Rose slide:
LJ, I know what roses you’re talking about but haven’t ever had those clove scented ones. I gave up my rose garden when I ended up a single mom. Food took a priority of my time then.
In my older years I’ve changed my taste from planting for color and show. I want fragrance. The only roses I’ve planted in the past 30 years were some cuttings from an abandoned cemetary. They had overgrown about 5 graves and smelled like heaven. I clipped some cuttings, rooted them and they covered my fence. They smelled exactly like roses and the scent was strong enough to drift in through open windows. Loved those but the blooms weren’t much to speak of. This was at my home before I met and married DH 10 years ago and I have no roses now.
DH fixed me up a spot to plant a fragrance garden off our front porch and that was my project for 2020. Gotta laugh, at the beginning of this chicom attack virus I figured I better focus more on food again than fragrance. So here I sit on the front porch looking at the potential fragrance garden full of cukes and squash. Just finished putting up a batch of pickles so that’s a positive.
Next year I will finish out muh fragrance garden. There’s a 6’ wide trellis for climbing roses and my plan is to go back to that cemetary to cut more starters. Got 6 rosemarys started from an older plant. Lavender to dig up and move and a host of scented geraniums, lemon verbena and lemon balm. There’s an old lilac tree at my Grama’s old house which I still own and I intend to get cuttings from that this fall. Only thing I intend to purchase (at this point) is a gardenia bush. 2021 looks to be a fragrant year.
Excuse the slide length, just love gardening.
Sounds good - I mean smells good! I have major lemon balm but it’s in bad soil and so very stunted. I have bad dirt, fir forest red clay with 30% stones. Have to make soil. I like damascus roses - old fashioned kinds are often not so showy but ultra fragrant.