Bare cuttings of Hoya shipped by aleyagarden in Small Air Parcels : 19 days in the mail, but still perfect.

The thread was posted on http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/hoya/msg0722571320118.html and is pasted under the text below. Aleyagarden is very grateful to the author for taking the time of posting and making pictures.

Here is our comment : 80 % of Small Air Parcels sent to the USA arrive within 15 days, the average being around 12 days. EMS parcels take on average 2 days less and also the deviations to this average are smaller ( less arrivals in 5 days and less arrivals in 3 weeks than the Small Air Parcel method. ) These data should be related to the difference of cost of the two methods and to the price of the plants in order to assess which method is better. ( Here at aleyagarden we import cuttings in envelopes, with a 100% rate of arrival to this day, and rarely in more than a week time.)

Hoya cuttings in a very good shape after 19 days are good luck as said in the thread but they are not the effect of a miracle : at aleyagarden we got returns of parcels after a month and we could re - grow up to 80 % of those.
Cuttings being bare or being in moss : that does not make any difference ( we have conducted many trials here ) and this is certainly the reason why - my opinion is from feedback received and experiments with imports - if we conducted a survey among our customers, certainly 50% would be positive and 50% would be negative about the use of moss.

Thread :

Just as I was beginning to fear the worst, my cuttings from Thailand (AG) arrived. Technically, they arrived over the weekend, but I was in Minneapolis, so I didn't get them until Monday. That made 19 days in a box, which I know isn't breaking any records around here, but it did freak me out!

FYI: I got psyched out by the text on their website saying small packages sometimes arrive faster via the "slow" method and ignored all advice posted here to use the fast method and request sphagnum baggies. I didn't make any special packing requests. Next time I'd go with the faster method though - I think I just lucked out this time

This is how they looked when they arrived. They are soaking in some sort of water-vodka-sugar-epsom salt-superthrive cocktail I was trying out.

Here they are after 26 hours. (I didn't think they needed that long, but I was either sleeping or working the rest of the time)

blasternaezii, cumingiana, caudata, ariadna, erythrostemma (pink)

Note: They sent 3 stems of the erythrostemma :)


archboldiana (pink), nicholsoniae, lobbii 2, imperialis (red), waymaniae (long leaf)

There were a few peduncles in this batch. :) I think they look pretty good for 19 days. There are a couple I'm worried about but I'm optimistic. ..

Hoya and other plant collections are for sale on aleyagarden.com Plant care is available in various posts of this blog. Contact : aleyagarden@hotmail.com

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