Finally, we have the third plant from my 2022 rose batch. I’m so happy that all three ended up being such healthy plants, allaying my fears about growing roses in cold climates. Why did it take me so long to get roses, after having so many in our garden growing up? A dumb mistake, really.

I made one earlier attempt to plant roses during our first year at the house, back in 2012. My bad choice of location (a sunny but rocky slope with very poor soil and heavy snow dump over the winter) led to those not surviving the year. Perhaps the lesson in this is mostly about observing your garden for a year before trying to make any long-term plantings. After that, I tried to figure out solutions by reading articles about overwintering with burlap sacks, special mulches, and complicated pruning regimens, all of which only made me more anxious. It was only after I’d built my gardening confidence with a few years of vegetable garden success that I felt up to the challenge of trying roses again, only to discover that the first try had been nothing but a piece of bad luck. I’m catching up on a lot of lost gardening time now.

Rosa ‘The Poet’s Wife’ (ruusu) blooms not long after ‘Gertrude Jekyll’ and has been absolutely prolific this year. It is also, I’ve discovered, a sprawler. It’s been interesting to see how each plant can have such a different growth habit. I think one of its stems has managed to layer itself and is in the process of becoming a separate plant. Since it’s planted in the cutting garden amongst bulbs and annuals, this isn’t much of a problem so I’m letting it have its head to see how big it will get. I might just give it an arch if it gets too tall since it’s pretty close to the front of the garden anyway.

Final count:

• Rosa ‘The Poet’s Wife’ – one rapidly expanding shrub