''Rosa'' 'English Miss' is a Floribunda

rose A rose is either a woody perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred species and tens of thousands of cultivars. They form a group of plants that can be ...

bred by Roger Pawsey of Cants of

Colchester Colchester ( ) is a city in Essex, in the East of England. It had a population of 122,000 in 2011. The demonym is Colcestrian. Colchester occupies the site of Camulodunum, the first major city in Roman Britain and its first capital. Colch ...

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and Grea ...

in 1977. The cultivar was introduced into Great Britain in 1979. The plant is a compact, bushy shrub with light pink camellia-like flowers. It is disease resistant and blooms continuously from June to mid-October.

History

Cants of Colchester Cants of Colchester is the oldest firm of commercial rose growers in Britain. The company was established as a general nursery by Benjamin Cant in 1765, in the town of Colchester, Essex. The family nursery initiated a rose breeding program in 187 ...

is the oldest firm of commercial rose growers in Great Britain. The company was founded by Benjamin Cant in 1765 under the name, 'Benjamin R. Cant & Sons' and was located in

Mile End Mile End is a district of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets in the East End of London, England, east-northeast of Charing Cross. Situated on the London-to-Colchester road, it was one of the earliest suburbs of London. It became part of the m ...

, now a northern suburb of Colchester. The nursery originally sold a variety of plants, seeds, bulbs and trees. With the rise in popularity of roses in the mid-1800s, Benjamin R. Cant (1827-1900), initiated a rose breeding program at the company in 1875. By 1880, Cant had become an award-winning rose exhibitor in England. Cant's nephew, Frank Cant (1857-1928), split from the family firm and established his own nursery in Colchester in the early 1880s. The two Cant families became fierce competitors. The rivalry between the two nurseries lasted until the 1960s, when their descendants decided to merge the two family businesses into one company. The 'Benjamin R Cant & Sons' of Mile End Colchester and 'Frank Cant & Company' of Stanway, Essex became the 'Cants of Colchester' under the leadership of Cant family descendant, Roger Pawsey. Cants of Colchester has introduced several popular rose varieties, including ''Rosa'' 'Just Joey', ''Rosa'' 'Alpine Sunset' and ''Rosa'' 'Goldstar'. Pawsey developed the new rose variety, 'English Miss' in 1977. The rose was named in honour of Pawsey's three-year-old daughter Sally-Anne. It was introduced into Britain in 1979. The cultivar is a hybrid of ''Rosa'' 'Dearest' and ''Rosa'' 'The Optimist'. 'English Miss' was used to hybridize two child plants: ''Rosa'' 'Colchester Beauty', (Pawsey, before 1992) and ''Rosa'' 'Our Beth' (Beales, before 2006).

Description

'English Miss' is a compact bushy shrub, 2 to 3 ft (60–91 cm) in height, with a 2 to 3 ft spread (60–91 cm). Blooms are large, 4 inch (10 cm), with 24 or more petals, Flowers are double in form,

camellia ''Camellia'' (pronounced or ) is a genus of flowering plants in the family Theaceae. They are found in eastern and southern Asia, from the Himalayas east to Japan and Indonesia. There are more than 220 described species, with some controv ...

-like and emit a strong and sweet fragrance with a spicy undertone. They are often borne in large clusters in the traditional floribunda style. 'English Miss' is pale pink in colour, often with darker pink edges. The plant blooms repeatedly, starting from June and progressing through to mid-October. Foliage is purple to dark green and leathery. Flowers do extremely well in rainy weather. 'English Miss' can tolerate exposed conditions and has good disease resistance, especially against the common rose disease black spot.

References

{{Rose, state=collapsed English Miss 1977 introductions