Fantastic! No just to get more people growing it.

That makes sense to me Jeri.

This beautiful picture led me to the HMF profile of this rose, and every photo there of it is gorgeous. I especially love the buds with the little tassels on top before they open. The foliage reminds me somewhat of Grandmother's Hat.

Not as clean though, Ingrid. But kinfolks, maybe. :-)

So that means Crestline Mulberry and De la Vina are pretty much the same rose. Both are La Reine, only improved.

@jerijen they could be degenerative sports, or they could be infected with an undiagnosed viral issue. When you're discussing a 181 year old plant variety which has been passed from one hand to the next; one schlock producer to the next and infected with God knows how many mutations of which viruses, anything is possible. There was no clean plant movement until less than forty years ago so it had nearly a century and a half of being passed around like a social disease and nearly a century of it during which there was RMV as it was only in the early 1920s articles concerning "Infectious Chlorosis" began appearing. So, infected or degenerative sport, take your choice.

But I think you have to think that roses like "'Barbara's Pasture Rose" and "De la Vina Mystery" and the like have to be a close approach to what was originally christened "The Queen".

If they were produced prior to the wholesale infection and degradation of the US stock, they would be.

I think Jeri is right - mystery roses might have been found in a location where the actual cultivar had been growing for who knows how long, so they might be more like the original.

Example - the ancient Le Vesuve in our garden turned out to be 2 plants. One was planted, we think from old photos, right after the turn of the 20th century. The other one was tip rooted off of a cane from the old one, which was a favorite thing to do of my FIL's in the 1970s - he was always taking long canes and putting bricks on them so they would root. Of course roses can tip root without this help. I only mention this to demonstrate that a found mystery rose might be the second generation of a very very old cultivar, adding several decades or more to the amount of time that a rose would not have been ruined in commerce.

Jackie

@jacqueline9CA as long as the variety was likely planted prior to the 1920s, that may be a good bet. By the 1930s and 40s, there were many US originated roses which were virused from the beginning. By the time of Queen Elizabeth, you couldn't find that one without RMV. They were infected on introduction. The AARS winners were all introduced by Armstrong and that company was infamous for virus infected stock.

Yes Kim -- I think that's it.

Kim, I do think there was a good chance that our LV was planted prior to the 1920s, and was purchased at the West End Nursery in San Rafael (founded 1909). In the obviously prior to WWI family photo below (women's daytime attire, and the fact that the metal driveway gate went to a WWI scrap metal drive), you can see roses planted behind the wall on the right. There were a row of very ancient roses there when we moved in, one of which was LV. (another way to date the photo - the babe in arms is my FIL's elder sister, who was born in 1911).

Jackie