Angel Wings

Angel Wings is unusual among roses in that it is grown from seed rather than propagated from cuttings or budded, and it is one of the few rose selections that gives a reasonably predictable result that way. Sold as a miniature China or fairy rose, it flowers within roughly three to four months of sowing, which means a packet started in late winter can bloom the same season — behaviour more like a bedding annual than a shrub rose. Blooms come as a mixture of single, semi-double and fully double forms about 2 inches across, in shades running from white through rose-pink, carried in clusters on a low mounded plant. Because seedlings are individuals rather than clones, growers on the Rose Hybridizers Association forum report real variation between plants: colour from white to medium pink deepening with age, roughly half the seedlings coming up completely thornless, and habit ranging from tidy mounds to noticeably lanky. That variability is the trade-off for being able to raise a rose hedge from a seed packet.