A Difficult Birth.

First Chapeau de Napoleon!, a photo by Leenechan on Flickr.

Chapeau de Napoleon has been suffering from our excessive rainfall more than the other roses. One of his buds has botrytis, and his first flower would have balled if I hadn't broken open the outer petals. The flowers are bigger and puffier than they were last year. I wonder how many of his flowers I'm going to have to help along? It's too bad, because there are so many of them. I hate to see them spoiled by fungus.

Big Red.

How big is Griff's Red?, a photo by Leenechan on Flickr.

I'm only including my gross and sickly-looking hand in here to show off how large the flowers are on Griff's Red this year.

I don't know if the photo captures it, but the flowers are velvety and really gorgeous. I've always been rather blah about this rose, and it's finally getting its revenge!