This is a first year (1999) seedling, Hansa X
(Therese Bugnet granddaughter). The picture was taken September 3, 1999. Hansa
is a very interesting mother. Many of her open pollinated seedlings have very little
rugosa character. This suggests that she is self sterile and supports the suggestion
that she is not a hybrid but a sport of R. rugosa since diploid species are normally self
sterile. Percy M. Wright of Wilkie, Saskatchewan wrote in The American Rose
Annual, volume
21, pages 41-42, (1936) the following:
"The female parent of my crosses was the Rugosa variety
Hansa. This is probably not a hybrid at all, as reported, but a pure strain of Rugosa,
related to Rugosa as the double-flowering strain of R. blanda, known as Mrs. Mina Lindell,
is related to Blanda. The ordinary Rugosa dies to within a few inches of the ground in
most winters, but Hansa is so much hardier that in my plantation it has lost but a little
of the greenest wood in ten years. It has thirty-nine petals, and is that miracle, an
everblooming hardy rose. The color is a violet-red."