Roses from seed

I have been asked several times now how I grew my roses from rose hips. It's actually rather simple and the resulting blooms are unexpected, magical and have very unique features.

Autumn and Winter are a good time to collect the rose hips from the bushes, perhaps heading for the healthy old species roses is better for success (also the hybrids often have controls on breeding them). I have collected rose hips from prickly rugosas, old fashioned teas, gallicas, and old dog roses ....  each baby plant from the seeds within just one rose hip are as unique and individual as any family of children in their leaves, thorns, blooms and growing habit. I can sometimes trace their lineage to a rose growing nearby that the bee had visited (yes I'm not scientific in my methods!) and yet other times I have collected seeds from a deep red rose and resulted in a pure white bloom amoungst its offspring that may have come from it's historical breeding lineage.

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