BLOSSOM TIME PAIR'S ROSES WIN NATIONAL HONORS.

Byline: Sharon Cotal Staff Writer

CANYON COUNTRY - The first challenge faced by Bob and Kitty Belendez of Canyon Country when they decided to enter their prized roses in the American Rose Society Spring National Rose Show was the Santa Clarita heat.

While June may mean spring in Portland, Ore., where the show was to be held, temperatures in the Belendezes' back yard were soaring to over 100 degrees, and their beautiful roses were wilting on the vine, the bloom sizes quickly shrinking in the summer-like swelter.

``Our peak bloom for spring is the end of April, so I was just hoping that I would have something to take to the show,'' said Kitty, who serves as president of the Santa Clarita Valley Rose Society.

Once suitable blossoms were found, the next challenge was to transport them the 950 miles to Portland. Having flown to previous shows and experienced difficulty transporting their roses by plane, the Belendezes decided to drive to Oregon in their minivan, and Bob came up with a way to keep the roses cool and comfortable.

Bob built a special box, with two inches of insulated material on each side, that fit in the back of the van and carried more than one hundred roses, each bloom protected inside its own tube filled with water.

Using a gel coolant to keep the inside of the box below 40 degrees and cranking up the van's air conditioner, Bob and Kitty made the trek to Portland not knowing what they would find when they opened the box upon arrival.

``You can't open them to check on them, because the cold air will escape, so you just have to wait until you're ready to display them and see what you've got,'' Kitty said.

What they had were vivid, spectacular blossoms that the judges declared worthy of two national trophies.

``I was jumping up all over. We've been trying to win a national trophy for about five years, and we finally did it,'' Kitty said. ``These national shows are always a lot of fun, but winning was the ultimate thrill.''

The Belendezes won the Dee Bennett Memorial Trophy for their bouquet of 12 Miss Flippins miniature roses, and the Dr. Griffith Buck National Memorial Trophy for three hearty, shrub roses: Perdita, Abraham Darby and Geoff Hamilton, displayed in separate vases.

Kitty attributes the success they had at the show to a number of things, including a seminar by a top exhibitor that she and Bob attended, a new floral preservative she started using this year, and, of course, Bob's homemade rose transporter.

``I think the transport box that Bob made really made the difference,'' she said.

CAPTION(S):

3 photos

Photo:

(1 -- 2 -- color) Crimson Miss Flippins, above, won a national prize. The Belendezes also exhibited Rainbow's End, left.

(3 -- color) Gold-tinged Playboy was among the roses the Belendezes showed in Portland.