Everyone loves roses, but it’s easier to love them than to understand their classification!
And so when the beginning rose fancier sets out to choose plants for their garden, they likely will run into considerable confusion.
The purpose of the “old graphics” below is to distinguish the more popular types of roses, list some of their plant heights and planting distances, and share how each type may be used in the garden.
Hybrid Tea
Plant in a rose garden, plant with perennials and in small beds. Plant hybrid teas near garden features and important points of the home.
Floribunda
Plant with evergreens and for color accent in borders. Plant floribunda roses as hedges and mass plantings also adds to the rose garden.
Climbing Roses
Plant for general screening or color accent near buildings or other features. Plant around pillars or growing over walls and fences.
Tree Roses
Plant as specimens and accent paths in the rose garden. Height adds a third dimension to rose and perennial beds.
Shrub Rose
Specimen plants can be pruned to specific shapes and sizes. Massed as a group or mixed with other herbaceous shrubs.
Besides the five types illustrated, others are often found in rose catalogs and gardening literature.
As might be expected, the distinctions are not always hard-and-fast, and different types often overlap.
Popular Rose Types
Hybrid Perpetual
Similar in appearance to the hybrid teas are the hybrid perpetual. The growth of these roses, however, is more vigorous, they’re somewhat hardier, and their blooming habits differ.
The hybrid perpetual makes a grand display in June and July but bears few flowers during the rest of the season.
The hybrid tea blooms more consistently from June till frost.
Climbing Roses
“Climbing” roses are often divided into 3 or even 4 separate classes:
- Climbers
- Ramblers
- Pillars
- Trailers (or creepers)
But it’s difficult to decide just where one class ends and another begins.
Floribundas
Floribundas are of comparatively recent origin and represent an improved, slightly less hardy form of the polyantha or cluster-flowered type of rose.
Although the distinction is not precise, “floribunda” refers to the larger-flowered and “polyantha” to the smaller-flowered varieties.
44659 by Fred Morley