Question
We had a huge 15+ year old Lady Banks Rose that we never pruned.  It was georgous evey year and seemed to be healthy.  We live in North Carolina - Zone 7 - after a summer/winter moderate drought, the entire plant died - could it have been something other than lack of water?  I have read that these roses are draught tolerant and we want to replace the one we lost with another one, but not if we are going to have a problem.  It did not look diseased or wilted in any way - just dropped it's leaves and did not come back at all in the Spring.  Thank you.

Answer
Lady Banks is one of those roses that does well if the weather can be predicted to stay above a certain temperature. Zone 8 is considered to be ideal for this rose. I have Lady Banks in my zone 7 garden planted in a very sheltered area but every year it gets dieback. Although a rose may be classified as drought resistant, it still needs to be treated like any other rose. All that drought resistant means is when you get a long hot spell, that would make any other rose wilt or damage it, Lady Banks won't be bothered by the high heat. However if yours lasted 15 years then it was in a place that was good for it. If it didn't get any water ( also in the winter) then it would have been lack of water that caused it to die. I would plant one again and for the first year, just make sure it gets an average amount of water to get those roots down deep.