FUTURA is an amazing rose... If you are into vintage modern roses/mid-century roses...this is the rose for you. Nice garden rose, excellent cut flower, and above average disease resistance. In Atlanta, this cultivar is a show-stopper! 4-5 ft tall and a heavy bloomer. If you spray, no blackspot problems what-so-ever. If you LOVE orange roses, this is a MUST have.
I may going down a rabbit hole I am so perplexed and so intrigued by Futura. Looking at the squat, square to ovid bud and feathery sepals there is just no way Tropicana is not involved. Those traits are slam dunk Tropicana and Warriner didn’t use a lot of esoteric stuff, he used Tropicana so it has to be part of the equation.
Anyone have any guesses as to what the unnamed seedling Mother might be here? The feathery sepal on the squat seems to indicate Tropicana blood in this one. As a parent, Futura seems to produce mostly pink/pinkish offspring which is really surprising to me so somehow something really aggressively pink exists in its genes. Something has to exist in the Mom line that counteracts the cluster habit suggested by the paternal genes as I have never in decades seen a cluster on Futura, not even atop a fat fall basal break.
Have recently bought most past American Rose Annuals off Amazon. LOVE reading those old Proof of Puddings (now called Roses in Review), amazing to see how once "hot" new varieties have fallen off the market, interesting to see how fashion dictates so much of how a rose variety is viewed............I love this rose, remember it well from the J&P catalog in the 70's..........it was too late to the red/orange frenzy back then, maybe too close to Tropicana........mine is a full sized bush, looks like a budded plant, is a 2 year old band.............extremely healthy, blooms a lot, has more foliage than Tropicana...........those old annuals, when Futura was in the PoP/RiR discussed how it "needs more petals." THAT I agree with. If this one had been handed like 8 more petals it would have been an exhibition delight.............
