Can I get full size plants through mail order?

Can I order full size plants like I would get at my local nursery through mail order? For example, if I want to get some purple cone flower in 5 or 6 inch pots through the mail can I do that? The only time I ever ordered anything though mail order I got what was basically some roots and a stem wrapped in newspaper. Not exactly what I had in mind.

Most mail order places send small plants since it can be prohibitively expensive to ship larger plants. Things like coneflowers are common enough I would think your local nurseries would have them? That would be cheaper than trying to order a large one from the internet, by the time you pay for the plant and shipping costs you probably could have got 3 or 4 plants from your local nursery. The one place I know of that sometimes carries larger sizes of perennials is Forest Farm--they have tubes which are smaller but some stuff they sell in gallons so you can go there and see what the prices are like.

The other thing I would do if I were you is look up the company you bought your tiny ones from in Garden Watchdog--if they have a poor rating then their plants may be smaller or in worse condition than what's typical, in that case you may be happier with the small plants that you'll get from places like Bluestone Perennials. Their stuff is small but always healthy.

I would be a bit hesitant ordering large plants through the post, for a start, as Ecrane said, they will be costly, remember the more soil a plant has around the roots/pot, the more cost is added for postage, therefore you defeat the purpose of cheaper plants and would be as well going to your local nursery, you may find a nursery cheaper and better than say DIY garden sections as the nursery has folks looking after the plants whereas most/not all DIY stores have someone water the plants but not caring if they miss a few, at this time of year, rooted plants will have tons of time to make a lot of new fresh growth this year and when they arrived you should unwrap them immediately and give them a soak in a bucket of water to hydrate the roots before planting, after planting, you will almost certainly need to water every day for the first couple of weeks till the recover from shock and get enough moisture at the roots to enable them to grow new roots ready for flowering later this year. you would need to allow for shock recovery even for plants in pots. good luck. Hope this helps you out a bit. Weenel.

Take into consideration the difficulty in shipping full-sized plants as far as damage, also. Even well packed plants can suffer greatly from rough handling -- not to mention, local growers are more likely to carry plants that are known to be hardy in your zone, and you are supporting the local economy. (OK -- admitted -- my family used to own a local greenhouse.)

T
Theresa