Plant-A-Day 2020 (Day 168) Rose “Alister Stella Gray”

So many roses smell wonderful, but this climber tops them all in my estimation. I got a start of this plant at the Arboretum gift shop fifteen or so years ago and boy, did it ever grow! It has been blessing us with its floral show and fragrance every May/June and then a sporadic later show, as well.

The plant needs a hard chop in early spring to keep it in line. I neglected to do that this year. The flowers were amazing, but the canes are overtaking one of the dwarf cherries and heading over the roof!

I pruned the rose a bit today and will whack it back good next weekend to try to get it to resprout and rebloom later in the summer.