Plant for the New Garden

One of the quintessential parts of a cottage garden is roses... this meant finding roses that didn’t require any special winter care... while I don’t mind molly-coddling one or two plants through winter, I’d rather not have a whole stack of them. There are two main series of roses that have been developed specifically to live in our cold Canadian winters, the Explorer Series – developed at an Ottawa research station and the Parkland Series – developed in Morden, Manitoba. I was looking for climbing roses as well as the bush type, so far I have come up with:

 

Explorer Series

John Davis (climbing rose) – light pink, spicy fragrance

John Cabot (climbing rose) – red to deep pink, light fragrance

Henry Kelsey (climbing rose) – Red to medium pink, light spicy fragrance

Alexander Mackenzie (climbing rose) – Red, medium fragrance

J.P. Connell – Light yellow to creamy white, medium fragrance

 

Parkland Series

Morden Blush – light pink to blush ivory, slight fragrance

Morden Fireglow – orange red, light fragrance

Morden Sunrise – Yellow to yellow orange, strong fragrance

Rugosa
Wild Spice - white, strong clove fagrance

 

Others
Wild Alberta Rose – pink, slight fragrance

 

I’ve seen the Morden roses in person & love them all. The Wild AlbertaRose would go in my front garden as I’m planning on that being predominantly native plants so the upkeep is minimal. Out of the climbing roses the John Davis is the most “cottage garden” looking & of the three red ones I think John Cabot is my favourite but I’d like to see them all in person before making up my mind. I’d like the J. P. Connell & the Wild Spicebecause they're white, I think the wild Spice would compliment the Wild Alberta Rose nicely.

 

I have a chain link fence at the bottom of the garden looking out onto the green space & I plan to use it for sweet peas, here are the ones I’m thinking of getting:
Queen of the Night

Pastel Sunset

Blue Celeste

April in Paris