Roses are Red, White, Pink, Yellow, and Green

by Lydia Holley April 22, 2024

When choosing a rose bush for your garden, there are several qualities you need to explore. Antique roses are roses classified before 1867, before the first hybrid tea was bred. There are several types of antique roses. Teas, Noisettes, Chinas, and Hybrid Perpetuals are some of the most popular classifications of antique roses. Some only bloom once or twice a year, but most prefer little to no pruning and display an abundant flush on a large shrub. A few are even evergreen. Fragrance may be strong or weak.

Hybrid teas, on the other hand, need to be pruned hard and have large blooms on the end of long stems. These are florist-type roses. Many do not have any fragrance, and the hybrid teas of years past needed to be sprayed with fungicides because they were bred for color and form instead of disease resistance. These days, you can find many hybrid teas that are resistant to disease and do not need to be sprayed. Some now even have a scent.

Shrub roses have become popular in the last few decades. These bushes are grown to be both disease resistant and to put on a flush of flowers throughout the summer. Some are more accomplished in those areas than others. Most of the shrub roses are pruned to stay within a certain size to fit in the landscape. Many have no scent.

Rose bushes can live for a long time, so choose your rose wisely. The oldest rose bush known, the Thousand Year Rose, is possibly only 700 hundred years old. The largest rose, a climber in Arizona, is over 100 years old. Because rose bushes can live for so long, there are several things to consider before you place one in your garden.

First is size. Roses come in dwarf sizes, medium-sized bushes, large bushes, or climbers which can cover a 30 ft structure. Bloom repeat may be important to you. Color should be considered and you should be aware of its preferred pruning routine. Dark red is a popular rose color, but so is pink, white, coral, apricot, and yellow. The Green Rose (Rosa chinensis ‘Viridiflora’) is an antique China rose which is mostly grown to put in floral arrangements.

Of course, you may fall in love with hundreds of roses. Not only can their color, form, and scent entice, some may be sentimental to you, having been grown by a family member or with a name similar to a loved one. No matter what type you grow, roses bring color, style, and a sense of festivity to your garden. Like potato chips, it is hard to stop at only one.

For more information, call 903-675-6130, email [email protected].