TAMWORTH  CASTLE  ROSE  GARDEN

A new rose garden is to be created in the grounds of Tamworth Castle in honour of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.

The garden – which will be shaped like a crown and will feature walkways, seating in the centre and 200 red rose bushes – will act as a permanent memorial of the Jubilee celebrations.

Work will start on the new garden with 200 red Heart of England rose bushes being planted in March in order for them to be in full bloom in time for the Diamond Jubilee celebrations at the start of June.

Cllr. John Garner, Cabinet member for the Environment, said  “The rose garden is the perfect tribute to the dedication our Queen has given to her country and her people.  I believe that this tribute will be welcomed by the people of Tamworth as they join in the celebrations of the special event.”

If there are any special rose gardens being planted by where you live, perhaps you could let us know and we will list them in the next Newsletter.

 

SHREWSBURY FLOWER SHOW

Britain has had many famous gardeners; in modern times perhaps the most famous was Percy Thrower. Known as ‘Britain's first Celebrity Gardener’, Percy appeared on television in Gardeners’ World and on Blue Peter. He wrote many gardening books and articles for newspapers and the weekly magazine Amateur Gardening. Percy died in 1988 but I think if we were able to ask him now of his proudest achievement he might just cite his many achievements in Shrewsbury. In 1946 he was appointed Superintendent of Parks for Shrewsbury where he remained for 28 years. During those years Percy transformed the park in the centre of the town and created the Dingle garden in the Quarry which is maintained today in all its original glory.

Set in the natural amphitheatre that is Shrewsbury Park, the Shrewsbury Flower Show is held every August and features many attractions including marching bands, show jumping, craft and horticultural stands, a traditional flower show and is rounded off each day with a terrific firework display. Like the general flower and vegetable show, the number of rose exhibits has dropped in recent years but is none-the-less popular with the thousands of visitors.

Many RNRS exhibitors can be seen supporting this most British of flower shows; at last year’s show it will surprise no one to learn that Alice and Tony Bracegirdle were the major prize-winners as they exhibited some superb roses across all the classes. The rose classes are a mix of classes with everything from single stems to bowls and for the more adventurous, even a display of roses.
Whether you’re a show-jumping fan, a fruit and vegetable fancier, a flower child, a lover of premier pyrotechnics or are just in need of a little retail therapy; Shrewsbury Flower Show has something for you. If you fancy a ‘free’ visit to the show next year, enter a few roses in the show and join in.
                                                                                                             
                                                                 Ray Martin (2011)
 

ROSES  IN  SEPTEMBER  IN  BELGIUM

We were pleased to return to Le Roeulx, both to meet up with the people whose company we had so much enjoyed last year and also to sneak in another holiday. We decided also to visit the lovely city of Ghent. The weather was extremely kind to us throughout, as were the railways.

Among the judges were Jim Hunter, again making the long drive from Scotland, and this year two rosarians from the Czech Republic, Dr. Stanislav Konstacky and Vaclav Koula. Stanislav had been chosen to preside over the International panel this year. Nicole Mainil once again helped us to feel really welcome. She had produced a little English guide to the historic buildings of Le Roeulx and personally showed this little group around the town. Stanislav and Vaclav are very keen to encourage English rose breeders to contribute to their trials in Hradec Kralové and to forge friendships in the international sphere. They have felt rather isolated in the past and their country split into two parts, so they are trying hard to build up their rose society and have established a web site www.rosaklub.cz, which can be accessed in English. Vaclav gave us a copy of the folder he had produced in English to send out to all the breeders, but was disappointed that he had little positive response apart from David Austin’s. We really enjoyed their company and met up with them and Nicole again when Jim drove us out to see the huge funicular lift on the canal at Strépy-Thieu, as well as the historic boat lift.

On our return from Belgium we accessed their web site and also one at www.lidice-memorial.cz. Here we discovered another reason why roses are so important to Czech people. After the Second World War a group in England campaigned for a memorial to the village of Lidice, which had been annihilated by the Nazis in 1942.  Harry Wheatcroft provided a large number of roses and eventually a rose garden was provided with roses from twenty-nine countries. This rose garden was renewed in 2002. You can find out more on line, but this serves to remind us of the important part roses can and have played in helping to promote the cause of peace and international understanding, an important message for us all.

