SYMPOSIUM 

 ON THE 



EVER NEW 

 YET OLD 



QUESTION: 



ARE BUDDED 



PLANTS 

 REALLY BET- 

 TER THAN 

 OWN ROOTS? 



[Editors' Note: We extend an invitation to our readers to contribute any actual facts that may have a bearing on this problem — mere opinions will not help. 

 This discussion is continued from the June issue.] 



Dr. W. Van Fleet, Experimentalist, and 

 Raiser of New Roses. Now with Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, Rounds Up the Question: 



The question of own root as against 

 budded roses is largely a matter of the 

 grower's ideals in rose culture. If he 

 goes in for exhibition type flowers with 

 their long stems and massive foliage, he 

 will want all the help he can get from the 

 extensive root system of the most con- 

 genial stocks on which his weak-growing 

 varieties can be worked. He will be 

 willing to sacrifice individuality of plant 

 and bloom for the sake of size and vigor 

 of individual shoots. 



On the other hand the rose lover who 

 regards his plants as individualities to be 

 studied, humored, and coddled as well when 

 necessary, but to be considered as a whole 

 in every aspect, of habit, stature, leaf, 

 branch, bud, and bloom, will likely prefer, 

 as experience is gained, to have as many 

 of his pets as possible develop unaided on 

 their own root systems. Of course, there 

 are rose varieties, and fine ones too, that 

 do not form sufficient roots when propa- 

 gated by cuttings or layers to make vigor- 

 ous plants, and these are best budded, 

 grafted or inarched on congenial stocks 

 such as Manetti, multiflora, briar or Rosa 

 laxa. The use of R. rugosa, R. Carolina 

 and other species sending out long under- 

 ground shoots or stolons that come to 

 the surface some distance from the stool 

 should be avoided for bedding and indoor 

 roses. All rose stocks, in common use, 

 are given to suckering from the base unless 

 the union is deeply planted, but Manetti 

 usually offends least in this particular 

 and is, under ordinary circumstances, a 

 strong and persistent grower. I have had 

 better success with roses worked on 

 Manetti when planted in heavy and medium 

 soils than on any other stock yet tested. 

 For sandy soils multiflora de la Grifferae 

 seems well adapted, but the suckering 

 tendency is a great nuisance though not 

 to be compared to the trouble caused by 

 the stolon-producing species. Rosa laxa 

 makes a fair stock but does not show espec- 

 ial vigor under our climatic conditions. 



A great proportion of the rose plants 

 imported into this country are budded on 

 dog rose or briar (Rosa canina) which 

 generally does well in Northern Europe, 

 but is not particularly adapted for this 

 country as regards maintaining vigor of 

 growth in many of the bedding roses for 



which it is compelled to furnish the root 

 systems; and it certainly is a nuisance in 

 the way of sending up suckers in late 

 summer, just when reserve growth for 

 the oncoming winter should be made. 



The demand for big, showy plants, re- 

 gardless of their lasting qualities, particu- 

 larly among the dwarfer varieties of the 

 ever-blooming sections, is doubtless the 

 main incentive for the profuse foreign 

 output of budded rose plants. Practically 

 every introducer of a new variety feels it 

 incumbent to bud or graft many thousands 

 of his novelty on the stock that is likely 

 to produce the rankest vegetative growth 

 with little regard to its fitness in preserv- 

 ing the individuality of the plant as a 

 whole, or its possible lack of permanence, 

 and these over-developed monstrosities 

 are distributed far and wide, leading often 

 to very erroneous conclusions as to the 

 characteristics of the variety. It would 

 appear that the art of cutting propagation 

 was all but lost in certain quarters, but it is 

 well preserved in this country and we can 

 still procure an exceedingly wide range of 

 rose types and varieties so propagated as to 

 develop excellent root systems of their own, 

 and these plants in the long run are far more 

 likely to give satisfaction than similar 

 ones worked oh nurse plants, though more 

 time may be needed for their full develop- 

 ment of the former. 



A bed of Hybrid Perpetuals from rooted 

 cuttings, planted by me in 1894, still 

 contains some of the original bushes, now 

 almost old enough to vote, but still in 

 fair condition, though many successions 

 of budded plants of the same varieties 

 have fallen by the wayside. When Teas, 

 Hybrid Teas, Remontants, Noisettes, 

 Wichuraiana and Multiflora climbers and 

 a host of garden roses can be had with 

 good roots of their own, I would unhesi- 

 tatingly recommend them in place of 

 budded or grafted plants, whether home 

 grown or imported, unless the desire 

 is for immediate transient effect or for 

 the production of very long-stemmed show 

 blooms, and for the latter purpose there 

 are many varietal exceptions to the rule 

 of stronger growth on profusely rooted 

 host plants. 



When, however, the grower wishes to 

 develop a Baroness Rothschild, a Victor 

 Hugo, or a Lyon Rose, among the bedders 

 or a Marechal Niel under glass, he had 

 better have the former worked on Manetti 



337 



and the Niel on Cherokee or Rosa Banksia. 

 All will root from properly selected cuttings 

 or layers, but the subsequent growth is 

 not always vigorous. And if he wants 

 tree or weeping standards of Conrad F. 

 Meyer or the new climbers, he should have 

 them budded high on strong canes of 

 rugosa, for while the latter is exceptionally 

 objectionable for dwarf varieties, it can 

 be strongly commended as a stock for tree 

 effects. The canes seem to be longer- 

 lived than dog briars so much in favor 

 abroad, extremely hardy as to cold and 

 they withstand the hot suns and drying 

 winds of our climate far better, while the 

 root system is less given to sulks, but 

 hustles early and late to gather plant food 

 for the developing tops. Suckers, always 

 an intolerable nuisance among bedding 

 roses, are easily seen and quickly suppressed 

 about the bare stems of the tree standards. 

 When generously and continuously fed 

 the rugosa stock goes far to justify the 

 highly artificial and formal fad of tree roce 

 effect. Rosa Carolina and R. Californicj 

 ought to be tested out for tree rose stocks 

 in this country, the former for the North 

 and the latter for Southern localities. 



J. D. Eisele, Manager of the Nurseries, 

 Henry A. Dreer, Inc., Pennsylvania, says: 



With the many years' experience which 

 we have had in growing roses, both on 

 own roots as well as grafted or budded 

 plants, we, in every instance, give prefer- 

 ence to the budded stock, as it produces 

 not only stronger plants, better flowers, 

 and more of them, but, when properly 

 planted, it is longer lived. 



While there is no perceptible difference 

 with some of the stronger-growing Hybrid 

 Perpetual, Wichuraiana, Rambler and sim- 

 ilar sorts, there is a vast difference in 

 choicer and more delicate varieties. This 

 is particularly noticeable in the Hybrid 

 Tea class. 



Not only the great percentage of Hybrid 

 Tea roses, but also some of our choicest 

 Hybrid Perpetuals make practically no 

 growth when planted in the garden on 

 their own roots, except in such favored 

 localities for rose growing, as on the Pacific 

 Coast and in some of the Gulf States 

 But, even in these favored localities, not 

 only the commercial grower but also the 

 amateur, who has had any experience 

 at all, gives preference to the budded stock. 



The average amateur has an abhorrence 





