Roses are Red – We Look at the Best
A long time favorite is the red rose, beautiful in the garden, lovely as a cut flower and of course the symbol of romance. What would Valentines day be without Red Roses? (just a box of chocolates) But what are the best varieties ? What are the names of the best to grow in the garden and which roses have the darkest flowers?
The best red varieties depend a lot on if you looking for, flowers to grow for the home garden, and are concerned with cut flowers or not.
Best Red Rose Varieties
For the home garden one of the best red roses is Mr Lincoln, the flowers are a very dark, perfumed and with long stems it is great for cut flowers as well. It’s disease resistant, and has nice shaped flowers.
Available as a climbing rose as well. This rose has been around since 1964, Bred in the USA and named after President Lincoln.
Or you might try something a little more ‘old fashioned’ maybe Tess of the d’Urbervilles, a lighter color but still a beautiful rose. See picture below. Other names worth looking for include :
- Papa Meilland, certainly right up their as well, wonderful perfume, and the young buds are well shaped.
- Camp David Strong growing, good perfume, very attractive flowers and good disease resistance.
- Ruby with its bright red petals splashed with a deep crimson is another excellent red rose, easy to grow , hardy and ‘a little different’. Sir Donald Bradman with its large rounded flowers is another.
- Cathedral City is a floribunda type, more of an orange red, but excellent.
- The rosy red flowers of Baronne de Rothschildhave wonderful perfume, this one is a Hybrid Tea Rose.
- Fire Fighter is a wonderful long stemmed rose with a good perfume.
- Ingrid Bergman with its velvety red flowers has been inducted into the ‘Rose Hall of Fame’
- Looking for something a little deeper in color, the‘Black Baccara’ is the rose for you, not as long stemmed as Mr Lincoln but a lovely deep color.
Loving Memory is a favourite red rose and even looks great in the rain
Thornless Red Roses
What about thornless varieties:
- Smooth Ruby Red
- Smooth Velvet
- Smooth Prince
Other Red Roses to Consider
Kardinal, Dublin Bay, Highdownensis (wonderful hips), Louis XIV (dark red) and Reine De Violettes are others to consider.
Altissimo would make a good climbing rose and Chateau de clos vouget with its low habit a good round cover.
Royal Bassino is a very attractive red flowering ground cover type rose, excellent for mass planting.
Dortmund is an old fashioned climbing rose, not to vigorous and bright red flowers.
If you were looking for a Miniature Red Rose you could try Figurine
As for the ones you buy as cut flowers, Samurai, Adrenalin and Tamingo Follies, or as a spray rose maybe Sante Rose, all great red roses, but these are not generally available for sale to the public.
Commercially grown types are often highly bred to produce long stems, not always as disease resistant and hardy as garden varieties and generally not readily available for sale.