I see this is an old thread, but my Dark Desire is very fragrant and has had no white in the blooms....

Mine almost always has lovely little white stripes and is very pleasantly fragrant. :-)

I have two DDs, both impulse buys. It does get white stripes, and perhaps especially when it is hot. I am not a good judge of fragrance so cannot say much about that.

It is a solid rose, but perhaps the name screw people's expectation. Really nothing particular dark, or alluring about it here, at least in my garden. Top name from a marketing perspective though. IMHO, if you want a purple, Mustead Wood is far better here in NJ in a non-spray garden almost in every aspect (other than it sprawls whichever way). DD just seems awkward. I need to chop both down next Spring to encourage basal breaks. It is not very good with branching, and I am ending up two plants each with two or three main canes.

In my hot and dry garden, MW became too paprika colored for me in the same spots I now have DD. I got rid of my MW, but it does look wonderfully dark for everyone else.

It’s a shady spot so DD gets nice and dark here. The photos don’t show it properly. It’s a dark ombré that I really love. I grow them as short climbers and I am liking them the best trained laterally. :-)

Training them laterally might just be the ticket. I need to find a spot where they can stretch a little bit. It is pretty hardy here and it might work as well here in NJ.

farmerduck, you are so right about the plant being awkward...mine was really crossed up and I figured it was from new growth being shoved together and then just growing that way. I did kind of a hatchet job on everything that was growing inside and across. Now the shape is more upright vase. We shall see. Cori ann, I will watch for the white in the bloom. I am not opposed to it, just have not seen it yet. Like I said, just planted this spring. I find her very fragrant...and very dark..but I do like the shade of red regardless. She is a thorny thing..sheesh...

I know people rave about Dark Desire. The flowers are beautiful enough but the habit of growth is annoying, gangly, awkward, untidy, and definitely not pleasing to the eye. The canes are long and grow in every possible direction. The canes don't bloom any flowers until the canes reach 5-6ft high and the buds form at the tip. I wish they would reclassify this rose as a short climber or something. If i had known this, I would have placed it in a proper location, at the back of the bed against a wall.

Karen, that sounds just like my summer romance! Dark Desire has been much more restrained. Sumner Romance, well. She actually blooms good, but talk about super long canes...just really odd. Her blooms are clusters on the ends. Odd ol gal, but we shall see!

My SR does the same. I'm going to try removing the terminal bud to see if that will encourage lateral branching and budding.

vaporvac, please post photos when you do and let me know what the results are (in the future). I grabbed SR and DD at a Lowes as an impulse buy....sigh....This site and members are enablers. It is crazy how long I have missed out on the rose thing!! I live in a rural area and no one offers anything but knockouts. I am late to the party, but so addicted. I read through all of the threads, see a rose people are talking about, search it in gardenweb/houzz, drool, trade....oh to have old established roses like the photos I have seen on here...I think my favorite thing about this forum is that everyone is REAL.....telling others the good and the bad..laughing at themselves about a purchase, just fun. I thank all of you for that!

THanks for sharing your info and experience about Summer Romance, gagalzone8. I was going to get that after seeing gorgeous pics on here. I am glad that I refrained from buying one since now that I learned about its growth habit like Dark Desire.

My experience with Dark Desire hasn't been great. This was its 2nd summer...and it had about 2 blooms. In the early summer, we usually get a lot of rain and high winds...and over about 2 weeks, about 8 canes were broken off. Very frustrating. I may not keep this rose....one more year and see if it can improve here.

I'm loving all of these pictures!!!

Carol

rosecanadian, although my DD is tall and gangly as I didn't prune it, it is a flower-maker. I wonder what's up with yours since it's grown in a pot. Karen, the growth habit of SR is nothing like that of DD. SR is a very dense bush shape that will get large with tons of basal growth. It's full of healthy foliage with which, in my defoliated beds, only New Dawn and Viking Queen could compete; it appeared as a thick bush even when the blooms were decimated by midge. Truthfully, I was happy just to see something other than an eyesore.

Gagal, cutting the terminal bud should work in botanical terms and I've had success doing that with other roses. In fact, a New Dawn cutting was annoying me by just growing very long. After a single bloom on the end, I cut it back to about 6" and it immdiately pushed out new growth and flowered! It's the same principal.

Someone mentioned doing it to SR and said they get excellent bloom up and down the stem that way. I wish I could give credit for thinking of it with SR. I'm sometimes afraid to give up a flower when they're so sparse.

Vaporvac - yeah, I don't know...maybe it doesn't want to be grown in a pot. :)
Carol

vaporvac, SR does have gorgeous foliage! Mine is a 3 can wonder right now, with some new growth at the bottom. One of the canes is pushing 6 ft. I wonder if I should cut it back before winter...I am afraid some ice/wind will lay it on the ground anyway.

