7th Anniversary

It's been exactly seven years since I began this blog.  I hope that you have enjoyed reading it as much as I have writing it.

For the past couple of weeks,  there's been a new look out there in the garden --  it has both artistic and practical aspects.  Let's start with a couple of photos and see if you can detect the new feature(s).

Photo taken:  December 4, 2018

Photo taken:  December 4, 2018

The moss and liverworts have really established themselves and the roses are pruned (I do light pruning) and waiting for a new year.  The new feature is the rather basic "kinetic art" -- the CDs swaying in even the slightest of breezes.  Each CD is suspended from its own artful stake so that the roses themselves aren't disturbed.  There's a very practical reason for their deployment:  I'm hoping they'll deter the robins that love digging around in the moss in search of crane fly larvae.  Special thanks to imgflip.com/gif-maker for constructing the GIF.

Photo taken:  December 4, 2018

CDs swaying in the breeze

Update of September 25, 2019:      The robins prevail;  the motion and reflected light didn't bother them at all.  The "kinetic art" has been removed so that I'll have easier access to the roses.  A revised watering frequency will hopefully make the rose bed less appealing to crane flies, which will reduce the number of larvae, which will make the robins go somewhere else (I hope).

Rose bed reclassified

Today I am re-naming my REHAB rose bed, because the six 'Voodoo' rose seedlings exiled there have made a sterling recovery.  From now on, I'll just call it my "Auxiliary Rose Bed #1".   To recap, I grew these roses from seed, and for years they had stunted growth, probably because of tree root competition in their previous locations.  Their parent rose was the hybrid tea rose named 'Voodoo', which I just let be open pollinated to obtain seeds.

It turns out that the REHAB bed also was (and still is) plagued by tree roots, namely from the big cedar tree on adjacent property.  Again, the seedlings failed to show any vigor.  Then around 3 months ago I gave the bed a good ration of Milorganite and then followed up the last 1½ months with a once-a-day foliar spraying of SUPERthrive (at twice the suggested dosage), and the results have been impressive, to say the least.

This is how the "Auxiliary Rose Bed #1" looked today, shown from two perspectives:

Photo taken:  October 3,  2018

Photo taken:  October 3,  2018

These rose bushes are definitely on the road to recovery.  Below are photo-pairs for each of the six seedling roses.  You can tell from their "birthdays" that we are talking about 7 to 10 year-old roses here.  Many thanks to the generous folks at befunky.com for their collage making tools.  I chose the most elementary "collage" format for the side-by-side presentations.

Photos taken:  August 17,  2018
Birthday:  May 18,  2008

Photos taken:  September 28,  2018
Birthday:  May 25,  2008

Photos taken:  September 19,  2018
Birthday:  January 30,  2011

Photos taken:  October 2,  2018
Birthday:  March 18,  2011

Photos taken:  September 28,  2018
Birthday:  April 26,  2011

Photos taken:  August 30,  2018
Birthday:  April 29,  2011

The layered look

A 3-tiered display of rose blooms caught my attention today.  First were the red blooms from my 'Red Galaxy'  rose bush at a height all the way up to 4 feet.  Spreading above them were the white (slightly pink) blooms of one of my unnamed 'Queen Elizabeth' rose seedlings rising to 5½ feet.  Towering above all of them were the pure pink blooms of a 'Queen Elizabeth' rose bush topping off at 7½ feet.

They were deserving of two photographic approaches.  Below to the left I stitched 2 horizontal photos together one on top of the other; to the right is a regular vertical photo.  Enjoy the display.

Stitched photos
Photos taken:  September 17,  2018

Photo taken:  September 17,  2018

Mutation

If you keep growing roses long enough, and you try stimulating their growth in a variety of ways, something extraordinary might just happen.  Such is the case with one of my rose seedlings, which has been receiving, along with around 20 of my other slower growing seedlings, a daily (for the last 30 days) foliar spraying of a solution of SUPERthrive, which I have mixed at double the suggested strength.   On a newly developed cane, this particular rose bush has produced a mutant bloom having 12 petals (with a bloom diameter of 3 inches).  The norm for this seedling has been, and still is, blooms of 5 to 6 petals (with bloom diameter of 2 inches).

Below are three photos that I took today.  The first photo shows the entire seedling rose bush, with a normal bloom on a taller cane.  The mutant bloom is on a newly formed separate cane, and is the lower bloom in the same photo.  The second and third photos show close-ups of the individual blooms.  There is also a fourth photo, one that I took exactly 2 years ago of the seedling when it was producing "normal" blooms exclusively.  I did a post back then which featured this seedling -- look for the post titled The "underdog" rose bush.

An otherwise normal rose bush
Photo taken:  September 10, 2018

The mutant bloom
Photo taken:  September 10, 2018

A normal bloom
Photo taken:  September 10, 2018

Two years ago
Photo taken:  September 10, 2016

Update of November 20,  2018:          There was some doubt whether this small rose bush would produce more blooms before Winter set in.  Fortunately, the "mutant cane" developed another flower,  but I had to assist it by holding the bloom open for this photo shot, because the weather is too cold.  As you can see, the "mutation" appears to be a "one off" event, as there's been a reversion back to five petals.  I'll do another update next year if things change again.   The bloom is shown in both photos below, and so are some CD's (??).  I'll explain when I write another post next month (December 5th to be exact).

