I have recently returned home from a week of vacation. During that one week, I missed the entire blooming season of my beloved peonies, and my roses bloomed.

These “Knock Out” roses are new to me. I placed them last fall in a sunny spot – a few varieties in several places around my garden. In my previous country garden I had planted only hardy “Explorer” and “Sidewalk” roses. My new garden is a zone 5 or 6, – warmer than my windswept zone 4 to 5 garden. The Knockout roses are a variety of roses which are meant to be easier to care for, hardy to zone 5, tolerant of heat, and long and repeat bloomers. They should be self cleaning, meaning you shouldn’t have to deadhead to achieve more blooms.

Now I planted 6 of these roses last year in June, and I can say that only 3 have survived. While they may be easy care, they require some care, and I believe it’s just that they didn’t get a chance to get a good root system developed. Some of my roses are on a slope, and I believe the soil has eroded. I believe my Goldendoodle has also visited them a bit too frequently too. The roses in the picture have been scorched, which tells me that they have received too much sun, or insufficient water. It might be tempting to trim away the scorched leaves, they are still providing some shelter to the rest of the plant during this hot weather, so I think I will refrain from trimming until the heat subsides a bit.

The “gift” from the title is the bellflower which has seeded itself next to the rose, and is leaning on the rose for support.

Not everything in a garden that turns out well is planned.