Right now I have an 8 foot cane on mine. With a tiny bud on top.

Thank you, Chris. I was thinking potting up one of my DDs and then I saw your post. It is invaluable to have someone like you to share your knowledge and insight!!!

Buford - sounds ridiculous, doesn't it....sheesh. :)

Chris - Thank you!! I may give that one to my friend who has her roses in the ground.

Carol

For me, DD went crazy when I got it in the ground last fall. It currently reaches almost 7ft tall and at least 3ft wide. The canes and stems are thick and robust. Blooms are frequent and average about 4" in diameter. I haven't checked fragrance. It's definitely a healthy, happy plant!

6/17

5/19

Beth yours is gorgeous!

I got rid of mine because the blooms were tiny in my heat and humidity. :(

Wow, Beth!!! Love the color!!

Carol

Beth, I can't wait!! I keep saying next year....(don't we all)

Again, you guys in Ca are killing me with the gorgeous bi-colour!!! SoFl, did you have yours long? Was it grafted? My blooms were good last year, but are huge this year with better roots to support them. Same thing with Darcey Bussell, although even she will still throw out a tiny one.

I'm waiting for Dark Desire buds! Bought it as a late season discounted bareroot last winter, and it was very slow to leaf out ( Beverley, coming from the same place, was already setting buds); I went for one last look before calling the seller to try and negotiate a credit, and woohoo swollen leaf nodes had appeared! So now comes the impatient wait for buds..I think I spotted one yesterday. I just hope it keeps its colour as the dark reds/purply tones always pink out here. I have one prime in ground spot for planting so any rose is going to have to earn its place.

Seeking Advice re Dark Desire: I bought a 5 gallon pot with DD about a month ago from Otto & Sons in Santa Paula. I was told that it had just been planted in the 5 gallon pot (from a one gallon) in August, and advised to keep it in the pot until spring. But I'm reading here about DD not wanting to get root bound -- should I put it in the ground now, in bare root season? Or wait for spring as advised? My first DD did nothing and then died. So I bought this to replace that one. I don't want another dead DD!

Thanks.

I don’t think it would get root bound from now until spring. It’s just a couple months away. But me personally, I would put it in a pulp pot and then just bury the whole pulp pot in the ground in Januaryish/Februaryish.

Wondering how you zone 6er's DDs fared this winter. We had a cold one with -7F nights and many single digit days which is still within range for Z6, but not always experienced. Anyway, both my DDs were knocked back almost to the ground, whereas last winter there was no die-back at all. I was surprised as I thought it was hardier. At least I don't have to worry about pruning it. : ( What are you experiencing?

Vaporvac, This weekend we are suppose to have a low of 23 and this morning we had a low of 26. What about you? Winter was really hard on my roses, too, maybe worse ever? After Wed. morning, the forecast is looking good!

Tomorrow night 2"-4" of snow is forecast with a low of 16F!!!!! What is up with that???????? I'm thankful I have generally zoned up, but it's been hard on some of my Hybrid Musks that I was hoping to grow as climbers. Surprisingly, MAC and Lavender Lassie still look good, whereas Cl Pinking has a lot of dead looking canes. : (((

Vaporvac, have you guys had a lot of freeze-thaw cycles? It's been ridiculous here in Missouri - it's 60 today and we're predicted to go to 18 tomorrow night with a chance of snow. I think the yo-yoing hurts more than the coldest temp sometimes.

Which reminds me I have one more rose I need to cover up. I got the rest with leaves the last cold snap, but I'll use a big pot turned over for this one.

Should I dump oak leaves over all of mine? I meant to write a post asking this. We have had a lot of crazy wide temp variations, but I think DD canes were done it early by the sub-zero temps for an extended time. Thank you for you chiming in. The freeze-thaw has been hard on my Hybrid Musks. They were all looking great earlier on, but now there's a lot of die-back. : (((

I think DD is fine in colder zones but not so good where the freeze/thaw is happening. I see specific varieties having a lot of problem with the unpredictable weather. Here in Oregon we have seen it when roses keep growing into late fall with no frosts and then a major cold snap in late November. This causes lots of damage even though our winter temperatures are quite mild - maybe 20 degrees for the low all winter long. My theory is that some cultivars easily start growing out of dormancy and then get damaged when there is a strong cold snap damages tissues. Mostly what I see is damage in the canes where the freeze wounded the cane and disease then enters the damaged area. One thing I tried to do several years ago was look at the roses in early spring and where I saw damaged canes cut below the damage. This seemed to help with the disease not continuing down the cane. Where I did not cut back below the damage the rot continued down the cane until mid to late spring when warm temperatures stopped the pathogen. I did not lose most of the bushes but without the treatment I did lose quite a few almost to the roots.

