Beautiful, noseometer!

Here, I have one own root and one grafted. The grafted was stronger initially and doing great in rather poor conditions of sandy "soil" by my courtyard wall.

The own root one is a major survival story. This rose was on death's door in the conditions by the courtyard wall for several years. I think Rick in Canada gave me an opinion that this rose was dying. I moved it to a better spot where it had it's roots eaten by gophers almost immediately. I potted the one cane near corpse and unbelievably it came back from the dead in the pot and regrew roots and survived. It is now replanted in the ground in a gopher wire basket and is doing great. It is astonishing. My photos are too jumbled to find the photos easily, but this is a strong rose. I'll try to post photos of the two plants blooming soon. They are now about 5X4 ft.

Ive grown Evelyn for a few years and she is a keeper. Gets to be about 6 -7 feet tall in Chicagoland and I tie her up against a trellis. She gets eastern exposure, no sun after 2 pm but still seems to be happy and productive. Great scent and big beautiful apricot flowers. Plenty of thorns too.

My grafted Evelyn

Own root Evelyn

Died.

Sheila, is it just the lighting or does your grafted Evelyn have a more intense color than your own-root? Your spunky own-root Evelyn is gorgeous!

Wowsa, Sheila! Those are absolutely gorgeous! And the own-root one was the one that was nearly killed, twice? Looks like it just shrugged off those bad experiences.

Ladybug, I’m sorry to hear that. Are you going to try again?

Yes, Ingrid, I do believe my grafted E has more intense color, but it is in a shadier area which could explain it.

Noseometer, yes, the own root E went through absolute hell. The survival story could make my heart warm.

@ladybug A 9a Houston area

Do you find you have a hard time growing Austins in your area or it was just Evelyn?

I also have one grafted and one own root Evelyn. The grafted Evelyn died back almost completely, and the lone surviving cane is disease-ridden but has produced a bud. The own root Evelyn has healthy, huge leaves but is relatively small overall, and flops over from the weight of its giant saucer blooms. Quickly becoming one of my favorite roses from the blooms alone. I might get rid of the grafted one.

I got Evelyn last year just months before DA announced they would bring her back. I keep mine in a container and honestly, it's not doing too great. The branches are very floppy. I was hoping she would have more of a bushy structure. Several branches broke off and couldn't support the weight of the branches even at the bud stage. If I put her in ground the branches would be on the floor. She's susceptible to black spot here in the Bay Area same as my other older DA roses. The rebloom however is excellent and the blooms are just so pretty. They are strong pink and apricot in cold weather and lighter apricot in warm weather. The fragrance is lovely too. I don't get the hints of peach that other posters have mentioned but it's a very strong floral fragrance. In terms of fragrance, I prefer Abraham Darby which smells like fruit loops cereal here in my garden but Abe is even more floppy/twiggy and the stems aren't as long as Evelyn.

I'm glad she's becoming more available. I had two grafted ones, my partner told me we lost both of them earlier this year (in addition to several others--winter was terrible). Fortunately ARFR had two own root available so he got me two more for my birthday. Guess what popped up from the ground? Not the rootstock. I now have four, and need to find places for the other two. It's an embarrassment of riches.

I wish I was your neighbor, Aaron. I’d gladly come over and dig them both up and take them home with me. I got an own root Evelyn from someone who rooted it for me and sent it to me two years ago. Unfortunately, it isn’t Evelyn at all: it’s Abe Darby! I already had a great Abe in my garden and now I have two. I want to get rid of my second Abe and replace it with Evelyn. The real one.

I've had a lot of luck with A reverence for roses--I've gotten Abe, Graham Thomas, Nahema, and Evelyn through them. I saw Evelyn there twice in the past year. It goes quick. Easiest way to search them (I've found) is go to their page, select by attribute, click fragrance rather than choosing a fragrance type, select 300 on one page, and then when it adjusts, look at the URL and change the part where it says "&sort=7" to "&sort=11" and you'll get all their stock in descending order of availability (down to out of stock).

They don't have anything right now, but here's the link if it helps:

https://www.areverenceforroses.com/category-s/274.htm?searching=Y&sort=11&cat=274&show=300&page=1

I also highly recommend just every so often trudging through the pages of RVR. I found Abe that way.