Lady Banks Roses (Rosa banksiae) bloom here in southern Arizona gardens in late March and early April.

These evergreen ramblers are probably the easiest rose to grow here in Arizona. Lady Banks Roses have small, faintly fragrant, white or light yellow, usually double flowers, and they will bloom spectacularly for a short time every spring.

I have several of these roses in my Tucson yard, and they make excellent, fast-growing bank covers or privacy screens if trained on a fence or trellis.

Lady Banks Roses are long-lived and can grow extremely large. In fact, the largest rose tree in the World, a Lady Banks Rose, can be found not far from Tucson in Tombstone, Arizona. This rose, named the "Tombstone Rose", has a trunk circumference of over 13 feet (4 m), is 9 feet (2.7 m) tall, covers an area of 8000 square feet (740 square meters), and is over 120 years old. The Tombstone Rose Festival is held sometime in April every year to celebrate the blooming of this huge rose tree.