Inadvertently Good #1

Inadvertent good idea--actually it wasn't an idea at all, it was an accident. A few years ago Home Cheapo was selling mail order end-of-season left over J&P bare root roses for five bucks apiece, with free shipping. I couldn't pass that up, and got my under-performing copy of 'Julia Child', which has not yet caught up to her quality sisters, as well as a somewhat obscure landscape rose regrettably called 'Petal Pushers'. Ewww.

Rosa 'Petal Pushers': silly name. This rose deserves better.


Nice little rose, as it turned out, but I had nowhere to put it, and finally stuck it by the stairway in the gully, where there isn't even any irrigation. I dump dirty pond filter water on it. That rose in that spot was accident #1.

'Bishop's Castle':


Accident #2 was buying three copies of 'Bishops Castle', an Austin rose sold by J&P a couple or three years ago. Another case of roses I bought without having a place to put them. They got stuck by the stairway, too.



It was about the only open place left, and not quite sunny enough, but I didn't want them in pots, even though they were deemed "compact" growers. I thought they'd be something like 'Jubilee Celebration', which is a dinky little thing that blooms really well. Wrong.



They are small climbers that bloom really well, at least in my yard.   Instead of being small globes on either side of the stairway, the plants arch and spill over the stairway walls. Now I walk down with roses tumbling over each side of the stairway.


I would never have thought of doing this. Accidents made it happen.

'Bishops Castle' is strongly fragrant and I descend and ascend through a cloud of rose perfume. Another piece of Eden, fallen into place.