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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] Setting the Record Straight

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  • From: "Donna &/or Kieran" <holycow@cookeville.com>
  • To: "North American Fruit Explorers" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Setting the Record Straight
  • Date: Fri, 23 Mar 2007 09:20:01 -0500

Doreen,
I'd like to see the article as it originally ran, thanks. I don't care about the photos. I wrote a couple of articles on old roses last year for a local freebie paper, as I'd aided and abetted a local nurseryman in his quest for old roses to sell, and they weren't selling very well. I felt guilty, so this was a way to help him out. Plus, so few people succeed with roses here, I'd like to make a few gardeners happy too.
I've spent about $100 on roses, maybe a little more. Mostly I've gotten cuttings from other people, taken them to the nursery, and gotten plants a year or two later. Our big problem here I think is the hot droughty weather. (I read that roses are becoming less popular in England as the climate changes to hotter and drier there. Roses really do want their inch of water a week.) I know a gardener in town with a garden hose who has lovely roses. Mine spend their time after the spring flush waiting for the fall rains. That's all I really wanted anyway, as the Jap beetles are so bad, but some releaf and try to bloom too late. With La Nina back in the picture, we are probably shit out of luck for the whole garden year. We are going into it with low water table and a spring drought. It's now 22 years since the beginning of the drought in the 80's, and there's supposed to be a 22 yr drought cycle.
But back to roses. The Kordes 'Illusion' is probably my best rose, and the extremely tacky 'Westerland' looks like it will be as good. You can get the yellow sport, 'Autumn Sunset' I think is the name, Ashdown Roses has it. 'Westerland' will probably blend ok with my apricot tea-noisettes, and my husband pointed out that it blends VERY WELL with bright orange marking tape. Unfortunately it is next to the equally bright 'Nur Mahal', which also has finally gotten growing well so I don't dare move either one with drought coming. On the Gardenweb antique rose group, Jim in NY swears by Kordesii roses for his climate, kinda Z4-5 I think. I have been extremely impressed by the two I have, they never lose a leaf to anything.
I take it you have settled down for good this time? The hotshot troubleshooter husband found something staid to do? I have to say I often think of you when I encounter our president Alfred E. Newman in video, audio, or print. I tend to avoid such encounters because the voice and face are so grating. Sort of like a friend who cannot endure the voice of Neil Diamond, to her it is like fingernails on a blackboard. I came across an article by Molly Ivins about Nixon becoming rather psychotic. Do you think there is a pattern here with the Republicans? One paranoid, one Alzheimers, one disassociated schizophrenic semi-retard. Was Bush Sr resistant to the disease, or was it the medication he was on that kept him under control? Seriously though, I was very surprised that the Democrats actually took both houses, I thought there were ways to prevent that sort of thing these days. Actually it worried me a bit, I only hope they don't do something stupid, like the Labor party on a roll in England. I prefer government gridlock, the less they accomplish, the better off we all are. Donna




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