Do We Really Need More April Showers!?

With such gloomy weather today (thundershowers), I thought I'd show a nice colorful combination from last year. While it looks like a variegated rose bush, this is the combination of the shrub rose 'Pink Mass' with a new, variegated forsythia called 'Kumson' (Forsythia viridissima koreana 'Kumson'). The rose is one of my favorites and I love the silver veination of this forsythia even though the blooms aren't very profuse. This shrub can be cut back severely even twice per year as it tends to splay out and take up a lot of square footage. Imagine a branch of this in a fresh arrangement though.

Our rose garden has a wonderful collection of shrub roses from Bailey Nursery (MN). Installed last year, over 100 roses represent 28 varieties in their Easy Elegance series. We are one of very few trial and display sites for their roses. The deal is that we pretty much leave them alone and take observations and notes during the year. This data is then sent back to Bailey. The benefit for us is the ability to show some truly, low-maintenance roses for the home landscape. We used to have lots of hybrid teas, grandifloras, etc. but I don't miss having to put on the white suit, block off the garden and poison the environment with my Solo MistBlower shooting out various chemicals to maintain the appearance and health of roses that most homeowners would not be interested in maintaining anyway. I probably lost a couple years of my life being in close proximity to so many chemicals.

Not much to report about today. We're getting our containers ready outside and continue to dig perennials for division. We find it easier to remove the entire perennial, dice it up, pot the divisions and later return a portion of the plant (if warranted) to the original site. It's amazing how many divisions we've made already. We brought some plants, soil and pots inside for the Saturday volunteers to work inside on division. We certainly don't want any idle time at Rotary Gardens! Summer teaser below.