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17 August 2010
The thought of buying plants online at an online nursery may spark the question: ‘How are the plants packaged?’, and ‘How will they be sent'?’. The idea of mail ordering plants is relatively new, and not surprising seeing the huge popularity of the internet, and home shopping. Plants are surprisingly resilient and, with the proper packaging and preparation, can successfully be transported to all parts of Australia. Therefore, plants make excellent products for online shops.
Depending on the nursery, plants will either be sent via Australia Post or via courier. We (National Tropicals Online Nursery) always use Australia Post for all our mail order plants, but we ONLY use the Express Post option. It is very important to make sure your nursery uses the fastest transport method possible, so your plants arrive at your home as quick and healthy as possible. Couriers are another great way of transporting nursery stock, but they do not go to all parts of the country. For example, our nursery is located in Rosedale,
Queensland, and couriers will not come here. We need to drive to Bundaberg which is 80 km away from us, to pick up nursery stock and supplies.
Packaging is another issue with two major possibilities. You will find nurseries who prefer posting their plants potted, and nurseries who prefer posting plants without soil, also called ‘bare-rooted’. Bare-rooted is a bit of an unfortunate name, as the roots of the plants are not actually bare! We always use the bare root method in our nursery as we believe there are major advantages for the plants and our customers. Understandably, it might sound like a less favourable method of sending plants, but when we compare the two packaging methods, the soilless way is by far the better way to go.
Not only are the
roots of soilless nursery plants better protected during transport, as they do not shake around in loose dirt, the plants are also much better secured in the cardboard boxes, avoiding stem breakage. Our boxes can be thrown, tossed, shaken and dropped, and we can guarantee they will not move an inch! When this is done with plants which are packed in pots and soil, they will end up everywhere, with broken roots and possibly damaged foliage.
Also, soil harbours many, many pests and diseases. When you, for example, check certain states’ quarantine regulations, it will always state ‘soil and soil matter’ is NOT allowed to enter the state. This is because a lot of pests and diseases thrive in soil. We also do not want to spread weeds which may be growing in the soil, from our nursery to your garden, or weed seeds which may be present in the soil. Using the soilless nursery packaging method also enables us to properly soak the roots in seaweed solution, strengthening them and protecting them for the journey.
Soilless packaging of nursery stock also has benefits for you, or more so, your wallet… soilless plants can be beautifully packaged in compact boxes, and save weight by leaving out the weight of the soil. They can therefore be posted much cheaper, such as our flat rate postage of only $9.95 per order, for as many plants as you would like to combine in your order from our nursery. They then also fit into express post satchels, ensuring they arrive at most places in Australia overnight, or Wednesday!
So when you are browsing online nurseries, make sure you check their packaging methods, it can make a huge difference to the health and condition of the plants when they arrive at your doorstep!
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