Heat it may love, but not humidity. I grew it in zone 6b in NJ without the benefit of weekly spraying. In either its first or second summer it spent June, July, and August completely defoliated and didn't bother coming back for more next spring. It was the behavior of most hybrid teas in my garden. But not all. So I wonder how I should describe the superiority of ones that remained unaffected by black spot there if this one is accurately described as "very disease resistant?"
I cautiously used 'Marina' in a few crosses this spring, to a rose that may break the bad faults of these lines, but we will see. It is REALLY hard to get those intense colors, without a lot of issues (or a ton of chemicals, which are OFF LIMITS in my world).
I grew both 'Pinocchio' and 'Spartan', parents of 'Zorina', last season, and neither were notably susceptible to the kind of BS in my yard in Utica. Hardiness is another story; it is not clear if 'Spartan' will grow back this year, despite three feet of snow cover and plentiful moisture in the soil.
Theyre both good garden floribundas for their time. Spartan is in A LOT of modern roses. Its main issue was that it sometimes bred rust into roses. Zorina has some unknown yellow rose in it, which could be the culprit, or, more likely, a weak rose was selected because it was so novel for its time. Whisky was also like this. Not a strong rose, and very novel for its time.
What did Prominent produce? Trying to think of bright, clear orange and P, G and V came to mind. Prominent is the better of them all, tiny, thorny beastie that it is. And I need to review but I think it is also spawn of Zorina. I love orange and coral roses. I have the old variety Hawaii which is as fertile as a rabbit, or so it seems. Big, fat hips with lots of seeds. I just have yet to get one to germinate!
Prominent produces a lot of defiled tone orange -- very muddy colors. It also brings mildew and prickles, and the seedlings didnt have the vigor I want.
I am currently using Marina onto roses resistant to the main North American strains of blackspot, as well as anthracnose. It will be a long road, but well worth the effort.
I wish I could have seen Hawaii, Tampico, Polynesian Sunset in person. Never have, oddly enough. I have seen more pre-1940s roses that then rare ones from the 60s and 70s.
I have all 3: PS, Hawaii, Tampico. Tampico is one of my favorites. They all do much better budded than own root so this year I have all maidens, 2 of each, all so far doing very well. Hit me up at the end of summer if you would be interested in some budwood.
