Lovely, Jeri. Gorgeous color, and I'm enamored by those lonnnng sepals. And does BL always have the button eye?

John

Jeri - I forget the back story on JL - can you tell it?

Jackie

Jackie -- My friend Ingrid, a rosarian, lived in Thousand Oaks, here.

Benny Lopez was a friend of her family, who lived in Santa Barbara.

Ingrid visited his home, and saw the several plants of the rose, and of course asked about it.

Mr. Lopez had fought in the Korean War, and when he returned to the U.S., he bought a fairly new home in Santa Barbara. (IIRC, he was the second owner.)

The house was on land that had once been an orchard, and it was very near the location of Fr. Schoener's nursery. (Schoener was in Santa Barbara from 1917 to 1939).

George Schoener - Wikipedia

Mr. Lopez clearly had a green thumb, and he propagated several plants, trimming all of them as standards. It's quite broadly arching, so must have been lovely that way.

Ingrid got a plant (or cuttings) from Mr. Lopez, and gave the rose its study name. It's been studied quite a lot, but no one has ever come up with a confirmed identity for it -- so it remains (appropriately, I think) "Benny Lopez".

Beautiful! Thanks for sharing Jeri!

Jeri - I cannot find any info on HMF about the size of this rose. I think you have grown it for a while - how big does your bush get? Could you post a pic of the entire bush on here? (I am looking for short rose bushes for my "getting fire safe" reorganization of my garden).

Jackie

Jackie, the one we've grown longest is in too much shade, and has never gotten that big. The one down the hill is only 2 years old, but I'd put it at about 3-ft. tall, but arching/spreading wider. I suspect the one we planted this past winter will be about the same. Keep in mind that it is quite prickly.

Thanks!