We've had a little rain the last few days but it's still in the 90s so it's very steamy out. I got the other bottle of Bayer but I'm afraid to use it with this heat. I know it's not a foliar spray but even so I hate to use any strong chemicals on the roses in this kind of heat. So I'll wait.

Not much blooming at the moment. Disneyland is about the only thing really covered in blooms and I'm bummed because something ate the bud that was going to open on Madeleine. Now I'll have to wait weeks again to see what it looks like because there aren't any other buds on it yet. I clipped back Christian Dior's blind shoots to see if I can get it to bloom. Those two and Peace are the only ones I haven't had any blooms on yet this year. Peace looks incredibly healthy. It knows I want to shovel prune it I swear but still no blooms and I don't care how healthy it looks, if I don't get any blooms it's going.

I'm also making a plan up to play roulette with some plants. Cinderella is coming out of the bed. It's too small and just gets lost so it will go in one of the baskets and one of the other minis will replace it. maybe Caliente. Also going to dig out leafless, one stick Intrigue and pot it to see if I can save it. I'm not sure what to put in it's place yet. I need to pot up Hondo and Granada too. I had no idea how big they'd get and I put them in pots that were too small. Their smaller pots will get some of the bigger minis that are in too small of a basket, probably Iced Raspberry and Heather Sproul. Like I said roulette.

Well I got the Bayer 3 in 1 and mixed it up and put it down. I should have gotten 2 bottles because I only got half the roses done and ran out. I'll need to pick up another one pronto and do the rest. I do hope this stuff works. The roses look so bad. I know they always do at this time of year but it still drives me crazy. I also planted the 4 minifloras in the bed today. They had already outgrown the pots they were in and I'd like them to get well established before winter. And I watered again. Gee I wish it would rain.

It's HOT and humid too. Yesterday I did an inventory of all the roses, took a picture of each plant and assessed it's condition. Some are doing very well considering the heat others look ghastly with black spot, powdery mildew or both. I've been spraying regularly every 2 weeks alternating with Seranade and Green Cure but it hasn't helped so I'm going to have to resort to chemical warefare. I bought some Bayer 3 in 1 today. I hate to do it but the roses need their leaves if they're going to be healthy going into the winter. Yes, although I hat to admit it,.it's August and time to start thinking about stuff like that. The season is just too short, big sigh.

These are the ones that look the best, healthy clean leaves and blooming.
Dublin Bay
Tuscan Sun
Quietness
Winter Sunset
Appleblossom Flower Carpet
Sunrise Cupido
Baby Betsy McCall
Heather Sproul
Ruffled Cloud
Always Love You
Baby Blanket
Hot Romance
Rose de Rescht
Graham Thomas
Christian Dior (clean as a whistle but it won't bloom for me)
Hondo
Reine des Violettes
Honorine de Brabant
Dainty Bess
Climbing Peace (another one that refuses to bloom though)

And these are the worst with either no leaves left from black spot or both BS and PM at the same time.

Miss Flippins, leafless
Memphis Blues, both BS & PM
Winter Magic, leafless
Madeleine, PM big time
Sunny Delight, BS nearly leafless
Intrigue, leafless and a one cane wonder too
Sunsprite, BS bad
Wild Plum, BS bad
Ingrid Bergman, BS bad
Folklore, both BS & PM
Garden Party, both BS & PM and still blooming it's head off

The rest fall some where in between with a little of one or the other.but not too too bad.

It RAINED! Not just once but 3 times yesterday. At last. That meant I could spend today cleaning up the roses, beds and pots instead of watering. I have both black spot and powdery mildew plus aphids and some tiny green caterpillars that are eating the leaves on Angel Face (poor AF, she finally got new clean leaves after her last bout of BS and now they're getting eaten) . And I sprayed with Serenade last week and Green Cure this week and still have all this. I used some insecticidal soap today for the bugs. I'll wait a bit on the fungi to see if the Green Cure kicks in. The rest was mostly dead heading and picking up debris from the rain. Otherwise the roses are doing OK and continuing to bloom. I finally got a bloom on Touch of Class. It's small and doesn't look to good but it's only it's first bloom so I'm hoping with some maturity it will improve. My miniflora Rachel bloomed too. I'll post a pick here since there aren't any yet. Memphis Blues is blooming and Robin Alonso has 2 big fat buds showing color so any day now. Madeleine has one bud but it's still small so it will be a while for that one.