Graham Thomas

This gorgeous black pussy willow (Salix gracilistyla v. melanostachys) started out eight years ago as a one-gallon multi-branched twig and now look at it: about 20 feet wide by maybe 12 feet high. It sweeps out over the sidewalk, with the lowest branches kept pruned to stay about 5-1/2 feet off the ground. The younger kids love to walk underneath it, "like an umbrella," they say, and run their hands on the soft golden oregano (Oreganum vulgare 'Aureum') that carpets its feet.

In this photo you are looking east, which means the willow and the oregano face west, and the drainage is superb because the area behind the foundation wall is filled nearly to the brim with rocks. Even so, this willow, which I'll write more about in the winter when you can see why it's called the black pussy willow and when I'll really need something to write about, doesn't need much additional water when the rains stop. What does need water is the plant that grows within it (one of the flowers just barely shows within the white square).

It is THIS:::::

Rosa Graham Thomas, named after the horticulturalist and former Gardens Advisor to the British (minus Scotland, which has its own) National Trust. Mr. Thomas was planted here when the willow was a wee twig and I didn't believe things that started that small would ever get this big in my garden. Three or four years ago Mr. Thomas got completely lost in the willow and I figured that was it. The next year I was hauling something down those steps to the garage and -- whoa! -- lookat that!

The chance encounter with the willow has saved Mr. Thomas. Mr. Thomas is otherwise rather spindly and has trouble holding up his apricot-flesh-colored flowers. (The buds open an even deeper apricot and the flowers eventually fade to a buttery yellow. A proper gentleman, Mr. Thomas never shows any harshness in color.) The willow acts a bit like an umbrella for Mr. Thomas, too, otherwise his 30+ petals would turn to mush like every other. And the willow hides the lousy foliage that'll be coming along soon. As Mr. Thomas is a David Austin rose, it has a terrific (fresh tea) scent but gets blackspot as soon as you say the word out loud.

This is the only rose left in my garden that didn't come from Heirloom Nursery, but you can find it there and grow it through something of your own. It blooms continuously from mid/late June through frost here and I give it a prune just to get rid of any dead parts after the leaves fall from the willow. Otherwise, regular water and the usual treatment of organic 5-5-5 a couple times a year plus an inch or two of soil-building compost.

Do you believe that plants just get lucky, as Mr. Thomas did in being overtaken by the willow? Or, look at the question another way: Is it possible that there are no coincidences? (Hat tip to M. Night Shyamalan.)

Roses

In the late afternoon on May 28th, the sun peeked out from these stubborn gray skies and that's all the light Cornelia needed to put on her first blooms.









Planted in front of her is a white shrub rose, Dr. Robert F. Korns, named after the man who directed the nationwide field trials of the Salk polio vaccine. Dr. Korns has white flowers, in clusters like Cornelia, and is listed as growing to 3' tall; it is at least 4-1/2. He'll be blooming in another week or less, depending on the sun.


Here they are together, with a red laceleaf maple on the left and Oriental lilies in between; at their feet is galloping Gallium odoratum, Iceland poppies and geranium. This is the south side of the house.







Many roses have come and gone from various parts of this garden. Whether I put them in the ground or in a pot, they all looked awful after a couple years and eventually I pulled them out. One was sent to live with a relative in southern California but most went to the dump.

I first saw Cornelia in full bloom at Huntington Gardens, in Pasadena, California, growing on a pillar in bed 26. The Rose Garden isn't my favorite (a toss-up between the Japanese Garden and the Desert Garden), but it's a central place to sit and rest your hips while your friend takes another look around. I was drawn from my seat by the delicate apricot-pink that completely covered the pillar and smelled like the height of summer.

For our climate I think the smaller the flowers, the fewer the petals, the better the rose, whether climbing or not. Look for shrub roses, polyanthas and singles. Forget hybrid teas; they get every disease there is. The gobs of petals on "old" roses will turn into wet mush. Single roses usually have very little fragrance but otherwise do very well. Rugosas also do well almost anywhere and can be very fragrant, but need lots of room to ramble. Rosa glauca, aka Rosa rubrifolia, is very pretty, with its blue-tinted ("glaucous") leaves, its deep-pink flowers (no scent) and lots of purplish-red hips in the fall. It is very thorny and will get 6-7 feet tall and gracefully droopy. It also self-sows, so you'll get babies to give to friends.

You can get Cornelia and just about any other rose from Heirloom Roses, in St. Paul, Oregon, where I also bought Dr. Robert F. Korns. I'll never buy a rose anywhere else, unless there's another own-root nursery in Oregon. I recommended their roses for our local community radio's plant sale a few years ago, thinking they'd sell like grande frappuccinos, and Heirloom graciously donated a couple dozen plants. But people didn't understand why they should pay $15.00 for a rose "bush" no taller than the palm of their hand. Unless I stood by the rose table and talked them up, they were passed by like the Frog Prince.

The love they need is little more than a kiss. Transplant one of those small plants to a medium-sized pot, a tallish one with lots of room for long roots if you have one, and the next year the plant will be twice the size of the hybrids you can buy at your local garden center. It will be virus-free and almost entirely resistant to the blackspot that denudes every other rose I've grown. Then put it in the ground and watch it explode into healthy, lush foliage; gorgeous, prolific flower; and fabulous scent.

Clematis Mrs. N. Thompson (see also Joy Creek Nursery, in Scappoose, Oregon) grows fairly low and stays mostly with Dr. Korns. Another Clematis whose name I can't remember now grows through Cornelia. Every year, usually around February, I shovel about an inch of steer or other compost, mixed with a few handfuls of Whitney Farms' 5-5-5 organic fertilizer, around the group. (What happened to the big bags of Whitney Farms? I can only find the boxes, which don't cover much and which are expensive.) A little more Whitney Farms in May, before the soaking rains stop. Once a summer, in a spate of coolish days, I water the whole garden with a Miracle Gro feeder attached to the hose (best to do this in May if you live in warmer climates); and then another handful of Whitney Farms in early September. I'm not rigorous about any of that: I tell you what I've done in the year or two when I think I've taken very good care of this group of plants.

Cornelia and Dr. Korns have been in the ground for about five years, and so far, so beautiful. But I've been optimistic about roses before. In a journal entry dated February 23, 2003, I wrote:

I’m planning the whole bed around “Royal Sunset” because it’s such an incredibly beautiful rose, always met with oohs and aahs, always in bloom and relatively disease free.

The next year, Royal Sunset, bought at a local garden center, was sent to the dump for poor performance.