Ok. That's it. I am done with roses.
It must be something about me, or something about the micro-climate of my garden, but I can't keep roses going to save my life.
Black spot seems to arrive with the plant labels, and no amount of spraying (with organics, mind you) can keep their leaves from yellowing, browning and defoliating right in front of my eyes.
And the aphids and beetles have their field day, too, despite my attempts to control them with ladybugs and sticky strips.
The best luck I had with roses was with a robust climber that seemed to like it in the corner of my yard on my picket fence.
But my husband was right when he called that climber "a live fire exercise," and when they scraped the eye of a little girl walking by, I took them out.
The not-really-thornless-despite-the-advertising variety that I replaced them barely survives.
Oh sure. I have a Knock Out rose. Anybody can grow those. But their blooms are small and they aren't fragrant so their health comes at an aesthetic cost.
And I tried a small potted rose, and placed it where it would get plenty of sun and ventilation. And the tea rose near my deck produces fragrant, white blooms - on canes with hardly a leaf left.
Adrian Higgins of The Washington Post wrote a defense of roses and how to grow them without chemicals, and he named a number of healthy varieties. He reports that breeding has been successful at producing roses that can handle our humidity, and in lengthening bloom cycles.
It was almost enough to suck me back in.
But not quite.