So good to hear from you, Jim. I am sorry your trials are not over yet. I so hope that things settle down for you as you deserve a period of peace.

Your rose looks fabulous.

Thanks everyone!

I have one on order and am excited to try it! Love the colors!

I love my Orange Dude, and he's getting bigger. Over three feet tall now and wider. He's running out of space in my crowded garden, but I'll keep him no matter what. He continues to be a continuous bloomer and we've had head waves continuously since late May. Double Easy Orange is one tough rose. Diane

Wow, Diane, for it to bloom continuously through your winds and heat...what a great rose, and that final picture blew me away!! SWOOOON!!!

Looking good Nanadoll! :-)

What a rose! It looks too beautiful to be real! All I'm doing now is waiting for the reports on its black spot resistance to start coming in. If favorable, I cannot see me not growing multiples of Double Easy Orange.

Moses.

Jim - looking great!

Moses - yes, that would be great for you to grow. I hope it's really disease resistant.

I am posting a photo here just because it will make sense to some of you -- and you'll get a kick out of it. but I won't leave it up long, as I don't like putting photos of people on this forum open to the public.

So...we've been calling double easy orange the Orange Dude (thanks, Diane!). And then we were riffing on the Dude Abides...maybe the Orange Dude Abides...or Abiding Orange. ANYWAY -- on Wednesday morning I was at a breakfast for the local boys and girls club downtown, and Jeff Bridges was a guest (and he pledged $50,000 for the club). I had about a 2 minute chat with the man -- very nice, very affable. But I also got to say to him as we shook hands "the dude abides." Cliche I know. So very very very very cliche. Still. Check that item off some kind of list I didn't even know I had. And my husband took our photo. Here 'tis!

{image deleted on Monday morning}

Deborah, fantastic. It's the DUDE. Wait until I tell my son in law who is a huge fan of the Dude and has seen The Big Lebowski a bunch of time. Yes, the Dude abides! I just ran and told him about your meeting with the Dude. What a generous guy he is. And a great photo of you, so poised. Thanks for posting this pic. Diane

So cool!! The DUDE!!! :) :) What a great picture. Nice to hear he's a good person.

I love this, DD. You both are adorable and my family all love the movie too.

I didn't read this thread until just now... what a great picture of both of you!

Well, back to the other Dude--the orange one. This was his third season, and he's now about 4X4 feet. He was supposed to be a small guy, but he's proving me wrong. He is still blooming and with quite a few buds yet to open, though I don't know if there's enough energy from the sun in our northern latitude to power the bud openings into November. These photos are from a while back this season. My latest photos are still in my camera, but I hope to have those ready to post tomorrow night. We'll see. Diane

The Orange Dude Abides

I'm not surprised that your Dude exceeds expectations. You have a rose growing genius, Diane. Truly. Gorgeous photos. Mine is still small. But it was a teeny own-root bare-root from J&P, so I think he's just getting cozy in his spot.

Deborah, my rose was from J&P, too, a bareroot, but grafted. He took off like lightening for me that first spring, and he's never looked back. Maybe the difference is that this rose needs to be grafted. Just a thought, but not necessarily the reason for slower growth. However, my behemoth Julia Child roses, from 2006, are grafted, and my third Julia is own root. She's a nice rose, but can't compare to the grafted Julias. Diane

June 18, 2023 Orange Dude was planted sometime in April. He bloomed for months that first year. I've got the date stamps on each photo.

Here he is on October 24, 2023, still blooming.

Wonderful photos, especially the 3rd pic. Mmmmm

Hi Nanadoll, I see your Double Easy Orange is grafted...YOURS is awesome! :-)

Mine is own root and it took a beating over the winter from a very cold winter season...

Blackened canes etc etc. I had to cut it back 4 inches to the ground... Growing back slowly but coming along...

I'm going see how it does this year..Maybe I need grafted for more vigor???

Couple days ago:

Winter hit me hard too, Jim. Black canes galore were on my tallest bushes at the back of my rose bed. Strangely, the middle ground and shortest roses at the front came through pretty good.

For a while now, the front has been blooming earlier and gowing more vigorously, having less winter kill than the taller bushes at the back of my one and only rose bed (It's 8' deep, 18' long). Blooming is progressing nicely. Bliss, Apricot Candy, and South Africa are carrying the bed at the moment. Quietness, Pinkerbelle, True Inspiration, True Sincerity, and True Devotion are just kicking into bloom. Princess Charlene of Monaco, Moonlight Romantica, Dee-Lish, and Quick Silver, the tallest ones, are just starting to open.

The shortie Apricot Drifts are now past the peak of their first flush. The Sweet Drifts have just started blooming.

