Thanks, Ken! K & M uses fortuniana and It's too cold here for that so I'll try Wisconsin in the fall I guess.

It's a great rose Seil. I haven't had problems with it opening here even when it's humid.

Hi Seil, I do offer it, but have to warn you its VERY winter tender in our neck of the woods! Sold out until fall 2016. Steve....

Seil, you can always try e-mailing Pam at Angel Gardens. I don't think she keeps the website current, and she may very well have Randy Scott if she has listed her nursery as a source on HMFRoses.

Thanks all!

Steve, I'm in zone 6 so I'm hoping with some protection it well make it here.

I wanted this really bad too, Seil. Like desperately. Since Wisconsin Roses was sold out, I ordered one from K &M. Not sure if fortuniana will will thrive here, most sources say not. But I figured I'd give it a shot. That's the only way I'll know for sure. I've got a large, thriving Camellia bush, at least 9 feet tall and 20 years old, that wasn't supposed to be hardy here. It's in a protected area, so it has a little micro climate going on. I thought I'd try that with the Randy Scott. The worse that'll happen is I'll lose the bush, no biggie.

If I want to grow roses that I know are winter tender, I"ll grow them in pots and then trench in the ground for winter, usually come though in great shape, but takes some extra digging!!

Cadiarose, I sometime like to push the envelope too but I really want this one to survive I've heard that if you can get fort. through the first winter it does OK but I don't know if that's true or not and don't want to risk it.

Steve, I probably will pot it anyway. Most of my beds are on the street and I lose blooms to passersby. Since I'd really like to be able to show this rose I don't want that to happen. It's not just the loss of a bloom but they often damage the rose by tearing the blooms off.

A friend 5 miles south of me (was a big exhibitor and judge) tried HTs on Fort. They made it through two winters and promptly died the spring following the second winter. Your mileage may vary. For this area, I would wait to get it from Steve on R. multiflora rootstock.

Probably what killed those plants on Fort the following spring as you said was the ying-yang of late freezes which happen a lot [over here anyway] in many places.

I may at some point venture a try with something grafted on fort. but not for this one that I really want. Yes, we do get those ying yang freeze and thaw cycles here both in the late fall and in the early spring so I know it's an iffy proposition at best.

I spent some good money and purchased three 2-gal roses this year grafted on Fort. I just want to see if I can experience the huge growth that I see online and have read about regarding plants grafted on Fort. I'm in zone 5b/6a border area, but I have a good plan to ensure they survive. I obviously can't bury the grafts deep because then the scion would root and the Fort rootstock would die which defeats the entire purpose of buying the plants. So a different plan would be needed.

Just a note if you do get roses on fort. The pruning is different. You don't want to cut them too much, as you can with one on Dr. Huey. I did that with one of mine last year and it sulked for weeks. I'm not sure why the rootstock makes a difference, but it does. The roses seem to have more canes, but they are thinner than some of the monster canes you get on Dr. Huey.

We don't get the long growing seasons that the warmer zones do, this is what facilitates larger growth on HTs in general, and the huge growth of plants grafted on Fort.

Well for one, Fort has a much more massive, fibrous root system than Dr Huey. Dr Huey grows tap roots and some side roots but Fort can grow a shallow root system up to 6 feet wide in just a couple of years! And so as a result, if you prune it heavily the balance of top growth to root system goes horribly out of whack and so the plant suffers. That is why you are supposed to not prune it that heavily.

As for plants getting much bigger on Fort, I was referring to doing an apples to apples comparison in terms of comparing the same roses growing in similar conditions in the same place with some grafted on Dr Huey and others on Fort and you can clearly see the huge difference. So it isn't just the longer growing seasons. The huge, shallow root system on Fort allows it to gather much more water and nutrients than Dr Huey which is what contributes to the heavier growth.

That's beautiful, Ken, thanks!

Here is a full bush shot of mine, planted last spring.

Here's a bloom. Mine looks a lot more yellow than yours Ken.

BTW, need I have to say it? Blackspot Magnet!!!! I was unable to spray on my regular schedule because of wind and some of my roses did have a breakout. I spent hours yesterday picking off the diseased leaves off the plants and ground. RS was one of the worst. But it's a show rose, what do you expect?

Braverichard, yes, when I first looked into getting roses on fort, I was told NOT to bury the graft because you don't want this to go own root. The main point of fort is it's root system and the ability to feed the roses more (plus for Floridia Rosarians, it's resistant to nematodes). The graft thing made me nervous, but supposedly if you can get it through one or two winters, you are home free. I did do a bit of winter protection on my fort roses.