As for the awards at Le Roeulx, many of the successful varieties do not yet have commercial names, but roses from Belgium, France, Italy, USA, Holland, Germany and Denmark were among them. Midsummer Snow by Vissers of Belgium was the people’s choice for 2009 and the award for the best rose of the 2010 trials was to Grand Award by Poulsen of Denmark. In all 72 cultivars from 25 breeders in 10 countries were judged.

                                                                Lynn Lancaster

Thanks Lynn, you do have some interesting holiday.

AWARDS  AND  ASSOCIATIONS   2010

Written at the request of Jean, and not, I hope from any vanity on my part.

The Rose Trial year began at La Tacita near Rome.  These trials were initiated by Helga Brichet, former World President of the World Federation of Rose Societies.  I had asked Jill Bennell if she would kindly take some pictures of my two varieties as much as anything to see how they fared in a different environment.  Guess what, she forgot her camera.  But this was only the start of the woes as it poured with rain and they missed the bus pick up.  But by a combination of buses and taxis she and Ann Bird finally reached La Tacita – after the judging had finished!  Ann had a camera and the pictures reached me four months later.  Gardeners Glory and Chewalbygold both looked O.K. but neither picked up an award, which was a shame as the top prize was 10,000 Euros, with a 1000E for the Best in Class.

Ian and Lynn then took a trip to the Monza trials and I had asked them to look out for Chewpurplex.  They duly sent me an email picture.  It looked terrible – no growth (about 5ft) and hardly any flower.  That one is clearly not going to work I said to myself.  A few weeks later I get a phone call from Bernhard Mehring who is on his way home from Baden Baden.  Chewpurplex has won a Gold medal, a Fragrance prize and the People’s Choice.  It had grown to 10ft and had flowers from bottom to top.  A week later it won a Silver at Geneva and an additional Public’s Choice award.

On to the first week of July and The Hague trials.  Here you meet with breeders and growers from around the World as well as friends from the Dutch Rose Society.  Here we had a pretty well stamened near single purple shrub which won a second class Certificate, Chewsinger.  This is now being sold in Japan.  We also had a Gold medal for a climber Cheworangeglow, but this is unlikely to go into Commerce as I believe I have better and healthier orange climbers.  I also collected an award on behalf of Frank Cowlishaw for his white climber Franspray, which the Dutch are calling Eloise.  This is very healthy and has a good fragrance.  This was followed by two awards for Rambling Rosie and finally by a Gold medal for Peter James for his Pejcrepeye.  Pejcrepeye also won nothing at St Albans.  This is a patio ground cover with a very distinctive eye and a beautiful rounded habit bred from my Centre Stage.  All of these awards must have seemed impressive, but the reality was of course, only two of them were mine.  Two weeks later the Belfast trials in Lady Dixon Park were held.  This park is the best rose garden that I have visited and once again the floribundas, HT’s and shrubs were outstanding.  Sadly most of the climbers were poor, trying to compete in old rose beds.  Gardeners Glory still won an award but it was the best of an indifferent display.

The Cambridge NIAS trials have their final judging in September.  Chewalbygold picked up one of the Gold standard awards.  This is an apricot yellow climber with lovely flower form.  Not yet named, but will be introduced to the trade this year.  Very healthy, but rather slow to repeat.

When the NIAB results were announced in early October we also heard the ROTY winner.  Would you believe it, in a total of 1422 points we missed the top spot with 1420.  The closest result ever apparently, so instead of Rose of the Year we get nothing.

This disappointing result continued into the St Albans awards.  We had I thought several meritorious varieties which won nothing, including Chewsumsigns, a Persica hybrid definitely for commerce.  We did have a T G C for Chewsunnyblue, a very good patio climber in a blend of mauve and yellow, but it does not meet my requirements of surviving a no fungicidal spray regime.  We did also win a T G C with a second year plant Chewscentity.  This is a fragrant buff yellow shrub with very nice healthy foliage, but I can not see much of a commercial future for it.

                                                                            Chris Warner

Congratulations to Chris and members Peter James and Frank Cowlishaw.  These roses sound the sort we need in our gardens.  Perhaps the breeders could tell us where we can buy them.