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Hardy antique roses can add uncommon beauty to garden

Learning about and growing antique roses has interested me for several years. Until lately though, I’ve grown only a few easy-care David Austin roses and a Harris 1935 yellow. Last year when I was able to root another, Katy Road Pink, from a 4-inch stem, the ease of propagation at no cost of this beautiful “ol’-timey” rose to my garden may have hooked me into collecting more old roses. So it’s not surprising that I was happy to learn that Gerlinde, wife of fellow Master Gardener Associate Edwin, has two of these pink beauties in their backyard.

Gerlinde mostly grows antique roses that are repeat bloomers. Tucked into corners, against fences and in formal beds you’ll find her favorites: Queen Elizabeth, loads of pink blossoms; La Marne, fragrant deep pink; Katy Road Pink Rose, a shrub rose discovered in Katy Road, Texas, by the Rose Rustlers — a group that finds old roses in abandoned homesteads, cemeteries, etc., researches their original name, propagates and offers them to the public. Valentine (she has five), a velvety deep rose with lovely shape; Belinda’s Dream, a fragrant pink (lovely form), Maggie, a fragrant bright dark pink rose; Sam Houston, a pink blend; Cecile Brunner, with a good strong aroma, light pink, Mrs. R. M. Finch, a light pink fragrant; Marchessa Boccella, a medium pink fragrant; White Pet, a small white; RiseNShine, a yellow, grows low (not terribly pretty and doesn’t bloom well); Coral Beauty, a bright coral, lovely shape.

Edwin had asked me over to see their 9.5-foot-tall hollyhocks. These lovely pink, rose and white old-fashioned hollyhocks act as a partial screen between the more formal bed of roses, perennials and flower beds and the vegetable garden. I was enchanted with the layout. The numbers and varieties of trees, perennials, annuals, squirrels and birds that co-exist like a happy family in this small enclosure truly are astounding.

Not only is this intimate garden beautiful and tidy, it’s comfortable: a place in which you want to linger. Edwin and Gerlinda use nothing that will harm the wild creatures that visit or come to stay. They are glad to share the bounty: being content with a few imperfect apples or chewed on leaves in preference to poisoning their environment with harmful chemicals.

Picture the evergreen borders that frame the garden, acts as a privacy screen as well as feeds the birds and squirrels. Among the berry- and fruit-yielding plants in the border chosen to feed the birds are: American, Foster and youpon hollies. In the yard proper an Arkansas Black and Douglas apple trees (a robin sits on a nest in the Douglas; a dove appropriated an abandoned robin’s nest in the other) provide food for the squirrels first with plenty left for the couple to share with others. There’s also a large Brown Turkey fig (last year she gathered approximately 300 large sweet figs) and two pear trees.

When mother robin gets too hot sitting on the nest in the Douglas she glides down and cools off in the shade of the other apple tree nearby. After a few minutes she flies directly back to her brooding duties.

The squirrels have plenty of other food besides the apples. There are feeding stations, an acorn tree and three hazelnuts. It’s no wonder then that they’ve become spoiled and lazy. Gerlinde showed me pictures of one of her “pet” squirrels sprawled out flat, legs akimbo, totally content and trusting.

It’s cheap and easy to grow roses from cuttings, especially if you can beg or “borrow” a cutting. Choose a stem about 6 inches long, remove a few leaves from the bottom then push the cutting in a 4-inch pot of sterile potting mix and moisten. Place sticks in the container to hold the clear plastic above the top of the cutting to form a tent-like structure. Secure the plastic with a rubber band, place in the shade and keep soil moist — not soggy. When and if roots form — it may take up to a month — you will see new growth beginning.

Uncover immediately and gradually harden off before placing in the garden. Keep rose bush moist until it takes hold in its new location. Old roses are earth-friendly, tough and easy-care, not like many modern hybrids that need chemical insecticides, fungicides and fertilizers.

For instance, the picture that accompanies this article is an antique rose — name unknown — that once belonged to Edwin Thompson’s mother. The family lived on a farm southeast of Okemah but when they left the farm and moved to Oklahoma City about 1938 they had to leave the beloved rose to the new owners. The rose was thrown over the fence into the bar ditch where it survives today.

About 10 years ago, Edwin dug up a portion of the bush and took it to the couple’s home in Norman where it has a central spot in their circular rose bed. His mother’s beloved rose, so carelessly tossed away so many years ago, not only survived, but flourished in a ditch untended, beset by county graders, weeds, droughts and floods.

Most of the roses mentioned above may be found at The Antique Rose Emporium, Brenham, TX. Call them at 800-441-0002 or visit their Web site: www.weAREroses.com. Jackson and Perkins lists Katy Road Pink. Their number is 800-292-4769 and their Web site is www.jacksonandperkins.com.

Betty Culpepper may be reached at bculpe6769@att.net for comments, questions or ideas for future columns.

posted by Cheryl Levesque @ 1:26 PM