Lois de Vries' Garden Views

This year I received three field-trial roses: The previously-described Pink Home Run™, Dick Clark, and Candy Oh ™ . I'm guessing at the Weeks floribunda Dick Clark, since it arrived with only its trial number. The description of its cherry picotee blushing to burgundy didn't hold for my individual plant. It did start out as creamy white. It did form the cherry picotee, but as it opened out, became full-flushed with the cherry color. I'll reserve judgment for now, since it's only produced two flowers so far, with one new bud forming. It's been busy growing a full, bushy plant. Either way, it will blend well with the other nearby roses. Candy Oh ™ Vivid Red is a trial landscape rose, which arrived in-bud and has been blooming continuously every since – even though I still have it in a pot -- so it is a good choice for containers, as well. A polyantha hybrid, it is billed as needing no winter protection, disease-resistant, low maintenance, and hardy to -30ºF ...

My field trial roses include Weeks' original Home Run™ and this year, Pink Home Run™, both bred from the KnockOut™ strain. Dan raves about the original's dark red color, which seemed to me a little off. Just goes to show you that beauty really is in the eye of the beholder. I quickly discovered, however, that it's unaffected by dogs, handymen, clay soil, drought, and disease (it doesn’t seem to get any). You just have to keep the Japanese Beetles picked off.   I'm crazy about the pink version, which I received this spring, so it's still a smallish plant. All of them are the offspring of a single mutated branch on a Red KnockOut™, which sported pink blossoms. It fills the hole created when we lost the Rainbow KnockOut™ to snow and ice. My three favorite roses for fragrance are the grandiflora Melody Parfumée™ (Jackson & Perkins) Oklahoma™ (Weeks), a hybrid tea, and Moondance™ (Jackson & Perkins), a floribunda. Melody is a purply lavender ...