Is it a heavy feeder? Maybe I need to feed it something to help it out?

The foliage seems pretty healthy.

Those who have huge success with Memorial Day... please share your secrets so I can try to give this rose what it needs to be spectacular. Thank you!

I'm not so sure why yours blow so quickly. Mine open slowly for weeks...maybe it's our cooler weather? I think you'll get better info from someone not so far north. It's a shame though. Does yours get great fragrance?

Carol

It has fragrance, but then the bloom is gone so I haven't really been able to enjoy it.

I guess I will see what happens over the fall as weather gets cooler. It has just been such a disappointment.

Do you feed yours Carol? If so, how often?

Get one on fortuniana and you'll probably be amazed!

Cori Ann - fragrancenutter is probably right about the rootstock. Yes, I feed my roses - but they're in pots, so the feeding is going to be different than what you would do in the ground.

Carol

I don't think you have the correct variety. Petalage, color and flower form are not Memorial Day.

It's a possibility phyllissteen, but I think the frilly edges of the petals do seem to be like Memorial Day. The foliage also seems to match.

It probably is that the rootstock just isn't happy here. Darn! I have a lot of fortuanina that I'm experimenting with, growing it as my own future rootstock (possibly). I'm not sure how well Fortuniana does here yet. Stilll experimenting.

Roses from Palatine do really well here, probably since I have acidic soil, so multiflora seems to be the rootstock that offers the best initial growth in my yard.

Sigh. What to do with this disappointing Memorial Day?

The fragrance is wonderful so I guess it can stay while I figure it out. I think the patent runs out in 2026 so I could wait a few years, then graft my own on a different rootstock. In that time it may mature and get better. Or I may just end up getting tired of waiting for it and gift it to someone else. I guess we will see!

Another thought is that it's very young in your yard....give it some time. :)

Carol

True Carol. But the growing conditions are so good here that I tend to have little patience with dissatisfaction in the garden if I'm being honest. I know others garden differently with a lot of patience and empathy towards roses, nurturing them lovingly until they're suddenly amazing. But I'm a little different. I don't mind putting in work and being patient.... but I'm not keen on doing that for any plant that irritates or disappoints me. Especially when I know lots of other roses would probably be outstanding in that same spot. I don't see the need to wait for a slow to impress rose in my area of CA.

If I'm being totally honest....I tend to view my flowers as subjects that must all serve for the queen's pleasure (and of course the queen is me). I will protect them and give the subjects good lives... but they must entertain me in return.

The jury is out on my Memorial Day. If my daughter wants it I will probably gift it to her. She has been sniffing around my roses asking for freebies for about a year now. This might be a good one for her. It may even do better for her than it does here. Whatever it's grafted on may just not like my acidic soil. We will see. It has until the end of fall to impress me. Otherwise it's being banished from the kingdom.

My Memorial Day is on Fortuniana , huge wide bush .It is the most thripy rose in my yard . blooms are small and blow fast during summer with no smell . very vigorous , always throwing new basals .In Fall/spring ,the blooms become huge 5 inches with strong smell .I have a love/hate relationship with it .I wish I could s/p it .

I'm with you Cori Ann, I am impatient at best

The shovel is always looking for a dud rose to SP.

So many amazing roses and limited space. My roses better dazzle me or another rose will.

Maybe your daughter will have better luck with it.

Here's to the qweens and their rose kingdoms

I have yet to sp something. I gift them away to others instead. But yes, I don't like using precious water on a plant that isn't giving me happiness.

Perhaps it isn't getting enough water? Or maybe it doesn't like a dry climate. I don't grow this particular rose, but my ground is wet enough that I didn't have to water the roses all year. My heavy clay soil is great at holding water--which is why roses do better if I build up organic matter on top of it so the roots don't drown.

Thanks for the ideas Zack. Must be nice not to water roses all year! That seems crazy to me!

Others report that is really does well in a hot/dry climate, which is another reason why I bought it. It gets just as much water as the other roses all around it, which all do extremely well... and it doesn't show any other signs of needing water. It is a possibility though.

I am leaning toward the rootstock reason, which I don't know how to fix besides getting a different rootstock, but it could be your ideas too.

I'm going to feed it and pay it special attention until October 15 to see what happens over the fall as it gets cooler (into the 80s and 70s) during the day here. Let's see!

