A Walk Through The Garden, 2008

Rosa multiflora

Species, North-Eastern Asia and Japan

Here it is, the original. I found it in the West Rose Ditch, which runs on the street side of the ostrich pen, where no one in their right mind would plant a rose. I think it got there as a seed from another multiflora that grows down the road. The bush by the ostrich pen grew and flowered profusely in complete shade for many years until 2006, when the ditch mysteriously dried up; at that point, the whole plant, save one cane, died back. By the spring of 2008, the entire original plant had died, although another plant down the road from me was flourishing.

On the other hand, the two cuttings that make up my one R. multiflora in the garden are doing quite well. The cuttings were made in 2005, and in 2006 they grew into a two meter plant which flowered on the bottom. For reasons unknown to me, there was a great deal of die-back of the longest canes late in the summer of 2006, and I didn't have much hope for the remainders' overwintering. However, they pulled through. Dieback was considerably less over the winter of 2007-2008, so and by May there was plenty of new growth all the way along the canes. In June the plant was a huge mass of white flowers, with a nice, sweet scent, swarming with bees. Many stout new canes also appeared.

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