A shrub 6 to 9 ft high in gardens, with erect stems and arching branches armed with scattered prickles, the sucker shoots usually very freely furnished with prickles and bristles. Leaflets five to nine, oval or ovate, simply toothed, 3⁄4 to 1 in. long, downy beneath, especially on the midrib. Flowers pink, usually one to three in a cluster (sometimes more), each on a glabrous stalk and 11⁄2 in. across. Sepals with an expanded leaflike tip, more or less pinnately lobed. Fruits globose, 1⁄2 in. in diameter, red, crowned with the persisting sepals.
This interesting rose is a hybrid between R. pimpinellifolia (seed-parent) and the downy state of R. canina (sometimes separated from it under the name R. dumetorum Thuill. or R. corymbifera Borkh.). First discovered near Belfast, in 1802, by John Templeton (who thereby won a prize of five guineas for the discovery of a new Irish plant), this hybrid has since been found in a few other localities in the British Isles.
R. pimpinellifolia crosses with other members of the R. canina complex. The hybrid between it and R. canina sens. strict. was found in the last century growing near London on Ham Common and Barnes Common (R. × hibernica var. grovesii Baker). The rose named R. × hibernica var. glabra by Baker is now thought to be R. pimpinellifolia × R. afzeliana.