Rose shows aren't for the feint hearted. Selecting varieties that are winners, growing healthy, robust plants, cutting the perfect blooms with clean foliage, arranging them artfully and presenting them for judging. Phew, enough to make my nerves bad for a new C grade have-a-goer. Not to mention putting the right rose in the correct category or getting up at dawn to `bench up` on time.
But this wasn`t just another regional show, this was the BIG ONE. Members from Australia wide were invited to participate in the 2013 Australian Rose Championship. And so they came.
Serious competitors came by plane, train and automobile.
Carefully packing their fragile blooms in foam boxes, eskys and all sorts of containers packed with ice, they travelled with the hope of attaining a Championship ribbon - proof that they are the master of growing and showing the perfect rose!
Of course the weather went and spoilt all of my carefully grown and groomed roses just in time for me to have nothing to show - 40 degree temps with gale force winds will do that!
So I helped with the show, was a steward for the judging and gnashed my teeth at all my rotten luck.
Well, there`s always next year, so they tell me. There was one saving grace for the day though - I won the photo competition!! This is my winner - can you work out how I did it?
OK, I`ll tell - the rose was submerged in a vase in a pond .Then I chucked a handful of petals on the water. The clouds are a reflection of the sky.
So now I`m pruning, feeding and watering in hopes that I will eventually grow
THE PERFECT ROSE
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