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Hardier Roses
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Peter Joy &
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| Dept of Applied Biology, P.O. Box 27, 00014 Helsinki University, Finland |
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Background and aims of our work |
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| Early in the 1990's we started making crosses among various roses, including very hardy local forms found during a project (called KESKAS, a Finnish acronym indicating "hardy plants") to survey valuable woody ornamentals in Finnish parks and gardens. It was a matter of some pride that the KESKAS project revealed so many excellent yet tough plants, including several fine roses. On the other hand, Finland has long imported colourful and long-flowering Central European roses, which generally fail to survive our long, harsh winters. We realised that we could use the KESKAS roses in a hybridisation programme to diversify our range of hardy, ornamental roses. |  |
| The first generation of seedlings arising from crosses made during 1992-94 was not expected to produce recurrent flowering roses. Recurrent or repeat flowering in roses is apparently determined recessively, so that the gene for this character must be present in both parents for it to be expressed in any of the progeny. Once we had secured some first generation seedlings of hardy background and carrying the recurrence gene, we could make crosses aiming at long-flowering roses. This second cycle of hybridisation was made during 1999-2000. We were thus able to widen our goals to include long-flowering and hardy roses growing in various shapes and sizes, and performing well at least into central parts of Finland. |  |
| Cultivars released would be grown on their own roots. It is hoped that rose growing for garden and amenity use will be increasingly based on such roses, selected for their good adaptation to our climatic conditions. Our dependence upon tender, imported stocks would thereby be reduced. At the same time, Finnish cultivars may be suitable for other regions with harsh winters. | |
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