Those envelopes that were costing me $4.50-5.00 were only $3.00-3.50 with Pirate Ship. If your sending out 15+ envelopes that is a good deal of cash.
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Everything that I mail out with USPS seems to go pretty wellâŚreceiving mail from them seems to go through the local Postal Bermuda Triangle before it gets to our unreliable rural carrier (who finally has been replacedâI think.). One person sending me a package said he was told our address did not exist! 
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I got a pleasant surprise from pirateship. Apparently I paid postage based on 12oz. They gave me an unsolicited refund of over $1 because the package was only 4oz. I didnât realize there was another price break below the 12oz step. Also didnât imagine they would refund over-postage.
That has me rethinking my re-used Amazon box strategy.
I donât use Venmo or Zelle because they have almost no protections compared to credit cards. The money is immediately gone from your bank account, without recourse for mistakes or worse. Itâs like cash, but riskier because you canât lose more cash than what you withdraw.
With a credit card, thereâs the intermediary, payment is made later, and the benefit of the doubt usually goes to the card holder vs. the payee.
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This is how Iâm shipping trees:
I purchased 24" in length bags from Uline:
If you want to be totally professional then you should completely wash the roots and dip in Terra- Sorb, an ounce or two makes a 5 gallon bucket. For IL, no nursery inspectors are necessary if the roots are completely barerooted and shipped that way.
Here are rules by state:
David Hughes, Rock Bridge Nursery:
http://nationalplantboard.org/ Everything you need to know is on this site. Donât even try to ship any plant material to California. No pecans to Arizona, New Mexico and 4 counties in Texas. The Texas rule is written to look like the whole state but those 4 counties but it is the other way around.Several states donât allow Chestnuts. Most western states donât allow walnuts. The plant board site is interesting read.
4-counties in Texas do not allow pecans:
Tom Wahl about Chestnuts:
As far as I know, only Washington, Oregon, and California prohibit chestnut nursery stock, seed nuts, and culinary nuts from entering their states from states to the east (they do allow transport between those three states). Oddly enough, though you canât send chestnuts from Iowa or Illinois to California, you can import chestnuts to California from China and S. Korea. I donât think you can ship any kind of tree to California. Walnuts are a real problem everywhere.
Iâm pretty well doubling USPS tube boxes to ship a tree or trees.
This is the rules for USPS. After these dimensions, the price pretty much doubles. A postal office worker wrote the blue note // where the price doubles after those dimensions. She was measuring a 38" tube box while writing the dimensions I should follow and said, âdonât go over 4â in length and keep to the 108 inches or less total or the price will double.â
The pink note if for when I combine (2) boxes to create a 4â long box using Gorilla Tape. Thatâs itâs empty weight.
The yellow note is how much per USPS Priority Tube Box weighs, empty/dry. Under that are how much my pots w/media each weigh, so that is for me/not anyone else.
Only combine to make longer boxes the 38" length tube boxes. The 26" length tube boxes have a side with different dimensions than the 38âs. I stopped ordering the 26âs al-together for this reason.
I use White Gorilla Tape as it looks most professional.
I buy 8-10 mm stakes in 500 bundles from A.M. Leonard and Gorilla Tape makes an 8â stake fast:
I just so happen to use PayPal for USPS shipping:
Dax
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Yes. Unreliable rural mail-persons. I received a text saying that my Bonide âstuffâ was delivered. It was an Amazon order, and I was told that it had been put in my mailbox. Nope. Never got it. That was on Tuesday . . . and on Friday I had Discover take it off my bill. So, wouldnât you know it? . . . . It showed up on Saturday! 
So why was I told it had been put in my box on Tuesday???
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That âbunch of questionsâ has a lot to do
with poor âserviceâ
and price rises.
I currently have 2 shipments coming from the eastern seaboard. Both are USPS Priority mail. (plants, bulbs, cuttings)
One has been in transit for 10 days, the other 9 days.
A couple of weeks agoâ
I ordered 10 birdhouses from Walmart (sold by walmart) and put my PO BOX as my shipping address.
They shipped it via FedEx Ground. FedEx made 7 attempts to deliver and failed every day (end of day). They finally googled my name and came up with an address that was valid 20 years ago. They made 3 attempts at that address that doesnt exist anymore.
I finally flagged down the FedEx driver and gave him details as to where i live. (he didnt have the package that day).
On the 12th day of being in my area it arrived. Box opened and looked like it had been thru a taliban checkpoint.
I looked at the shipping label and my phone number was clearly on there. They changed my shipping address on their own⌠and never even tried to drop it off at the USPS nor tried to call me.
I hate FedEX. I dont think any thing has ever went smoothly via FedEx ground for me.
Similar thing with UPS. I ordered something online and put my PO BOX as shipping address. Confirmation email gave a UPS tracking number. UPS carried it to the USPS hub⌠and USPS carried it to my Post office.
A few years ago i got upset with how USPS was delivering my mail to neighbors and i was getting my neighbors mail and they shipped a car part to a neighbor that got lost⌠so for one year or so i shipped everything media mail. I saved up all of my junk mail and catalogs etc that i get and i put several of them per shipmentâŚ
The cost of sending Media Mail is determined by your packageâs weight. For a book thatâs 1 pound or less, youâll pay $2.75 for shipping with Media Mail. For each additional pound, add 52 cents to your total. For example, shipping a 5-pound book through Media Mail will cost $4.83 in postage.
So yes every package that i shipped had media in it. And to be honest it went as fast as first class mail.
Priority- its been a long while since any package that i have received has been a âPriorityâ to them.
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Are you saying you counted it as media mail because it had media in it? Media mail is supposed to be printed media and nothing else, FYI.
Yes i sure did. I sent all the media that i get on a daily basis back thru the system. I always recycle 
FYI its between me and the USPS but thanks.
Not only âprintedâ.
https://about.usps.com/notices/not121/not121_tech.htm
I once upon a time shipped lots of movies on 12" laserdisc as media mail. Boxes were heavy⌠The USPS person asked me to confirm they contained only âmediaâ and I concured. He said âyou know these are subject to opening and inspection right?â. I replied âCertainly, but make sure you pack 'em up just as good as I have them right now.â They assumed I was trying to game the system probablyâŚ
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Fair point! Although, printed matter is pretty darn heavy, too.
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Just be aware, media mail is subject to inspection, and the contents must be media. They will return the package with postage due if the contents are found to not be what is supposed to be in there.
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