I think we will see more of this as climate change seems to be making very unpredictable winter seasons with unusual warm spells in the middle of winter. I did notice that there were a lot of warm spells mixed with very cold weather in the Midwest and East Coast this year. Perhaps the industry will start selecting roses that work with our changing climate.

I so appreciate hearing everybody's experiences. Based on what I've read here, my DD is in front of a 7 foot trellis; in its first year it reached almost 5 feet. My other plant is in a bed with 4 foot roses, and I cut that one way down.

My trellis DD is gawky but the one I cut way down looks like its starting to assume a nice bushy shape.

I grow a lot of shrubs here in coastal VA and don't usually cut them back much. I think I should treat my new Kordes differently including Lemon Fizz, Savannah, and Beverly.

I saw Lemon Fizz at Lowes recently and the hanging tag actually recommends cutting it down annually. So the distributor may be recognizing that customers who've only grown KnockOuts may need a little advice!! Smart.

I planted Dark Desire last summer. I checked my rose last week and found all the canes are dead to the ground. The good thing i planted the rose 6 inches below the soil line and all the buried canes are green and healthy. I hope she will be ok and vigorous.

Thank you for weighing in, Chris!!! I think that's what happened: we had very warm temps in the 70s through Dec, then WHAM!, suddenly frigid arctic cold. It stayed that way for a while and then yo-yo'd all this spring. However, these canes were so thoroughly dead that I think they happened during the first cold snap. Many other roses looked good recently, but with the variable temps, have since declined. Thank you also for the tip on trimming things off early. I was reluctant to do that thinking it might spur new growth in a warm spell, but I'll do so from now on.

Fadi, I also planted my graft 2" below the soil line, and I see green at the base. It's just disappointing as mine were threatening to become veritable climbers! Oh well, I had originally wanted a short bushy rose in this space and was actually considering moving them due to their size and shape. I guess I should be careful what I wish for! : ))

I have had no trouble overwintering Dark Desire in zone 5, but it's only partly cane hardy at best and in this up and down winter it'll probably be pruned to the ground this year. I have found that even a little snow cover makes a huge difference in winter survival of cane over and above the protection methods I do. I have found roses that usually have no surviving cane that are green below the snow line even though we had extended spells of below zero highs in the winter. Being a dry climate, that was only 2-3" of snow cover, but in my world 2-3" of live cane is something to celebrate on HTs and floris.

As for Dark Desire climbing, I find that mine regrows to a good 6-8' each year even when pruned to the ground, but that it isn't a climber in the best of circumstances. It's a rose that likes to put out long canes and it would probably benefit from some horizontal training of the canes to get more laterals from them. It regrows rapidly, but I wouldn't count on it to cover an arch even in zone 6.

Cynthia

Totally different climate here, but here are photos of two of mine today.

Trained laterally against a fence in a LOT of shade (north facing exposure) below. It has grown more than the one in full sun that was not trained laterally. Lots of laterals budding.

Full sun below (it’s the one in the middle). I will start training it more laterally after the first bloom this spring, pulling it over to the obelisk, but so far I haven’t yet this year. Very healthy and I’m happy with the growth, but trained laterally it seems better, even in the shade.

Mine is in a spot that gets lots of sun periodically and some shade. I really hacked it this spring and I am now starting to see lots of new growth, even a couple of buds. I am going to see how it grows this year (planted last year) and may move it closer to my fence. I love it trained like you have it Cori Ann.

How many of you have Dark Desire on own roots vs. grafted? Mine was own roots. It is still tiny. As is my Madam Anisette. My MA - planted last February - is only about 8 inches high. My DD (original planted last Feb - stayed small, never bloomed, then died - replaced with new DD from same place, own root, in Oct/Nov 2017 - went in ground in Feb) is about 2" high. I think I might get flowers in five years. I don't have the patience for this!

Yikes!! What a waste of money, time and enjoyment. Kick it to the curb!! :)

Carol

I agree with Carol.

where did you buy your plants?

Hate to say it, but my Kordes are all own root and doing really well, growing very vigorously, blooming a lot and very healthy. Sorry Deborah... I know that stinks and I don’t want to rub it in!

