Area 6 – Notes.

Several of the varieties here are not formal doubles and I wonder how they came to be included. There is also a surfeit of formal double pinks that all look pretty much the same.

‘April Rose’ is a recent variety that if this is correct, looks old fashioned. The description is “rose red formal double”

‘Arciduchessa Augusta’ is a variety that in the right conditions turns purplish, normally it is a dark red.

‘Duc de Bretagne’ is described as “vivid rose” or “cherry red”, blotched and striped white. I suspect this is wrong.

‘Elisabeth’ is white and doesn’t require the “white form” part of the name. It produces the odd fleck of pink on some flowers.

‘Fanny Bolis’. The register description is “flesh white, striped and spotted red”, so this is incorrect. The name ‘Fanny Bolis’ has been applied to ‘Latifolia’ which is what this looks like. The plant is unlabelled, I am going by its location on the map. The label turned up on the bush of ‘Eleanor Hagood’, along with its own label.

‘La Pace’ and ‘La Pace Rubra’ appear to be identical and since ‘La Pace’ should have red stripes on a white or pale pink ground, they would appear to both be ‘La Pace Rubra’

‘Madame de Strekaloff’ is described as pale pink with white stripes, with a rather complicated description of the flower shape. It may be correct.

‘Pink Perfection’ is a synonym for ‘Otome’, a name that as been used for a number of varieties. The plants under this name at 3-024 and 5B-022 are much paler.

‘Polyanna’. This should have formal double flowers with 70 petals. I think it may be under-performing due to being  small plant amongst huge old ones so getting far too little light.

‘Sea Foam’. The register lists a japonica ‘Sea Foam’ and a x williamsii ‘Sea Foam’. The former is an American raised formal double, the latter an English semi-double. From its leaf this looks like a japonica but the flower form is wrong for it to be ‘Sea Foam’.
‘Sea Foam’ is marked on the oldest map I have seen, but on a more recent one seems to have been replaced by ‘Roza Harrison’. There is a plant of ‘Roza Harrison’ in Area 2 which is similar but not the same.

‘Ville de Nantes’ is a white blotched virus variegated variety and this appears to be the pure red ‘Ville de Nantes Red’. In 2015 it had a shoot coming out low down with red flowers the petals of which were neither fimbriated or twisted. I need to establish whether it is still there and whether it is a separate plant or a branch sport.