92 Old Roses: Bourbon Roses.
Description
This article is from the Rose Gardening FAQ, by Bill Chandler chandler@austin.ibm.com, Jolene Adams jolene@cchem.berkeley.edu, Brent C. Dickerson odinthor@csulf.edu, Karen Baldwin kbaldwin@veribest.com, and many contributors
92 Old Roses: Bourbon Roses.
Bourbon Roses are named for the Ile Bourbon, now called Reunion, in the
Indian Ocean, where they traditionally are supposed to have originated
from a natural cross between the China `Parsons' Pink' and the red
`Tous-les-Mois', a Damask Perpetual, two roses which were used as hedge
material on the island. (This, however, is an area of hot dispute in
almost every particular.) Seeds of this plant, and cuttings of the
plant, showed up in Paris in 1819 and 1821 respectively. The way in
which the virtues of its disparate parents were combined made these new
roses popular, and after ten years of largely unsuccessful attempts,
good new Bourbons began to come out of the breeding grounds in the
1830's. In the best of them, vigor was combined with floriferousness,
and beauty with fragrance. A typical Bourbon will have the arching
growth harkening back to its Damask ancestors, with the lush flowers
and fragrance from much the same source; but it will also have a strong
tendency to rebloom from the China ancestor, as well as a certain often
subtle influence of the China flower form. Bourbons, however, are often
not typical at all, and range from the arching growth just mentioned to
the very dwarf, China-like growth of the cultivar 'Hermosa', indeed one
of the oldest Bourbons still available (it had shown up by 1835). They
range in color from deep reds through pinks to blush and white. The
easygoing charms of the Bourbons have returned them to the forefront of
popularity among today's old rose people, though very few were
introduced after 1900; their original heyday was the period 1830-1850.
`Souvenir de la Malmaison', `Reine Victoria', `Louise Odier', `Gloire
des Rosomanes', `Mme. Isaac Pereire', `Acidalie', `Boule de Neige'.
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