Absolutely NO RRD. Normal growth.

I concur with Robert. Normal growth.

Moses

Thank you Robert and Moses. I was concerned about all the thorns here, then almost no thorns there. All the new growth so far is bright green. Thanks again!

Some roses don’t develop their thorns until they mature. But it’s definity healthy!

Thank you fig! That was immensely helpful. I will watch these like a hawk. There was a tiny bit of weird growth last year that I cut out. I wasn't sure if it was the intense drough or the extreme, sustained heat, or RRD. My mom had RRD on her Sweet Drifts maybe last year and it was very obvious. I dug those out and bagged them. I used her tools, not mine. But I wonder if the mite can travel on clothes? We live maybe ten miles from each other so of course the wind could carry them too. I'm not trying to jinx myself, but I do feel it's only a matter of when. So far only the drifts have shown me anything suspicious at all.

FWIW on another thread where Ann gave tremendously helpful information and support for RRD in my yard, she cited literature that RRD travels primarily by the wind and "drop patterns" of high growing plants/trees that then drop the mites to the roses. Apparently there was research where they deliberately tried to spread RRD from one rose to another using pruners and they couldn't do it. Not that I recommend trying that experiment in your own yard, and I sanitize my pruners for minimizing other things like Downy mildew transfer. We still don't know enough about RRD transmission but I let go of some of the immediate guilt of my transferring it between roses with pruners (or clothes). The source of my infection turned out to be a neighbor's yard that kept sending RRD mites my way.

I found it reassuring that it wasn't something I actively did that spread RRD, but there also aren't a lot of techniques for avoiding it beyond identifying (correctly) infected roses and disposing of them as you did at your mom's. Asking here for feedback about photos helps you not jump the gun too fast and see RRD where it isn't actually present.

Fig - wonderful summary of information and I've saved it as a great reminder of the bottom line parameters I'm looking for in the future. None of us can say we're done with RRD, but it shouldn't stop us from growing roses (at least it hasn't stopped me!)

Cynthia