Welcome Welcome Everyone! My name is Brad Jalbert and I will be your host until the World Rose Convention and Festival 2009 in Vancouver, BC. I have a tremendous love and passion for gardening with a special place in my heart for roses. Why roses, people often ask? It all started many years back with a discarded rose. That one rose bush so many years ago ignited a passion within me that was to become my life. I've always felt that roses were such a simple and easy plant to grow. As a young gardener I had not yet been polluted with the ridiculous ideas about rose growing. I bought rose bushes, I planted them, I watered them and they rewarded me with amazing flowers and fragrances. I'd love to share some of my experiences and love for roses with you . It would be great to hear about yours! Let's start by asking anyone out there to tell me about their favorite rose and why they love it so much!
Hope to see many of you at the 2009 World Rose Convention! WowWowWow
Brenda? Alec? are you out there, lets hear about your Favorite Rose! ( wink).
What do you think of the purple text? too much? Well, one does need a hint of colour!
Brad
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5 comments:
Hi Brad, I am looking forward to your blog. I love roses and am excited about the festival and convention coming to town!
Hey Brad,
Thanks for starting off our blog. As the co-chair of the World Rose Convention & Fesitval, I'd like to welcome everyone to this site and encourage you to share your rose hits and misses with us. We also hope everyone will gear up to attend our 3-day Rose Festival June 19-21, 2009.
Brad is the keenest rosarian I know and his enthusiasm for the 'Queen of Flowers' is infectious! Please ask him any questions you might have about roses and growing them -here on the 'wet coast', we have to endure a few trials and tribulations...but there's always a way to grow great roses with no fuss. And Brad's the person to share that info.
I've only been growing roses since 1989 (in my 30's) and, like Brad, have embraced them and the Vancouver Rose Society - both of us now being a Past President of the Society. My garden of close to 200 roses and hundreds of perennials and shrubs is quite mature now BUT is always changing...moving...expanding! Growing roses gets into your blood - you might start out simply, as I did, with 2 'hybrid tea' or 'florist-type' roses but then, as the bug hits you, you can't help but start expanding your collection to include hard-to-find, more finicky roses. I have my own business too (nothing to do with gardening) that keeps me extremely busy...escaping to the garden is therapy for me and is the only way I can stop thinking about the problems at work. I talk to my plants, I delight in the new growth in late winter/early spring of my snowdrops, crocuses and tarragon and can hardly wait to see the swelling buds on the rose bushes to signal the start of the new growing season!
And, talk about bird watching...this morning I was feeding 2 bluejays outside my back door - they see us in the kitchen and swoop down to the sundeck railings to say hi - they know we're only too willing to feed them a couple of handfuls of peanuts (. They chatter at us as we space them out on the railing and hardly get back inside the door before they're scooping them up two at a time!
One question that every rosarian is asked is..."what's your favourite rose?" This is the hardest question to answer and many of us can't do it - we have many favourites. To choose one, today, I'd say it's 'Frederic Mistral'. Tomorrow it may be another rose...but that's another day. Frederic Mistral was introduced by the House of Meilland in 1993 at a 'hybrid tea' rose - it's an extremely healthy, very vigorous, upright bush that I don't prune much to keep it around the 5-6' height and about 3' wide. It's full soft pink blooms grow one per stem and are hugely fragrant. The fragrance and dark green glossy, HEALTHY leaves are what makes it such a favourite. A must for every garden where you have room to plant it, perhaps in the middle or back of a bed with other plants in front of it.
That's it for me for today.
I recently got a house with a garden after living in Vancouver for 7 years and only being able to garden in containers!!
I've planted 8 rose bushes so far .. and the strongest and best looking one is "Aloha" from Select Roses!! Which is perfect as I come from the Big Island of Hawai'i -- growing roses there is quite interesting as dirt is like gold and bugs are prolific!
Thanks Brad for your help that morning I visited Select!!
I love roses, and am excited about the convention!!
I'm glad you had a good time at the rose farm. Hawaii is my favorite winter holiday spot. Aloha is also a favorite rose of so many people, it must feel at home with you!
Brad
I would like to get in on this action!It has been said,"A Rose is A Rose.......is a Rose." Not so! No two alike at all, like humans. The Old Garden Roses grabbed a hold of me, literally, about twenty-seven years ago, and I've been enamoured with them ever since. Most of my huge collection is growing up and away, and over a multitude of home made arbors, pergolas, etc. The Rugosas and Explorers, etc. are scattered throughout my garden...my favourites being, "Martin Frobisher" and in the Rugosa category,"Purple Pavement, aka, "Rotesmeer." For my first choice, she is "Madam Alfred Carriere," a magnificent Noisette climber from the mid 1800's. Her exquisite,tea-scented fluffy white blooms get me every time...mmmm. Oh, by the way, I have, in the past five years, succumbed to growing many shrubs in containers, "About Face", "Mardi Gras", "Pretty Lady","Tuscan Sun", amongst others. It's Brad's fault, cause he has the most fabulous nursery on earth!.....ramblin'rose
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