Species, Wild Rose, Common Sweet Briar, Double White Hip

We planted this rose about 15 years ago. Own-root, Zone 5. Been humongous for many years. Part of a literary thing, it's mentioned in Sha...Read Morekespeare and in Jane Eyre. Maintenance consists of annual pruning and feeding every few years with iron granules and M-Gro (It's under an overhang so it's a dry spot) and deep watering a few times every summer. It gets some blackspot on the lower five feet or so and needs pruning very year because the lower and sometimes interior branches die off. Its major attraction, for us, is the wonderful scent that the leaves give off after a rain, or when it's really humid out, because it pervades the area for a good 20 feet or so with a strong apple aroma. Memorably nice to pass by or sit nearby at those times.

I have this plant growing on my fence. Very tough conditions, a commercial back-lane with many diesel trucks going through every day. Ful...Read Morel sun, though, straight South. My eglanteria rewards me every year with hundreds of flowers, followed by pounds of hips of super quality. I obtained it by buying seeds from Richter's Herbs, but have grown seedlings for friends over the years. It breeds true with no unwanted variants, but every new generation seems to attract the same kind of parasitic ant (?) which makes green fuzzballs instead of a few of the potential flowers. They could at first appear to have decorative potential as dried 'flowers', but I am still working on a way to preserve them as green and fuzzy, for when the 'babies' break out, they leave brownish husks that merely look ratty.

Keep this plant under control by training and pruning. It is a heavy-duty rose and to keep it beautiful, you need to do judicious work every spring and fall.