Daily Dose Blogger Bios
I've Got Big Hips!
What beautiful big hips I have! My favorite rose, Rosa 'Altissimo', a drop dead gorgeous climber with single blossoms in a sexy lipstick shade of scarlett, has developed fruit ... and those are called 'hips'. Why such a provocative name? This is gardening, remember? What have I been saying for months? Hidden beneath the veneer of respectability lies a red light district!
Hips are wonderful. They come in so many different shapes and sizes, depending on the variety of rose. Rosa canina- the dog rose- has the classic oblong rose hip. It's the highest naturally occuring source of vitamin c, and was used by Native Americans to supplement their diet. My Rosa 'Altissimo' has round, orange hips - I never cut the flowers of this rose so that I can have plenty of hips for the holidays (I like to decorate Xmas presents with them). Other roses have tiny hips that look like beads - in fact, rose hips were used as rosary beads in the Middle Ages. Rose hip jelly is a popular condiment, Rose hip tea is tartly delicious - and rose hip oil is said to do miraculous things to our skin. All this, and they can grow right in your back yard. Since this is the time of year to mull over what you'll plant come spring, why not pop on over to Heirloom Roses and start looking for a relaxed, single-flowered rose that has some bitchin' hips. I'll find the ones I like, and we can compare notes!
I LOVE roses, but didn't want to deal with all the babying they required. Plus, I live in Florida-and have very sandy soil-not friendly to roses who want lots of nutrients.
So, heirlooms are a recent discovery for me. I love the old fashioned look over the hybrids. i planted a yellow lady banks rose earlier this year. i loved its little sprays of yellow climbing on my fence. i want to try another heirloom and would love some suggestions.
enjoy reading your blog!
What a great choice of rose, merry! LadyBanks is so wild looking to me - like it would have grown near Rapunzel's tower or something. I love it when people discover heirlooms and species roses ... usually someone who couldn't stand roses before starts to see them as wonderful. I mean, the whole plant neads to be beautiful, right? The hybrid tea roses that require so much care just look like steroidal masses of petals on sticks to me - who needs that in a garden?
One rose that I've been using alot of lately is Rosa 'The Fairy' - it's another single rose, but it's flowers ( a pale pink with a large white center) bloom in these long sprays, almost like a wisteria. It is a great foil for more architecural plants. I usually don't like soft pinks, but this one is really special. Check her out and tell me what you think...