How many different colours of roses are there?

Answer 1

According to RoseFile.com

There are yellow, white, and red roses.

And in a way, all roses are one of these. Sometimes they are more than one. A copper colored rose, for instance, might contain yellow and magenta pigments. A coral rose might also. Or it might contain only red pigments.

How many pigments the rose might actually have at its disposal is not a question I am prepared to answer. The number is almost certainly larger than three. Still, it is informative to imagine for a moment that the rose is capable of producing just two color pigments:

• Magenta
• Yellow

Those who are familiar with printing know that the classic way to produce red is to mix magenta and yellow pigments in just the right proportions. If the rose practiced this printer's trick, it could produce yellow, red, and purple.

Add to this idea that the amount of pigment will govern the darkness, richness, or saturation of the color; and that in the absence of any pigment the rose is white. This set of circumstances will allow a rose to produce every color in the rose spectrum by simply varying the amounts of two pigments it produces.