I got an own root, 1/2 gallon size Double Easy Orange from J & P this spring, which purchase was inspired by Diane and you. It was tiny at first, a little disappointed, but just today I saw a new shoot showing a bud, only about the size of a pepper corn, so by the end of June it should start to bloom. I hope your Double Easy Orange takes off running. I think I counted 9+ new growths coming up on your bush going by the photo you provided. That's the making of a respectable first flush! With your care it has every chance of returning strong, and even exceeding last year's progress made.

Take care. Keep us updated...BTW....anything new, rose wise, this year?

Moses.

Jim, I'm sorry cold temps and broken canes caused so many problems for your Dude. But your plant looks great, and will come back fine. Keep us posted with photos. I have some new photos of my Dude which started blooming really early this year, about May 8. Sorry to rub it in, but we really didn't have a winter. I think we had a few 28F temps as our coldest winter temperatures. The weird weather caused some really confused plants in my garden, probably the most confused being my hibiscus which started coming up in April instead of end of June-first of July. They keep stopping and starting their growth. I don't know what they'll end up doing....... Anyway, if you're interested, J&P has the Dude on sale, grafted bare root for $19.95. You could give it a try while it's still cool enough in your garden and have a second Dude. I'd like one myself, but don't have the space.. Or are you having temps too hot for bareroot roses.? You're not going to believe this, but my Double Easy Orange wants to be a big Julia Child, I think. He's now about

5 1/2 feet tall and about 4-5 feet wide. Nanadoll/Diane

Wow Nanadoll, yours is getting huge! :-) Awesome!

We actually had cooler than usual May....We Just now started having steady warm temps....

Moses , thanks for your info & input...

Roses behind here hopefully they will start blooming in June sometime....

I took out True Sincerity and I am going try...OSO Easy En Fuego....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phMhLB_9V94

I'll post a pic of Double Easy Oranges growth tomorrow...

Just took these pics of my own root Double Easy Orange rose: 5/31/26

STARTING its 3rd season as own root.... Leaves are very clean at this point....

DEO looks great, Jim!

It's beautiful, Jim :)

Jim,

Loving your clean Double Easy Orange!

And super loving the new rose you ordered: Oso Easy En Fuego-cool name, too. I Looked at your Proven Winner’s video & took some photos…. gorgeous new rose for you! Loving her bi-colors! Ooooooo! Aweeeeee!

Moses & Jim,

Sorry for the cold winter on your roses causing black canes. Being in colder NY, I lost many roses w/ black canes, mainly my young new roses, & frozen roots, going down to 1F many times last winter. Coldest winter in over a decade-coldest for me ever! I am excited to order to replace roses and now watching buds just start opening to bloom. June is my big month for first blooms.

All is well now and having a besutiful spring. Not too much rain! Rosrs look great and no diseases this spring!

Diane,

Amazing tall Orange Dude! A mild winter must have been nice. Wow! Your co fused hibiscus are growing already!

Awesome. Last year the one I ordered was randomly cancelled, but I just reordered a 2 quart from J&P!

Moses, keep us up to date on how your Double Easy Orange is doing in PA... I think we get alot more rain then you do in your part of PA though...

Anyhow, first bud is opening but looks alittle ragged... The other 2 buds opening are deformed and probably not going look good at all.... Reason,I have no idea...???.My other blooms on my other roses look good SO?

WE had a colder than usual month of MAY when buds were forming.... Rain etc in MAY So ?

I will try to figure it out & watch it the rest of the season....

I love him anyway, Jim. I think he will be fine.

Sheila, I do, too. Given how far the Orange Dude has progressed these last few weeks, I think he's doing great.

Jim, I think your first bloom in the first photo is quite pretty, though some petals look a bit pink to me. But it's a nice frilly combination. The third photo looks like botrytis rot to me, though that's a guess. I think your wet weather may have caused that. Things will get better and keep us posted........I'm not going to post pics of my Double Easy Orange until you have some dry weather and dry rose blooms. I'll just say that he is still exceeding my expectations and has gotten so big it's obvious he's challenging Julia for size--ha. May your weather improve, and may our wind finally be gone today. It's awful right now. But the 90sF start tomorrow. I thought I'd never say that I'm looking forward to that, but if the wind leaves, I can't be choosy. Nanadoll

Nanadoll, go ahead and post pics of yours... :-)

This year was just weird weather! 90 F one day and 40's the next day...lol... Frosts here & there in May etc. Just not a normal year....

