Rockhounding Around: April 2012

Every year about this time I love to visit this place.

The Gardens of the American Rose Center - Home of the American Rose Society sign (4-27-12)

The home of the American Rose Society and their gardens. Here's the link http://www.ars.org/   .
It is one of the most of the prettiest places I've ever seen. I've written about it before (American-rose-society-home-garden   ) But its always changing and things are moved around so it well worth going back and seeing many times.
    Two weekends ago my son went there to help out a friend of his get engaged. The friend wanted it to be a total surprise for his soon to be fiance and he wanted to make is so they would never forget it. He planned it like it was a group of them just going to spend the day there by him inviting a bunch of his friends to come along so she wouldn't suspect anything. The friend asked my son to take pictures and so my son borrowed the camera. When he got home I had to help him with downloading some of it and of course I was curious as to whether the girl accepted or not.
   I was surprised to see how in full bloom everything was in his pictures. I realized I had to get there soon or else it would be a while before they would be looking so pretty again. I've been trying to get away with today finally being the day.

   What also made me want to go is twice I've had people find my blog by searching for the Shreveport Rose. I knew the Rose Society had a whole bed of them and was determine to get some pictures of them with the labels so they could see how they change colors with age.

A bed of Shreveport Roses @ Gardens of the American Rose Center

A sign about the Shreveport Rose

So here are some of them up close.

Shreveport Rose bush

Shreveport Rose

Shreveport Roses

Shreveport Rose bud

Shreveport Rose

Shreveport Rose bud

Shreveport Rose

One of the things that I find so fascinating about the Shreveport Rose is that when it first starts out its a peachy orange color (that's how they explained it to me at the center) then as it matures it turns more pink in color.

Shreveport Rose

It was so neat to see the different colors on the same bush.

Shreveport Rose

The Shreveport Rose is not the only rose they have there.
One of the things I really like about the place is most of the roses are labeled so you know what you are looking at.

Fragrant Cloud Rose

Heart of Gold Rose

Lavag??? Rose

Tiger Tail Rose

Hot Cocoa Rose

Dixieland Rose

Alabama Rose

Pretty Lady

The do have some interesting features to make it enjoyable while you are looking at the roses. Such as this

Bell tower that rings on the hour.

Windsounds Carillon Tower

Durham Japanese Teahouse

The Danielsen wishing well

Or this sculpture that I didn't notice its name except that it was a Memorial garden.

Archie & Edalee Brandt Memorial Garden

Archie & Edalee Brandt Memorial Garden, different view of the sculpture

Europeana Roses around Archie Edalee Brand Memorial Garden

Meditation garden

pathway to the chapel

The Hardtner Chapel

The Klima Event center

The Thigpen-Herold Administration building

Even the resting places were pretty, like this bench.

I must admit I do like seeing the flags blowing in the breeze while I was there.

There were other interesting things to see like how they train new beds to grow.

I really liked this one because you could see two different colored roses on the same bush.

Some of the beds were just so pretty like these.

One of the many beds in full bloom at the Gardens of the American Rose Cemter

And they had other things growing too. Like these Hollyhocks mixed in with the roses.

Hollyhocks growing in between a rose bush

and this Rosemary herb.

But not all of the roses were in bloom. That's the beauty of the place they have it so there is something blooming most of the time. I thought it was ironic that at the first bed that I saw of 'Love' it was not in bloom. And then I started to notice other beds not blooming such as 'Quiet Place', 'Strike it Rich', 'Desert Peace' and 'Secret'. I guess 'Secret' is just going have to be a secret to me for a little bit longer. Here's 'Strike it Rich' not in bloom - (ah - I wonder if its trying to tell me something. )

A row of Secret rose bushes with no Roses on them

I finally did see one 'Love' rose in bloom and just had to get its picture.

Love Rose at the Gardens of the American Rose Center

The one thing I noticed about the 'Love' rose was how thorny the stems were compared to other roses.

'Love' Rose stems

Finally -There were some roses named after famous people.
Here are just a few that turned out ok and I was able to download.

Marilyn Monroe Rose

Julia Child Rose

And some who must be famous but I don't know who they are - but at least they have a rose named after them so they must have something going for them. Like this Gene Boerner rose.