Taylor's Guide to Roses is an oldie but a goodie.
A compact, hefty book, Taylor’s Guide to Roses offers as much as many larger volumes. What’s more important, it includes several features that many similar resources lack. The volume reviewed here was published in 1961, but several subsequent editions are also available. This work is divided into 60 or so pages of text (beginning with a discussion of the American Rose Society), followed by color plates with basic details about many specific varieties, which are grouped into eight classes of roses. Early on, the guide helps us on “Getting Started.” When planning, for example, the guide not only reminds us to consider how established trees and their root systems will compete with rose bushes planted nearby, but it also suggests that we imagine how big young trees will grow before we situate our roses in areas where they will be unintentionally shaded in the future. Among the atypical information are diagrams of how to improve drainage and how to prune to increase bloom production, as well as instructions for planting miniatures. Hardiness, winter protection, and related considerations, which are merely mentioned by others, are discussed over several dense pages in Taylor’s Guide. For instance, the problem of winterizing roses planted in containers is solved by the guide’s suggestion to either bring them indoors or to bury the entire container in the ground and then protect the exposed bush as if it were actually planted in a flower bed. Two solutions are also offered to care for rose bushes in climates where winter freezes and occasional thaws are an issue: The more expensive option is to use foam cones to cover the canes. The less costly method is to use layers of newspaper to snuggly encircle rose bushes and then staple the pages together, so they stay in place. Another pair of pages provides a useful rose-gardening calendar – starting with Month 1, which is whenever rose gardening begins in the reader’s region. Almost six pages are dedicated to showing roses, including “special rules for clusters,” storing blossoms before the show, and grooming them on site. The next helpful section covers rose garden design, and opens with a lovely thought: “Many people consider a rose garden to be the ultimate garden, the way a diamond is the ultimate gem. Fortunately, it is an ultimate within reach—a jewel of a garden that can turn an ordinary yard into a pocket of old-fashioned grace, fragrance, and glowing color.” This section also covers garden styles and considerations like sun and exposure, and then it goes farther to discuss harmonious colors, garden shapes, and edgings. For example, the guidebook discusses where to place a rose garden and suggests that good air circulation (to ward off fungal diseases) is as important as 6 hours of sunlight. Among the color plates is a key to the range of rose shades, which is followed by separate sections on each variety, from species to minis. What’s unusual – and helpful – is that the roses are grouped according to their shade, so if you like the light apricot Medallion, you might also like Helen Traubel, which is similarly hued but is more winter hardy. The volume concludes with even more helpful and unusually detailed information, such as an encyclopedia (that has additional information about each class as well as the varieties previously pictured) and an appendix (that has advice for arranging roses among other topics and a glossary of relevant botanical terms). Taylor’s Guide to Roses (which is based on Taylor’s Encyclopedia of Gardening) is an old friend that is still most helpful today, as well as a good resource with unique information.
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Patti Dee, Archives
December 2018
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