The rose addiction eventually leads one to test out types of roses which are less known. Those in mild climates can stay fully occupied for a lifetime with Teas, Chinas and Noisettes, but those of us in colder climates, of necessity, go in other directions. And so it is that my own explorations have led me on from the moderns to Hybrid Musks and Hybrid Perpetuals.

Miranda is one of the latter group. In spring of 2004, Gregg Lowery of Vintage Gardens enabled me into a list of HPs he felt might do well for me. Miranda was one of eight planted together that fall, in full exposed sun and wind. Only after planting did I learn that the HPs are reputed to need afternoon shade. While I cannot directly compare how these plants would do in such a site, I have other HPs which receive too much shade and they barely flower, while these exposed plantings do quite well. So much for the common wisdom, and is it any wonder that it takes years of experimentation to feel one knows anything much about growing roses well?

It also takes years, it seems, to understand the classification of roses. Miranda, while lumped into the HPs at Vintage, is also sometimes termed a Damask Perpetual. I gather that the connection to Damasks is felt to be more clear in HPs so termed. Given Miranda's unknown parentage, I am happy enough with the lumping. As with most roses, I feel that I know the plant only through growing it myself for a good number of years.

Miranda has been a good plant for me, attaining five feet by four in its third season in the ground, and producing plenty of its pleasing light pink blooms from late spring through half of summer. This season the HP plantings hopefully will 'feel the steel' as they are said to do best that way. If I am brave enough, Miranda will soon be cut back to a third of its present size, then half of the new shoots will later be cut again to half their length to try for a fall bloom.

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