Last autumn, I thought I purchased two 'Carefree Beauty' roses via mail order.
Now that these roses are beginning to bloom, you be the judge - are they the same or two different cultivars?
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| I particularly like this light pink one, which has a faint, sweet, pleasing fragrance. |
I'm happy with both roses and won't mind at all if they are different from one another, I just find it curious. I also have very little experience growing roses. Perhaps more experienced rosarians could tell me whether such variation is common within named cultivars?
Hard to say, but I have 3 yellow knockout roses and one has always had lighter foliage and flowers. Mutation? Mistake in tagging? Don't know. Fortunately I don't have them planted together so only I know about the variation. I'm curious as to the identity of the plant peeking into the top photo's lower right corner. Looks similar to a weed I'm pulling by droves in my beds.
ReplyDeleteYeah, these two roses are fairly close together (not right next to each other), but the color variation doesn't bother me. They're definitely complementary, I just though the variation was interesting.
DeleteThe plant in the lower right corner is indeed a weed, though a native one. It's Carolina geranium - http://www.wildflower.org/plants/result.php?id_plant=GECA5. As you can see (http://bonap.net/MapGallery/County/Geranium%20carolinianum.png) it's native to much of the U.S.
As weeds go, I find this one pretty charming. It grows a long time before it flowers, so it's easy to pull before it blooms and goes to seed. The plants are rather attractive when they're young, although they get sort of sprawling and less 'pretty' as they mature. Unfortunately, the flowers are tiny and not very ornamental, otherwise it might make the jump from 'weed' to 'wildflower'. I let this weed grow to maturity in some bare spots of my beds, because I find it shelters the soil and seems to inhibit the germination of some other more pernicious weeds. Ultimately, I find it very easy to pull when I'm ready to get rid of it and then I just drop it and let it 'compost in place'.
Ironically, the wild Carolina geranium has showed up mostly this year near to the cultivated cranesbill 'Biokovo' geranium that I find makes an EXCELLENT groundcover. The (non-native) Biokovo is growing in front of both my Carefree Beauty roses. Here's more on Biokovo - http://www.northcreeknurseries.com/plantName/Geranium-x-cantabrigiense-Biokovo