Chris I think Deborah got hers at Otto & Sons in Santa Paula, California. :-)

Yes -- the MA and DD were purchased last Feb (2017) at Otto & Sons. I went back in October or November, and they had just potted the new DD into a 5 gallon can. He recommended I wait until late spring to plant in garden, but I needed to get it rooting in its own soil before I leave town for a few weeks in May, so put it in ground in late Feb or early March. We don't have to worry about freezes or frosts here, so that was not a concern. It's possible a rabbit nibbled on MA a bit, but they only take off the buds. I seem to have put a stop to them in the last several weeks.

The DD last year never bloomed, then looked bad, so I cut out all dead looking parts and nursed what was left, but finally pulled it out in October.

The MA last year did bloom, 3 I think, in late spring or early summer. The flowers were lovely. But I had to cut them because they weighed down the tiny bush. I didn't prune this year as both are still teeny tiny little plants. They both look healthy, but neither look anything close to bush or shrub.

Deborah, what I think is that the reason the nursery person said to wait until later to plant DD was that it had not filled out the container. When a container has a fully rooted out rose then it is easy to transplant without disturbing the roots. When it is only partially rooted into the container then it is easy to damage the roots in transplanting which can really set a plant back or even kill it. From what you said and the timing I wonder was this a dormant field rose that Otto and Sons had just received?

Rabbit damage on a small plant is pretty problematic since they don't just nibble the buds but the growth tips and this sets the plant back. A plant can't grow if the growth tips are gone so this might explain the lack of growth. If you have the rabbits under control I would give those plants some foliar fertilizer like manure tea or Miracle Grow and be patient. My experience with MA is that it is a very strong grower and if anything it is too vigorous.

I am a bit puzzled by the description of tiny plants as usually Otto & Son sell field grown plants and at the last I knew were buying one-year own root roses grown in Arizona. Perhaps they did something else I don't know about, but these should have been decent size roses when you bought them if you were buying a 5-gallon pot.

I know that it is easy to think it is a variety problem when a rose does not thrive, but I first look at the growing situation to see if there is a problem. Soil type, water, drainage, nutrition and light are my first considerations when a plant does not thrive. If that is all good then I look for pest like gophers, rabbits or signs of disease. It takes some detective work. But eliminating all these potential reasons then yes, it can be just a particular plant that does not thrive or a variety that does not perform well in that particular climate.

Thanks, Chris, for your insight. To clarify -- the rabbit nibbles on MA would have happened in January -- but I didn't see any evidence of nibbles on that one (I did on a couple of other rose bushes, so I had put little fences around them -- looks very strange! I was just being careful with MA because it was so small and vulnerable looking. Both MA and DD when purchased last year were tiny. I know Otto & S. have a great reputation -- but my experience has not been ideal, frankly. When I first called them 2 years ago, they were emphatic that they do not sell bare root roses. So you buy a 5-gal rose and you pay for a 5-gal rose. So when I purchased non Kordes roses from them 2 years ago, I was super annoyed when I turned the pot upside down, and all the dirt came out, leaving me with a... wait for it ... bare root rose! Which I then planted. But because it was not rooted out and got planted past bare root season, it really suffered when the heat came. It is only now starting to look good (Black Cherry Floribunda). Then last year I got these tiny little rose bushes, MA and DD, but since MA put out some nice blooms, of course she got another year. The DD just never thrived. I've been growing roses for about 25 years, so I'm not a total beginner. I think I've had one bare-root rose just die on me. I had some little bands die on me several years ago, but that was because the person who was supposed to water for me when I was gone for a month had different ideas about what that meant. All this to say -- the DD & MA have been protected this year from the voracious rabbits -- and they both look healthy -- but they are both teeny tiny. The new DD (just planted a month ago) has new growth -- but not very upright. They are somewhat near each other - sharing a bed with three David Austins, a floribunda, and a grandiflora. No, they're not too close together. There are annuals around, but I've carefully kept them away from MA & DD so that they are not shaded by the annuals. I will keep them this year to see what they do. Maybe they're just late starters. Maybe Otto & Sons sold them too early. Maybe they don't like my climate (Santa Barbara in the hills, about 2 miles as crow files from ocean - lots of oaks nearby, but none in the area the roses are planted in). Have you heard anything about how they do on the central coast of CA? You're right - the DD definitely had not filled the pot with roots, though I don't think one month would have made a huge difference.

Carol - they get one year. If they've not done anything by January of 2019, they'll be given to someone else. And watch -- they'll probably turn into spectacular roses elsewhere!!!

Chris - where are you these days? I seem to recall that you used to be the N. America rep for Kordes, but then another company stepped in? Or am I hallucinating?

P.s. I don't want to say bad things about Otto & Sons. I love their rose fields, and the DA I bought last month (Thomas a Becket) is looking gorgeous and is full of buds...

Deborah - so true!!!