I typically mix in some lime when planting roses grafted on Dr. Huey--I also have acid clay soil. I also add in a lot compost made from maple tree leaves and grass clippings. Roses from US suppliers are on Dr. Huey, while Canadian suppliers use multiflora for their rootstock.

Cori Ann, my Memorial Day was grafted on Dr Huey and our soil is alkaline. M Day was a complete dud for me in this hot, dry summered climate. It received the same amount of water as my other roses. I admit to transplanting it a couple of times over the course of 5 or 6 years in the hope of its improving in a better spot. It did not. M Day's blooms were sparse and thrips infected. I was amazed to learn it was supposed to have a fragrance because mine didn't have scent, and it didn't grow, either. I removed it last spring and haven't missed it a bit. I don't know what the answer is, Cori Ann, but that rose just doesn't like some of us queens. Diane

Corii Ann - I love your analogy!!! I'm the same way...my roses are here to serve me...if I don't like it, and if I find something I like better, then the old rose is gone. It's just that here, it's hard to find roses that I really love, so sometimes I hold on to a less satisfactory rose, because there's nothing I like better.

My Memorial Day won a prize at the rose show for most fragrant. But if it doesn't work for you - then banishment is in order.

Carol

Cori-Ann, I have around twenty, maybe more, own-root, no-spray. You seem to have good luck with some that won't bloom much here (like Summer Romance) so maybe it's vice-versa with our conditions?

Mine are full sun and they don't like too much water. I water constantly but often skip MD as she just can't take it here. I have some in clay as well as sandy soil but do use compost (alfalfa fed manure/pine shavings).

I have one that's still not even a foot tall and some four by four, with the rest in between. No apparent reason for the differences either.

While I don't particularly love the fragrance so don't use them for the vase, I am loving them for landscaping because the blooms are so long-lasting and big. There's just a big different in how a rose looks from a distance if it's 6-7 inches across versus only four.

Anyway, I'm low on patience too and started out hating her in the beginning because they would wilt every time I watered. So now I just skip them and they are loaded in blooms.

I had one pampered in the pot that hadn't bloomed all year and just threw it in the ground recently in terrible grey looking soil in an area between concrete so now of course she's blooming, go figure. I thought it was a sure death sentence at the time.

Maybe your garden is too fertile for her, LOL!

Lavenderlace have you shared photos of your 20+ Memorial Day rose bushes? If you get a chance in the spring, I would love to see them all in bloom!

I haven't shared many pictures of anything, so sorry! But wanted you to know that there's hope for MD if you decide she's worth it. Maybe own-root does better?

But I do have to say that I had a bunch of them shipped in the heat last year, almost two weeks in the box, and Ebb Tide arrived fine while most of the MD's were DOA. So not the toughest in the world!

BTW, are your Amazing Grace still doing fine in the vase in your dry air? Mine look great on the bush and smell wonderful, unless it's extra humid, and then they ball and need assistance opening. But still shrivel immediately in the vase for me, so disappointing!

Amazing Grace seems to be ok here. It's very young and own root, much too soon to have much of an opinion, but... yes it does fairly average in the vase here. About 5 days. I really like the look of the bloom on Amazing Grace.

Memorial Day is gorgeous in other's photos. I hope it works here, but if not... there's always another. No other roses are really speaking to me at the moment otherwise I probably would have already replaced it.

It has also gotten a reprieve so far because it does have amazing fragrance and healthy foliage. Congrats on your MDs prize for fragrance Carol. I wish my blooms just stayed longer so I could actually enjoy them!

At first it was a water hog. I remember chatting with you about how ours were so different LL. Now it seems to need just average water. Definitely not less than others though.

It's weird ours are all so different.

Interesting that it didn't work for Diane either!

If Fortuniana does work here I will try that. Because Fragrancenutter's is outstanding!!!

Maybe my high humidity changes the water requirements for MD? I wouldn't say less water than Kordes, but definitely less than Austins if I had to generalize.

I love Amazing Grace and would be thrilled with five days in the vase! She doesn't blow, but is shriveled, dark, and tiny by morning.

I have three in the ground and four in big pots. Are yours own-root?

People have different ideas on hot and cool weather depending on where they live. In New England, cool weather tops out in the high 60s low 70s.
Cool weather in the middle of July

In Hawaii, where I grew up a daily high of 64 would be "freezing weather."

