Magazine (2013) Page(s) 39. Vol 35, No. 2. Includes photo(s).
Patricia Routley: Rose Marsh
About 30 or 40 years ago, some bright spark bundled up packages of rose seeds and sold them through supermarkets. They were seeds from the low-growing R. multiflora nana [or R. multiflora nana perpétuelle?] that was a single, prolific and repeating polyantha from 1891. Most of the seeds grew for the purchasers and the results made wonderful garden plants. Over the years and around the world, some of the names of these rose seeds have been ‘Seedling Fairy’, ‘Angel Wings’, ‘Angel Roses’, ‘Little Angel’, and ‘Little Kiss’ roses. I suspect that I have a few of these seedlings in my garden and that “Bernice Mitchell’s Rose” and ‘Tarrawarra’ are just two of them. Meryl Constance has just sent me cuttings of a seedling fairy her mother, Molly, grew from seed in about 1973. She has named it ‘Molly’s Rose’ and in just 21 days the cuttings are showing roots. Another one is a rose I got from Rose Marsh, Kojonup, WA in 1999. It was covered in blooms when I saw it flowering by her tiny stream and I begged a cutting. Rose told me that she had grown it from a packet of rose seed purchased in the late 1970’s or early 1980’s. As it didn’t actually have a name, I put it into my garden records book as “Rose Marsh’s Seedling Fairy Rose” which, although being a mouthful, was a fairly good name as it told one all about the rose – where it came from and what it was like. Like ‘Tarrawarra’ and “Bernice Mitchell’s Rose” (about which I have never been able to find anything at all, apart from being found in a garden on the Upper Murray in NSW), my rose has been an outstanding garden plant. I am quite sure that if I were an assiduous dead-header, it would repay and be a constant flowerer, despite the fact that it is now growing in semi-shade. It has grown to be 1.5m high and seems to be growing taller as the years go by; it doesn’t sucker, although the bush puts up more and more canes with age and just gets thicker - like all of us! It does get a smidgen of black spot here in Northcliffe, which does not detract one iota. The one thing against these little seedling fairy roses is that they are prickly. Now I know why the Victorian garden where I first saw ‘Tarrawarra’ had made the row of bushes into a hedge. One just got the shears out and clipped off the main excess, pulled out the detritus with a strong rake and then it was safe to get into the centre to deal with any dead wood. It has been such a good little rose that I shared it with two local nurseries: Natalee Kuser at Aunt Myrtle’s Garden Nursery in Bridgetown, and Seamus Johnston at Mostly Roses, south of Donnybrook. I know Natalee spread it around and a memorable Heritage Roses day was at Mick and Jenny Dewing’s garden when the rose was in full bloom – and Rose Marsh had travelled over to attend. Seamus just recently was asking me the history of the rose as he too, thinks it is a wonderful plant. In 2006 when the Busselton conference delegates visited here on the post-conference tour, co-incidentally Gregg Lowery was standing almost next to the rose when Rose Marsh arrived and I introduced them, at the same time pointing out the rose. “Why don’t you name it after her?” Gregg asked as he posed Rose against rose for a photo. Well, it wasn’t really up to me. It was Rose’s seedling and so it stayed in my records book as ‘Rose Marsh’s Seedling Fairy Rose’. However, I think by now, it is time to drop my mouthful of a name and take Gregg’s advice and honour the founder of the West Australian branch of Heritage Roses (In 1991, Rose Marsh was made a Life Member of HRIAI– Ed.) by officially naming this pretty little rose ‘Rose Marsh’. This is a fairly big step as a person only has one name and it is not a thing to be given away willy nilly or bandied about as if you have a few spare names to fall back on, just in case the rose is a dud. And you want to reserve your name for a pretty good thing anyway. It is no good having someone say of you, years later, things like: “She rusts”, “no good in a bed” or “good for a golf course where the continuous crop of balls would be handy”. This little rose does none of those things. I think it is extremely healthy, and so floriferous that sometimes you can hardly see the leaves, and it is very feminine. I have conferred with Rose Marsh and she agrees that it is a fine plant to bear her one and only name, even though she/it can be a bit prickly at times (she writes, grinning). So I have taken the liberty of naming this little seedling fairy rose ‘Rose Marsh’ and putting it, on to HelpMeFind.com.roses. For those who received cuttings in the past, I have also put in the synonym of ‘Rose Marsh’s Seedling Fairy Rose’. As for the bred date, Rose said she grew the seeds in the late 1970’s or early 1980’s, and so I think the date that Heritage Roses started in Australia would be most appropriate for the birth of ‘Rose Marsh’. We’ll make it 1979.
