Strategies to send plant material for the price of a stamp

[RandyS]

This looks really great!

I should add that I plan to give away some of those once they become independent plants. I think it would be great if this forum reached the point where anyone new could get a hold of an easy plant or two.

And...I have more Drosera binata cuttings:



The cuttings I sent myself, which traveled through Oakland (D. binata and D. capensis 'Red'), starting to grow:



The plant's about to bloom. I assume it's a self-fertile clone. The seller described it as: "The flowers of Drosera binata produce copious seed making them quite prolific."



And finally, since if figured I might as well take a couple small root cuttings now. They don't look like they'll have any problem making new plants:



So I should have a "few" Drosera binata. Hopefully they can be put to good use. Again, I received a small plant 1 1/2 months ago.

Finally, these are not CPs, but I also hope to have seeds of Passiflora foetida and an Aristolochia or two available soon as well. I'm expecting a friend will send some in the mail. I'm not sure how many.

 

[Blackfeather666]

Did mine make it? Condition? I did all of the above suggestions.

 

[RandyS]

Did mine make it? Condition? I did all of the above suggestions.

I haven't seen it yet.

 

[Andrew42x89]

No strikes yet, but still have some color.

 

[RandyS]

Did mine make it? Condition? I did all of the above suggestions.

Still nothing in the mail today. Did you pack it with cardboard? It's possible USPS rejected it or slowed it down because of that, as it's not supposed to be rigid. I think it's supposed to be an extra 40 cents charge for that, if it's still under 1/4 inch, and a lot more if it's thicker: then it becomes the same as padded envelope or box. I don't know how USPS would react in either of those cases. That's why I've avoided anything stiff like cardboard. It's hard to sort through the maze of all their requirements.

 

[RandyS]

Did mine make it? Condition? I did all of the above suggestions.

Finally got it. For whatever reason, the post office decided to reject this one, and not others. It says non machinable, returned for extra postage, but since I was the return address I assume they didn't collect any. They didn't ask me for anything. So it must have just been delayed, for a long time!




The cuttings were inside a folded paper towel. Perhaps 2 of 3 survived the 10 day trip? I put them in water.

 

[NineLine]

Your props in water— is the water deep, or is it just a few drops? I think I might have mine sitting in too deep of water

 

[RandyS]

Your props in water— is the water deep, or is it just a few drops? I think I might have mine sitting in too deep of water

Half an inch at least? I don't think depth matters--you can do it completely submerged in something like a test tube.

 

[RandyS]

I decided to also work on the other question I had: how to grow very small plants such that it was very easy, took little space, and would make them easy to ship ( but not for a single stamp...).

The ones I was thinking about were the small Drosera cuttings which I started. I had transferred a bunch of D. binata cuttings from water to sphagnum. The first leaves are just starting to open up:



After doing this a couple days ago, I decided to transfer these to small ziploc bags instead for further growth, and ultimately for shipping if possible. I have no idea if they'll survive this. I used 3 inch x 4 inch ziploc bags. First I put a layer of moist sphagnum in the bottom. This should provide moisture, a medium for grow into, and hopefully will prop the sealed bag open a bit so that the leaves have a space to grow into. I put at least 2 plantlets into each bag on top of the sphagnum. For most of them, this meant 1 cutting.

Here are 4 of them. i can see plantlets in at least 3 of 4:



I don't have much space, so I crammed about 12 into a small container. Possibly not all will get adequate light. I'm going to essentially ignore them for a few weeks and see what happens.

 

[Andrew42x89]

Update:
Looks like at least one of the binata cuttings is striking.
No other signs of growth yet

 

[RandyS]

Cool!

 

[NineLine]

Well done! I'm sad mine all bit the dust!

 

[NineLine]

I should have just put them in water. I don't know what I was thinking.

 

[RandyS]

I'm sure some people are very familiar with this, but this is just D. binata propagation, my original cuttings after 2 months (and it's pretty cold inside). I really like how the forking of many of the leaves is becoming more and more apparent. The original leaf has died and is breaking down.

 

[NineLine]

 

[NineLine]

I think I might have one of my cuttings striking in water... I'm not sure!