Jim, is weather ever normal? Ours hasn't been either, but yours was worse. I just hope you don't have another rain-mageddon like you had years ago. Pumping out rainwater from your basement, etc, etc. I think you should do a rain go away dance. To make you feel better, I'll mention we have a vole making his tunnel in our back lawn. I'll be dealing with him shortly. Nanadoll

Well, I plugged up the vole tunnel and the resident doesn't seem to be doing anything. I flagged the plugged entrance, so it will be easy to monitor what happens next. My kitty Finn is very interested in the whole thing...... I posted these Double Easy Orange photos on the summer thread a couple of days ago, and I'm sure you saw them. This was the Dude's first flush and he's in his second one now. I took some more pics this evening, though it was windy, and I'll post them in couple of days. He's growing bigger every day. Nanadoll

These photos cover the bloom progression over two weeks.

These two below are from June 6 as Double Easy Orange started his second flush. Actually this rose never quit blooming--it's a true continuous bloomer.

Oops, here are the earliest photos in mid May. DEO was blooming from about May 1.

Have I confused everyone? The point is this rose was first to bloom in my garden, and will be one of the last to stop unless the deer munch on him, which they did last year.

Jim,

My Double Easy Orange has been blooming for about a week now. The bush is still very small, being a 1/2 gal. own root from J&P, planted in late April. It came leafed out but no buds, only foliage. It did set buds and started blooming very quickly, and has three flowers open with about 6 buds still developing. The blooms are small, only about 2" now, but DEO's drive to bloom is evident. I have the greatest expectation that it will be one of my favorites. It's progress so far has been great.

A grateful thanks goes out to Diane and you for inspiring me to get a Double Easy Orange.

Moses.

I see more buds on my Double Orange Moses & those look normal... :-)

Still not sure what happened to the other buds...

Nanadoll, love seeing your Dude... Keep on posting! :-)

First bloom open now...

That bloom is the beginning of a full recovery, Jim. When your Orange Dude reaches Diane's phenomenal proportions, and puts out blooms like crazy like hers, we'll all be overjoyed with you.

My Orange Dude is right behind yours, having ~6 open blooms now, albeit they are small (understandable for such a small own root practically planted less than two months ago), they are beauties.

Moses.

Great to hear Moses!

The Dude photo taken yesterday. He's been blooming nonstop for nearly a month and a half. Jim, you'll need a bigger flower bed for your Dude. Mine is about 5X5 feet and clearly is still growing. Yikes. Nanadoll

And it's not fertilizer. I only fertilize roses twice during the year, and the second one was in March. First Plant Tone in February. Keep it simple, right?

I ordered a 2nd one when the JP sale was on - its potted and huge and blooming its head off! I adore this rose!! So healthy too!!! Should have ordered a couple more before the sale went off........

Judith

I would also like to comment on how long the blooms last, plus their heat resistance!

Remarkable rose! Winter hardiness is Orange Dude's next hurdle. It may take a few years to prove its ability to shrug off winter. Young roses here can limp along a bit for a year or two, showing more winter die-back than desired, only to kick in to shrugging off winter thereafter.

Moses.

Our zone 7 winters haven't fazed the Dude. I don't think he even went dormant last winter which was extremely mild. It's quite different in your gardening area, Moses, I know. Diane

WOW Nanadoll 5x5... :-O.... lol... Bet thats quite the sight! :-)

Awesome Judith!

Moses, Yep I agree!

Jim, the Dude is a Duke. The only thing that is keeping his size in check is all the giant stuff surrounding him like the snowball, a huge Ascot and some really big penstemon. Still, he abides, always pushing outward. Watch out. Your Dude will make a break for it. Diane

Yep I have faith that my Dude will make a break for it when its ready Nanadoll ... :-)

Actually Dude started taking off last year it just got zapped by a much colder than usual winter this year...

Not much winter wind protection here ...

Jim, your Dude is making rude noises at his large, perfect red neighbor I'll bet. But he will catch up to the red guy. He's looking fine.

My Dude, I hate to say, is about 5 1/2 feet tall and thinks he is Julia Child. This isn't the best photo. Dude is surrounded by too many huge plants and getting in to take a photo is hard.

WOW SPECTACULAR Nanadoll! :-)

Growing like a bad weed! :-)

Todays 6/23/26 photos: after a couple days of hard rain...not bad..:-)

I have a Coral Knock Out that is a twiggy piece of junk. I've been growing for 4 years now and it is still a twiggy mess. 3 feet tall and gets black spot faster then any rose I have. It is planted between Pink KO and Blushing KO, so this are never gets sprayed with anything. Coral KO will be getting dug up and tossed on the burn pile. SO, is Double Easy Orange black spot resistant? I would love to have orange in Coral KO's spot BUT, it must stay clean.

My Double Easy Orange is staying clean so far... Starting its 3rd season...BUT your area might be a different story?

I grew Coral Knockout at my old house and it got huge @ (5ftx5ft by the end of the season & stayed fairly clean...

Heres pics of my Coral KO from years ago...(Back then it was called Carefree Celebration)

So not sure why yours has remained a twig...BUT I have had similar experiences where a rose would just not grow right for me...