UT Gardens' Plant of the Month:
The Perfect Rose

by Dr. Sue Hamilton

Looking for the perfect landscape rose? Try the new Knock Out® Rose bred by Chicago Botanic Garden Rosarian William Radler.

This rose has great clusters of 3.5-inch blooms that are fire-engine red. (In hot climates their color is more of a light cherry-scarlet.) The flowers begin blooming in April and continue for many weeks. The shrub then rests for a bit, and blooms again for the remainder of summer and well into fall. Knock Out® Rose has the longest bloom cycle in the rose family and will fill your garden with bright color and a subtle tea scent. When the blooming finally stops - following a hard, killing freeze - the plant continues to color your garden with burgundy-violet fall foliage. Plus, its winter fruit (orange-red hips) makes it an attractive shrub in the landscape in every season.

The Knock Out® Rose is exceptionally winter hardy (to -20°F).

Unlike other roses, Knock Out® Rose is essentially maintenance-free and needs only half a day of sunshine to thrive. It grows to a 3 foot x 3 foot shrub rose while sneering at drought, humidity, and pests such as Japanese beetles, leafhoppers, and rose midge. In fact, it is so pest tolerant that pesticides almost never need to be applied! As a bonus, it is the most blackspot-resistant rose ever grown. Despite its durable qualities, the Knock Out® Rose will appreciate pampering its first season or two.

Knock Out® was bred from a seedling of R. 'Carefree Beauty' x a seedling of R. 'Razzle Dazzle.' It has become so immensely popular since its introduction that new varieties are arising each season. You'll now find Knock Out® available in a red selection named 'Radrazz.' and in 'Pink' and 'Double'.

Knock Out ® was first introduced in 2000 and hailed a "breakthrough shrub rose" by the All-American Rose Selections because of its exceptional disease resistance and hardiness. It was one of three roses to win the prestigious AARS award for outstanding garden performance in 2000.

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Sue Hamilton is an associate professor of plant sciences in the University of Tennessee Department of Plant Sciences. She is also director of the UT Gardens, a project of the Tennessee Agricultural Experiment Station. The Gardens are located in Knoxville on Neyland Drive and in Jackson on Airways Blvd. Admission is free, and the Gardens are open to the public seven days a week during daylight hours.

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Contact:

Patricia McDaniels, UTIA Marketing and Communications, (865) 974-7141