What is the difference between a shrub rose and a grandiflora rose or a floribunda rose?

Crossing polyanthas with hybrid teas produced the floribunda class. These roses are shorter than the average hybrid tea and produce blooms in clusters. The grandifloras are crosses between hybrid teas and floribundas. Most of them resemble tall floribundas with high-centered blooms. Shrub is a "catch-all" term for roses that don't fit into any other category, such as David Austin's roses, the Meilland and Kordes landscape roses, and the hybrid rugosas.

A shrub rose looks shrubby. They usually have "single" roses (roses with 5 petals) (I think) and are usually shorter plants. A grandiflora rose has blooms that are usually a single bloom to a cane and are tall & leggy. Think of a florist rose. A floribunda has LOTS of blooms on a single cane, kinda like an instant bouquet.

Grandiflora - "Octoberfest"

Floribunda - "RedGold"

Shrub - "Kordes Brillant"

Of course I could be 100% wrong with all of this, too. But that's how *I* remember them.

Grandifloras actually bloom in small clusters of 3-5 blooms. Roses with one bloom per stem, such as florists roses, usually are hybrid teas.

Shrub roses can be short because the class includes patio roses that are too big to be classified as miniatures, but many are quite tall (the Meilland and Kordes landscape roses, the David Austin roses, and the roses produced by Clements, Buck, and Shoup in this country). Petal count varies in the shrub class. Some are single roses, but others, such as the Austin roses, can have up to 100 petals.

Speaking ONLY for myself, here's how I remember it:
The hybrid teas are the ones that are mostly dead in the spring.
The floribundas are the ones that have too many green canes for me to prune.
Grandifloras have one big tall thick stick in the spring. Might or might not be green.
Shrub roses are the ones I don't prune, that I can plant anywhere in the yard, that hardly ever spring a Dr. Huey shoot, and stay clean of disease without any action on my part.

I would say your rule of thumb for rose classification would apply quite well here too.

OK so shrub roses it is for me LOL Thanks for the clarification!

The shrub class can get confusing. For example the Buck rose Honey Sweet, my favorite rose is classified as a shrub, but has single hybrid tea type blooms. I wish that I could grow hybrid tea roses as hardy and disease resistant as Honey Sweet.

Another thing that I wished that I knew when starting to grow roses - miniature roses have tiny leaves and flowers. Many of them are also tiny plants. Some, however, can get really tall but still have tiny leaves and flowers. Best to do research. Also, many of the grocery store minis are very hardy. I have some that survived for years in my garden and are still alive!

Another think that I learned the hard way, rugosa roses HATE being sprayed. They are happiest fending for themselves away from their fussy, well fed cousins.

Frillylily said:What is the difference between a shrub rose and a grandiflora rose or a floribunda rose?

A floribunda is a rose that bears blooms in bunches on a moderate sized bush. It is a cross between a hybrid tea and a polyantha. A grandiflora tends to be a tall plant resulting from a cross of floribunda and hybrid tea. Shrub roses are a mixed lot that are generally tough landscape roses of various lineages.

GardenQuilts said:
Another thing that I wished that I knew when starting to grow roses - miniature roses have tiny leaves and flowers. Many of them are also tiny plants. Some, however, can get really tall but still have tiny leaves and flowers.

While technically true, I feel you may have gone a bit far in the opposite direction. The leaves and flowers are smaller yes but the range is significant. I mean I have a moon river (or Gra's Blue...have both, very similar just slightly different colour and very different scent) next to Friesia (aka sun sprite) the difference in size is not that significant, blooms about 3/4 the size, plant height close to a meter, leaves by no means tiny.

On the other hand if I compared it to Rise N Shine then the blooms and leaves are around half the size of Friesia.

There are really tiny minatures out there but they aren't the norm. Most of my rose garden is minatures (and a few hybrid tea's and floribunda) and most are close to 2 foot tall with blooms around half the size of floribunda....but often many more blooms happening at the same time.

What type of rose is Gold Medal?

The database says it is a grandiflora.

'Gold Medal' is one of two roses that, to me, are precisely what the class calls for. Tall, somewhat bushy, with masses of bloom, often in clusters.

But the choice of classification for a rose has, historically, been made by the introducer . . . And in some cases, their choice is based upon marketing more than upon horticulture. 'Love', 'Honor', and 'Cherish' are a really good example of that.

Love (Warriner, 1977) is a Grandiflora
Honor (Warriner, 1976) is a Hybrid Tea, but it is cluster-flowering, and probably could have been a Tall Floribunda or a Grandiflora
Cherish (Warriner (United States, bef. 1977) is a Floribunda bred from Floribundas

'Love', 'Honor', and 'Cherish' . . . A marketing executive's dream.

This is what was sold as a mini rose at Krogers. . It's over two feet tall and the blooms look similar to hybrid teas.


Obviously not a mini, I'm thinking shrub?

Those grocery store "minis" are only that because they are very newly rooted cuttings that haven't had time to mature. So the blooms are fairly small. Now some of them are actually mini roses but not all of them. And you have to remember that the term miniature only refers to the size of the leaves and blooms, not the size of the plant. There climbing minis that can get 12 ft. tall. Once you plant those grocery store minis outside in the ground and give them a couple of years to mature then you can really see exactly what you've got.

There are MANY classes of roses besides HTs, Grandifloras, Floribundas and shrubs. These are only the more known ones and the most available at local stores. I think Zuzu's descriptions of them is right on. And Jeri's information about who makes that determination too. I had Love, Honor and Cherish all together at one time (J&P sold them as a set) and for my money they all should have been classed as Grandifloras.

Right on, Seil! If you look closely at the leaves in. my pic you can see that they're as large as hybrid teas. Definitely a case of mistaken ID on the plant when it was sold.

Man! What a useful discussion. I'm going to reread this a few times.
As an amateur (a plant lover, but NOT and experienced expert) and a
guy with a faulty memory, I have difficulty with terms such as these
and love to be reminded.
David