Product Description

In one engagingly written, frankly opinionated, lavishly illustrated volume, America's leading authority on roses reveals everything the gardener needs to know about the most popular of all garden plants: from how to grow and maintain them to critical information for the most experienced gardener on such essentials as harvesting, propagating, grafting, and breeding new varieties.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #868032 in Books
• Published on: 1998-11-01
• Format: Bargain Price
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 252 pages

Review
'The Rose Bible,' by Rayford Clayton Reddell, is full of spectacular color photographs and easy-to-understand descriptions that will convince even the most skeptical gardener to plant roses despite their reputation as high-maintenance plants...With a light hearted and down to earth style, Reddell even delves into the classification of rose varieties and the heated disputes that occurred when modern hybrids were being churned out in force to the chagrin of traditional-minded rosarians. -- The Indianapolis Star

From the Inside Flap
In one engagingly written, frankly opinionated, lavishly illustrated volume, America's leading authority on roses reveals everything the gardener needs to know about the most popular of all garden plants: from how to grow and maintain them to critical information for the most experienced gardener on such essentials as harvesting, propagating, grafting, and breeding new varieties.

About the Author
Rayford Clayton Reddell owns a nine-acre ranch in Petaluma, California, planted with over 8,000 rose bushes. An expert on roses, he is a garden columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle as well as a regular contributor to Horticulture magazine. Ray's previ

Robert Galyean to whom this book is dedicated, was the foreman of Garden Valley Ranch until his death.

Martha Stewart who wrote her foreword after visiting Ray's awe-inspiring nine-acre ranch planted with over 8,000 rose bushes.

Customer Reviews

Absolutely great for Pacific Northwest rosarians!
This was my first rose related book and it was absolutely magnificent. An all-over great experience. To me it seems mostly useful only if you are in the Pacific Northwestern area or a place where the climate is similar to Reddell's (N. California). If you're looking for a book that covers that area, you can't get any better than this. The book was fat with knowledge and had tons of gorgeous pictures which are always a plus. He catalogues his favorite 50 roses with a page each to their honor. Most priceless was his refreshing honesty with his opinions of roses. He wasn't afraid to show favorites or non-favorites and came right out and said what his experiences were with actually growing in this climate. I absolutely recommend this book to any new beginner in the Pacific Northwest, it covers all the bases.

A good gift book at this price!
Martha Stewart says it's full of inspired wisdom and knowledge- I wonder if she read it! The pictures are good- but much of the information is found in many other rose books I have in my library.

I could part with this book and never miss it- but then again I have a good size collection of Gardening and Landscape books. I suspect that the average person who loves roses would truly enjoy this, especially if it was the first rose book in the collection.

Some of the photographs would make great study photos for an art teacher to use to help her students study the structure of these flowers for drawing and painting.

Many different types of roses are covered, but only limited information on each is given. This book forms an overview of roses- with beatifull color photographs.

I am glued to this book! Help!
"The Rose Bible" is the best and most helpful book on roses I've ever browsed or read. The pictures are magnificient, the language is informative, honest, and humorous, and the history of roses is explained very well. There is a slight bias towards cutting as opposed to garden roses in the top fifty list, but the contents and organization are nearly flawless. No potpourri tips here! If you want to know where roses came from, what is available now (with strong and weak points for each), how to buy, feed, prune, protect roses, and if you don't mind drooling over hundreds of rose pictures in the most undignified fashion, this is the book you want.