Mini-Roses (Marketed as Kordana Rose)

Has anyone ever planted the mini-roses you can buy in grocery stores around Valentines day? My wife and I like to purchase living plants for each other instead of cut flowers so for Valentines day this year I bought her one of these mini-roses and some primroses for some fun spring color. I started to notice that what was sold as one mini-rose actually looked like 4 plants stuck together in order to make the pot look more full and have more flowers. So recently I carefully removed the soil and found that there were indeed 4 mini-roses in the pot. I separated and potted all four mini-roses each in their own much larger pot. So far they are all growing well and I'm planning on moving them outside in a little bit and then planting them later in the year once they have a chance to get a larger root base.

I'm curious how big they will get and what they will be like once fully established. If anyone has any experience with them I would be very interested in hearing about it.

Here is a picture of one of the four:

I had a friend who used to plant this in a garden bed surrounding her front porch. They all stayed pretty small until she replaced the whole bed with a pond. The planting bed was nearly full shade, so I'm interested in seeing how yours do. I've heard mini roses can grow into full sized bushes.

Thanks for the response! I'm planning on planting them next to a patio I'm going to build in the summer. My wife loves roses so we were already planning on planting some near the house. These roses are also special to us because I gave them to my wife the day our little boy was due (he was born 2 days later) so we call them our "Arden Roses" - named after him. If they get full size that would be great but even if they stay small that would be fine on our end.

Been over a year since I planted the four mini-roses in my front garden. Two are struggling but made it through the winter so I'm hoping they do better with time. But two of them are doing great despite some deer browse - they are going to flower soon!



This one has really grown tall this year and I'm excited for it to flower. It has gotten bigger than I expected so I might need to shift my walking path over a bit or just keep it pruned back from the trail. But it is great to see the rose doing well and I'm excited to see how it grows over the next few years.



This one has not gotten as tall as the other rose but is still doing great. It has a bunch of new growth and seems happy where it is - it got browsed fairly heavily last year by deer which could explain why it is more bushy.

The other two are small with yellowish leaves but one of them is getting new growth that looks healthier. But regardless I would say splitting the original Kordana Rose into four and then planting them has been successful. I'm happy with how it turned out and I hope the other two do better next year.

It looks like there is a large set of miniature roses with Kordana as part of their name: http://www.helpmefind.com/rose/plants.php?searchNmTyp=5&searchNm=kordana&rid=3986&sbSearch=SEARCH&tab=1

They all come from the German breeder Kordes whose speciality it is to grow very disease resistant, robust roses. They should do as well for you as any rose can even in conditions of benign neglect.

We have others from the Kordes family in our cottage style front garden. (bush Gebrueder Grimm up front, rambler-ish Flammentanz in the background)

I recently put a mini rose from the market in the ground--- after seeing that my mother did exactly the same with one she received, and it stayed alive for a year through the PA winter and deer attacks! I will be up there in a few weeks again to check for myself, but she says it is still going strong. I never ever would have guessed!

When I was active in our rosarian society I grew two beds of miniature roses (most of these are indeed Kordes bred).

I grew them for ten years without ever having one die, I also won 20 blue ribbons with my Kordes in shows.
The last time I went by the house, the rose beds are still going strong (35 years later).