Everything is Coming Up Roses

What do Dick Clark, Henry Fonda and Julia Child have in common? They all live in Virginia West’s garden.

Of course, we are talking about roses bearing their names and they are three of more than 140 rose plants West’s co-workers visited this weekend.

“They look magnificent,” said West, who has worked with County Mental Health Services for the past 28 years. “I wanted to share my love for roses.”

West brings roses to work every week, but decided to open her home and garden to co-workers at the Mission Valley facility. About two dozen people showed up.

“It’s been a tradition to have open gardens,” said West, referring to the motto of the San Diego Rose Society, which she joined a few years ago to learn more about roses.

West began cultivating roses 7 years ago. She started with a few plants that were in the front yard when she and her husband Mark moved into the house eight years ago.

She moved those roses to other parts of the house to make space for her collection of what she now calls Patriot Place, an area with roses named  4^th of July, Purple Heart, Firefighter and America, among many others.

To that she added Stars and Stripes, a space for roses bearing famous people’s names or multicolored roses such as Rock ‘n Roll, Berries ‘n Cream and Candy Land. Along a low-laying wood fence is her Easy Series, a group of 18 rose plants with names like Living Easy, Easy Does It and Easy Going.

Her collection kept growing and now includes an area for mini-rose plants. The hill in her back yard is also fully covered with rose plants in strategically-placed planters. At the very top of the hill is Altissimo, a tall bush that blooms a simple rose with just a few petals.

Why roses?

“They bloom 10 months out of the year and snails don’t like them,” said West, who can easily name all 148 roses in her garden.

She admits her hobby is “intense” and requires a lot of her time, but she loves it. On weekends she spends hour after hour fertilizing, trimming dead buds, and picking up petals.

“I enjoy being outside because when you are out, you get to meet your neighbors,” said West, whose rose garden is easily accessible to people walking by. “I just like to show it off.”

And her neighbors appreciate it.

“They’re so beautiful,” said a neighbor during her routine walk. “I smell them every day.”