ABC Wednesday

Dahlia 'Melody Allegro'

Happy ABC Wednesday, as usual I will be looking to see what everyone came up with. It has been a busy week that will come to a head on Thursday night when I play my first professional gig since last Christmas. Actually it is a benefit for the family of a friend that died unexpectedly a couple of months ago. We have had a couple of rehearsals and luckily I knew most of the songs already. I did have to learn a few of the old riffs like ‘Lyin Eyes’ and ‘Rebel, Rebel’.


This first flower is a Dahlia from the Melody series. They were introduced in 2000 and seem to be sticking around. This variety ‘Melody Allegro’ was blooming at White Flower Farm. I had forgotten what allegro meant (I’m playing everything by ear these days) and looked it up. It means at a brisk tempo.

'Memorial Day' a fragrant Hybrid Tea rose and 2004 All-American Rose Selection (AARS).

I have a lot of rose pictures left over from the Rose Festival; I probably could have gone on for a couple more weeks. Here are two more pink ‘M’ roses. ‘Memorial Day’ is a Hybrid Tea rose that has a strong fragrance. This is kind of the smaller version of the flower as I had some that were really huge. This rose combines two parents that I like very much 'Blueberry Hill' and 'New Zealand'; both are great roses in my opinion. It could use a better name, as Memorial Day is always too busy a time for me!

This second rose is ‘Music Maker’ is a Buck rose (Modern Shrub) introduced in 1973. It also is a ‘stinker’; just kidding it has a strong fragrance. It blooms like a Hybrid tea with one bloom per stem. This was photographed at the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden in the Bronx.

I was going to post another ‘M’ photo but couldn’t bring myself to do it. It actually was a double m. Meager and Maple foliage. The foliage in this area is some of the worse color I can remember seeing. Sure there are a few pockets of good color and some individual trees that look good but on the whole it looks washed out and thin to me. I generally judge the foliage season by the collection of Maples at the Estate. There are 20+ species of Acer and numerous cultivars. Most are showing really crummy color compared to years past.


Edited to add:

Oops, shows how tired I am. I forgot the ABC Blogroll:

Here are some of the other blogs that are participating in ABC Wednesday. If you want to join let me know and I will add your link.

mrs nesbitts place
hin's photoblog
tech the man
a bit of this a dash of that
Little Rock Daily Photo
photoxication
Kissing the Dogwood
strolling through Georgia
Ruth's Garden Blog
dwq online
kate isis
photography by kml
AVCR8TEUR'S Blog
Salty Dogs
The Modern Goddess
Simply Sage
HeART of the Nest
author blog
kai
Mollitudes
ten forty
Neva
Ackworth born, gone West
Secluded Habitat
bidadlah.com
Gemmas House

Hybrid Tea Rose ‘Marilyn Monroe’

Hybrid Tea Rose ‘Marilyn Monroe’
Synonyms: WEKsunspat

I must say this rose is a beautiful apricot blend with just a hint of green. It was blooming profusely at the NYBG. It had what I consider a light fruity type of fragrance, its real beauty was in the delicate shading of the inner petals.

Parentage: Sunset Celebration × St. Patrick

Petal Count: 30 to 35

Breeder: Tom Carruth. Here is an interesting article on Mr. Carruth’s career as a rose breeder:

SFGate.com/King of the Roses

From the article by Rayford Reddell, a list of Mr. Carruth’s AARS Award winning roses:

/start quote/ 'Scentimental' No two blooms are exactly alike, with petals randomly splashed with burgundy, red, cream, and white. Blossoms are fragrant as all get-out.

'Betty Boop' Single-petaled and bicolored Floribunda with shades of red and white.

'Fourth of July' Red and white climbing rose.

'Hot Cocoa' Blossoms are notably fragrant, foliage is glossy green and plants are resistant to common rose ailments.

'Memorial Day' Heavily petaled Hybrid Tea rose with strongly scented blossoms. An undisputed hit in areas with hotter-than-normal summers.

'About Face' Gold and bronze, for which Hot Cocoa served as the parent.

'Julia Child' Butter-yellow and fragrant Floribunda.

'Wild Blue Yonder' Deeply fragrant Grandiflora with red-purple blossoms.

'Strike It Rich' Golden yellow Grandiflora. Most blossoms have 30 petals each. /end quote/

For some information on the AARS Awards
click here


I have actually grown a lot of these roses and have had good luck with all but ‘Hot Cocoa’, although it does have a beautiful flower color. I haven’t grown 'Scentimental’ or ‘Fourth of July’ because I am not crazy about striped roses. I have seen them performing well in gardens, though. ‘Strike It Rich’ is one of my new favorites. In the new Rose Garden it is one of the few roses that didn’t have a lot of disease and continues to produce a lot flowers even though a lot of the roses around it were completely devastated by black spot.

‘Strike It Rich’ post