That last photo- oh my gosh. Those roses are spectacular without any blooms at all. You must return when they are blooming. Please.
Renee

Fabulous!!! Puts the pouting prima donnas to shame ;)

I had to laugh- that right there is a Before and After set good enough for an informercial!

Renee I can't wait to see the in-bloom pictures. (And didn't they pick a lovely setting? It looks like a wonderful park.)

Thank you for the tour, looks like a great place to visit.

Wonderful to see your commentaries on roses, Nick! Frontenac is fabulous!Soooo cool to see an Earthkind rose garden, and hurray for Chamblees support of them. Nick, yes, like Renee I'm absolutely looking forward to the flowers emerging!

Wonderful study on the before and after in terms of size and vigor!

I'm also looking forward to the roses you've planted for your Mom as well. Let's keep our fingers your parents will finally listen to you, and that the roses will finally get to bloom instead of being hacked or interfered with! We are looking forward to the blooming, Nick :D

Haha I hope so Serena. It looks as if Mary Magdalene or Abraham Darby will be the first bloomers this year. Paul Neyron would have bloomed first if *cough* somebody wouldn't have damaged the buds. At any rate, the roses are doing much better this year, especially the ones against the garage. I am a bit surprised at how varied they are in bloom period, although I pruned quite a few of them differently. I will post pics of it as they come out. I actually am planting some short and large larkspur, silene pendula, cherry brandy rudbeckia, liatris, plumbago, monarda, and some HF Young, Dr. Ruppel, and Sweet Autumn clematis tomorrow, so more to add and I have to move the artemesia and coreopsis as I VASTLY underestimated the size of the nepeta that I planted next to Evelyn last year...a perfect color combination for Evelyn by the way..

I'm going to try to get some pictures of the Earth Kind Garden in full bloom but it's going to be tough since I'm not in Columbus yet. :( I'm heading back in the middle of May so I can get pictures then, but hard telling what it will be like then...blooming for sure, but I'd like to catch Frontenac at it's peak...Frontenac will probably put on an enormous explosion of color.

Nick, yeah, same here in Kansas how each rose insists on doing their own thing. Sometimes I swear they have their own psychology. People always talk about waving their shovel as threats and the roses "suddenly" shape up. When I had Fragrant Cloud for example, I would always brag about Lincoln and its GORGEOUS COLOR! and FC would try so hard to have these deep red blooms instead of scarlet-orange like it's supposed to have. Lincoln right now is having machismo pride against Folklore. Usually Lincoln always is the first HT to bloom, but right now Folklore beat it and it's doing its male stubborness about wanting its own separate show...Nick, I specifically color coordinated the gorgeous deep florist red of L. to go with the candy-reverse sherbert orange/golden yellow reverse of F. to go together, but just like you say, they keep varying in bloom period. One gets spent, then the other rose starts up....

Nick one thing strange, I found out that I cannot keep large perennials alive once I transplant them, but NEVER EVER! have I had a rose go into transplant shock....I've had pretty old roses like Penny Lane that I've transplanted. You see I have too much energy spent on roses and can't have any time to care for transplanted large perennials save for watering every other day. Nick one of the problems is that I handwater EVERYTHING! and here we are having global warming to the MAX. Baby perennials do fine but not the big ones.

Anyway, your plantings also sound gorgeous Nick! We are looking forward to seeing them in their splendor! I can just imagine the blanket of beautiful purples, lavender, and mauve going....

Great pictures. I really enjoyed seeing them.
Suebelle

Thanks for the great tour, Jeff! Please go back later in the season too. I want to see them in bloom!