Thanks, Cori Ann. :)

LL my Amazing Grace is own root from Heirloom. It's still very, very young.

Who knows with Memorial Day's water needs. That one seems to be all over the board.

Zack, so true. I'm one of those that is "freezing" cold in the 60s and 70s. ;-)

Well, we got plenty of 100+F and 95+F days here last summer, and that's not uncommon. This is not New England, though latitude-wise we're about the same. Diane

Sometimes you just get a runt of a plant. I remember one of the prominent breeders (Carruth? Harkness?) writing that out of a bunch of plants in production, under the same culture in the same field, there will be some runts. For example, I've seen great examples of Belinda's Dream, and Belinda got her Earthkind designation and her Texas Superstar award not too far away from where I live. But mine has been one of the slowest and stingiest plants in the garden...definitely 'ho hum' at best, for a rose that is supposedly especially vigorous, easy care and free blooming.

No sentimentality nor patience here, I'm already eying her prime spot for other varieties I'd like to try. My only reluctance is that she has spent all year putting down roots in great soil , in an ideal spot, and maybe she is on the edge of her big breakout.

if your plant has bad or small canes, the only way to make them bigger is to remove them so that new basal breaks can grow into large canes. In New England it is now too late--any basal breaks won't have time to harden off for winter. If the plant is out of patent, the good part of damaged cane may be useful for rooting a new rose.

That makes sense. I had a Double Delight that never thrived. I loved that thing to death, literally lol

BenT, I agree about lack of patience. At my 67 years, I figure I may not have that many more years to enjoy beautiful roses so it better wow me. If not, adios.

That is nice you can pick your plants fragrancenutter. Here it is pretty much mailorder, and RVR pretty much has the staff pick a plant of the variety you want.

Sheila, maybe we should go work at RVR and whip them in to shape. It has crossed my mind to go apply for a job.

I pick most of my roses at Edwards Greenhouse here locally. They offer 100s of roses, and I did pick my Memorial Day out early just like fragrancenutter. Because our winter is going on when the roses first become available, we pick and pay ahead of time and receive a 10% discount if we do this before March 31. Then Edward's pampers your roses in a special greenhouse until the time you choose to take them home. Only the "chosen" roses are in this greenhouse. The head of roses and perennials will order special roses for you, too, which I have done several times. This woman is a force of nature, growing hundreds of peonies and clematis at her home for Edwards, as well as running a massive perennial and rose department. I am lucky, I guess. And rose prices, especially for the five gallon Austin's, are quite reasonable.

I still managed to pick a dud Memorial Day! Or maybe I am a dud grower of Memorial Day. I think how that rose turned out was a combination of factors. I certainly don't blame Edward's. I have had duds from Palatine and other rose sellers, too. It's all sort of a gamble. It's interesting, though, that a number of my "duds" never lasted long in commerce, either. Anyone remember Kordes' Party Dress? Diane

Diane and Sheila, do you remember me asking for opinions on what to do on a row of the same variety where most were three to four feet and one stayed at eight inches, ruining the whole line?

That was MD, and out of my 20ish, two are ridiculously different than the others for no apparent reason.

I ended up digging them up but the question was whether or not they would catch up with the others. I didn't SP them, just put them somewhere where they weren't so obviously behind, as they still are!

I picked mine out too. We're lucky here in northern CA. I can drive to Regan's or my favorite local nursery, Alden Lane Nursery. But.. I really have never been picky about rootstock until recently. It looked healthy when I first picked it.... but of course I couldn't see the bloom at the time because it wasn't blooming. I really hope it comes out of the funk it's in. It could be the rootstock (but I don't know what it is unfortunately). Or it could just be young. Or a dud, runty rose. The foliage is healthy, seems disease resistant and growth is good. Just the blooms are ho-hum. So far.

:-/

I would still love to see some photos of your MD line Lavenderlace!

Thanks Cori Ann! That line was only seven, now five MD, with another dozen misfits to finish. I stuck some giant Savannahs in their place. They are still shocked a bit so the whole thing looks quite ghastly at the moment.

The rest are intertwined with Austins, big mistake, though I quite like how it looks now. That's how I figured out how much they hate the same water that the Austins love!