Photo taken:  November 20, 2018

Photo taken:  November 20, 2018

Quick change artist

I took advantage of another 90 degree day in Salem to take photos of a particular rose that I knew would be changing colors as the heat and sunlight intensified.   The particular rose is an unnamed seedling of one of my 'Queen Elizabeth' roses.  Its colors reflect those of the seedling's great-grandparents, which include whitish-pink, red, and yellow.  One of the great-grandparents had flowers with 5 petals.  The quick color transformation happened in just 9 hours --

9:21 AM,  August 14,  2018

6:22 PM,  August 14,  2018

Lurking in the lawn

Another strange life form has just popped up in my back yard, specifically in the lawn.  In the first photo below, you will see a pale yellow growth that I've identified as "false puffball slime mold" -- try searching Google Images for other photos.  You might recall me introducing you to "regular" slime mold back in 2016 (Mixed flora and fauna -- 7/09/16) and also back in 2015 ("Slime mold" is for real -- 8/21/15).  The second photo gives you some  perspective of the size of the false puffball; you'll see it at the bottom of the photo.  The rose bed behind it is what I call my REHAB bed, where I'm trying various things to stimulate growth in some of my laggard 'Voodoo' seedlings.

Photo taken:  July 25, 2018

Photo taken:  July 25, 2018

A rose quiz

To celebrate a Summer bounty of pretty rose blooms, let's test your ability to identify a world-famous rose among the 4 photos shown below.  The other 3 are one-of-a-kind roses that are found only in my rose garden, and which remain unnamed.  No hints for you, and best of luck.  Answers revealed beneath the photos.

Photo taken:  June 20,  2018

Photo taken:  June 24,  2018

Photo taken:  June 26,  2018

Photo taken:  June 26,  2018

Answers:  The world-famous 'Queen Elizabeth' rose is the left rose on the bottom row.  The other 3, as different as they look from each other and their parent,  are seedlings that I grew from their common parent -- the 'Queen Elizabeth' rose.  The parent was open pollinated, and very likely "self" pollinated.

Update of June 28, 2018:     In addition to the 3 seedling roses shown above, I have 36 other seedlings that I grew from the 'Queen Elizabeth' rose.  Of those 39 roses, only ONE shows any close similarity to its parent -- see my post of September 5, 2015 ("The look-alikes").  There is much diversity in this group of 39, as shown below when classified by petal count:    

•  9  Singles  (4 to 8 petals)      See my post of May 31, 2012 ("Singles are nice, too")
•  6  Semi-doubles  (9 to 16 petals)
• 18  Doubles  (17 to 25 petals)
•   3  Full  (26 to 40 petals)
•   3  Very full  (41 or more petals)

Stellar performers

I've devoted quite a bit of "ink" in this blog to 'Red Galaxy', a rose that I grew from seed and to which I  gave a descriptive name.  In turn, I grew another rose (unnamed) from seed that I obtained from 'Red Galaxy'.  The two roses are now growing side-by-side in my backyard rose bed.  Here they are in photos that I took today -- unnamed seedling on the left, and 'Red Galaxy' on the right.  Note the state-of-the-art weather station in the foreground.

Unnamed seedling

'Red Galaxy'

Close-up photos of respective blooms are shown below.  Important note:  I've been tracking the unnamed seedling from its "birth" in a photo documentary that you can see just by clicking on the TAB at the top of this blog, the one labeled "A rose seedling grows up".

Unnamed seedling

'Red Galaxy'

A stitch in time

The weather has finally turned mild, so the roses are making up for lost time with a welcome display of blooms.  My favorite spot by the side of the backyard rose bed has a perfect view of a vigorous group of rose bushes (ranging from 5 to 7 feet tall), most of which I grew from seed.  I can best share the experience with you by "stitching" together 2 horizontal close-up photos to form a vertical stack that shows the view from ground to highest bloom.  What looks like grass in the photo below is really a spreading form of wild "Irish moss" (it makes a very nice living "mulch").   I've also added a second BONUS photo, taken later today, to acknowledge a garden visitor sure to bring good luck -- a petite dragonfly.

A favorite view

A welcome guest

It's been a while

It's been 5 months since my last post, and I hope that I haven't lost my blogging touch.  Below are two photos that show how my rose garden has evolved to what it is today.  The first photo shows the rose garden just starting to take shape (October 12, 2009), and the second photo was taken today (May 11, 2018).  Remember that most of my roses have been grown from seed, the first ones being "born" in 2008 and 2009.  Look closely at the first photo; you will see an orange oval around a particular rose seedling located close to the lawn border (click on the photo to enlarge it).

October 12,  2009

Today  (May 11,  2018)

So what's so special about the rose in the orange oval?   Well, it's the first to have an open bloom this year, for which I am extremely grateful.  It's hidden by all of the foliage seen in today's photo above, but it didn't escape my attention.  There it is in the two photos below, a proud seedling having the 'Queen Elizabeth' rose as its parent.  The seedling was "born" on April 4, 2009, and was just 6 months old in the October 12th photo.

Buried in the foliage of
a 9 year old rose bush

A closeup