugnet' except that TB is a diploid, so I'll leave that out of the equation for now. I may, however, turn to the Hybrid Spinosissima 'Suzanne', which has been reported as being a tetraploid. For now, recovering remontancy without sacrificing disease immunity is paramount; color, my friends, will have to wait ;-)

04-07-05: making progress with L83

In 2007, thanks to David Zlesak, I began working with the AgCan Kordesii breeding variety L83. My main interest in working with L83 was to improve Blackspot resistance in my work, but there was a likelihood that improvements in Winter hardiness might be had as well.

From the 2007 crosses I made, two groups stand out as having at least two or three selections that show both extremely good Blackspot resistance (near immunity) and apparent Winter hardiness (based on my limited experience). It should also be noted that several selections have good to excellent color and attractive bloom form. All have excellent vigor and attractive foliage. About 5 plants have been kept from the cross of ('Penny Ante' X 'Tradescant') X L83, including the fire engine red 77-07-23, which was used to a limited degree in 2009 breeding.

Illustrated here is the best yellow selection from 'Golden Angel' X L83, numbered 04-07-05. Some of you have probably noted that this is a cross of a triploid X a tetraploid, and so it is possible that the 04-07 selections are a mix of triploids and tetraploids. Some of these set open pollinated seeds last year (which I allowed to happen in order to determine fertility) and seeds were saved and a percentage have germinated. I am now starting to put select pollens on this yellow cultivar with the hope of moving forward with a Kordesii derived yellow breeding line. There is certainly a lot of room for improvements in both Winter hardiness and disease resistance in yellows! For now, I am limiting myself to using other first generation L83 hybrids to breed with this selection, and in fact will be crossing most of my best L83 selections with each other this year. Most are strong reds and medium yellows, so color results should be bright and rich with any luck.