Ammania has Landed

[Glenc]

Came home from work to find a package waiting. It was the Ammania Senegalinsis I ordered from Aquariumplants.com. They are backed up shipping to Canada, the order was supposed to ship last Tues, shipped on the 12th. Got here quick, I paid for two day shipping, got here in one. Can't complain about that. Now the sad part. It was in very rough shape. I'm not impressed with the packaging, as I could move the plant around in the box with little trouble. They could have used more padding to stop the plant from shaking around during transit, which I'm sure is why it's in such rough shape. This is a difficult plant to grow even in good shape, so in this condition I have my doubts that it will come back. Got six stems with almost no leaves, they were all over the inside of the packaging, as they had fallen off. Still had leaves on the tops, so I trimmed and planted them tonight. Here is a shot. Not looking to happy at the moment, am keeping my fingers crossed. I hate complaining. Just don't want you folks to get stuff in this kind of shape, just a heads up. This is a hard plant to find. I paid 18 bucks to ship it here, plus 5.99 for the plant. It should have been packaged alot better. If these plants don't make it I will not be ordering from these folks again.

 

[travis simonson]

I'm with you Glen. After paying that much, the least you should be able to expect is live plants. Coddle them and hope that they snap back. Ammania senegalensis is a rare one. I hope you can nurse it back to health

 

[Glenc]

Thanks Travis, I'll do my best. If it comes back and if your interested, I'll send you some. My motivation is selfish though, cause then you will grow it amazing and then I'll bug you to teach me how! Thanks again.

 

[mr funktastic]

i hope it picks up and grows back for u glen. i would definatly be sending them a complaint in hopes to recieve some free plants, they just opened there site to canadians and it isnt going to seem very succesful if they ship late and arrive in terrible condition. good luck with it

 

[malkore]

as long as the plants were wrapped in wet paper towels or newspapers, and then in a plastic bag...that's all you really need to ship plants safely.

I'm assuming the stems couldn't move so much that they snapped in half, correct?

 

[Glenc]

The plants did arrive wrapped in wet newspaper inside a plastic bag. Stems were not broken. However, these plants were in very rough shape considering they were in transit only 1 day. Maybe they wern't in good shape to begin with. They were not left outside for any length of time as my wife received them at the door when they were delivered. Again, I hate complainers. I only posted this as a heads up for other members. I'm not going to contact Aquariumplants.com. for a free bee. This was my first mail order plant delivery. If this is indeed the norm for condition of mail order plants, It's definatley not for me, I'll stick to my LFS.

 

[mr funktastic]

this is definatly not the norm for delivered plants. i got send plants from the states and i used global priority which ended up taking 8 days!! and that was when it was still below zero here. plus there were left in my mailbox for atleast 4 hours casue they didnt deliver to my door and i dont loose a single leaf or have a broken stem and th plant was reaslly healthy. cleary they didnt package it properly or the delivery guy was playing soccer with it. i only complain if the situatuion warrents it and this is clearly one of those situations. dont complain to get a new plant just inform them of the situation and advise them to try a different carrier or packaging method. if they decide to send u a free plant then thats if not then u did a favour for all the other canadian buyers looking to order off this site. ohh and i guess that now u have your plant u will be making a trip to come see mee soon lol i cant wait to show u all my tanks if u come to drop off some plants.

 

[Glenc]

Hey mr funktastic. Still don't know when I'm going to get up your way. PM me your address and I'll send you some stuff if I'm not up your way soon. Maybe I'll kick it around a bit first! Liked that one! Would live to see your tanks though. They packaged the actual plants ok but there was not much in the box to stop that package from moving around. Don't know who's at fault here, just know it sucks. You are correct. I'm going to e-mail them to make them aware of the situation. The package was handled badly, but still should have been packaged better. They should know about it. Typically when I get bad service, I just take my business elsewhere. Sometimes people need to learn the hard way.

 

[mr funktastic]

ok i will send u a pm tonight. i live like 2 streets over from your brother lol such a small world.

 

[malkore]

different places grow their plants in different ways. a LOT of aquariumplants.com stuff is grown emmersed because its easier and faster and less algae prone. they also put up with shipping times better.

on the down side, you have a good 3 weeks after planting in a tank before they start their submerged growth, so they can look pretty sorry for a while.

aquariumplants.com is more willing to ship plants priority mail than any other online vendor I've used. I've gotten some really sad looking plants after paying for next day air.

since yer up north, i know it wasn't a heat issue. but as a rule of thumb, plants ship better when slightly cool, vs slightly too warm. obviously freezing plants is bad, but when its 90F out and they sit in the back of a UPS truck all day, they suffer a lot more.

Honestly, I don't think they look that bad, and should recover if your tank has the right setup. Lots of light and CO2, shouldn't be too hard to bring it to full splendor.

I wouldn't give up on online vendors just yet, or our plant exchange, the classifieds, or places like aquabid.

 

[czcz]

Bummer. Hope it comes back alright, and if so, that you keep posting pics of it

 

[Glenc]

Thanks all. My plants are still look pretty bad. Lost a few more leaves. Thanks Malkore for the emmersed plant info. Feel better about it now. Just bummed me out to get my first mail order in looking so sad. CO2 is at 30 ppm and lights are fired. Ferts are balanced. Keeping my fingers crossed, really want this one to make it.

 

[nikipike]

Sorry you were disappointed

I got my first ever live plant package last Tuesday & it was from aquariumplants.com. They came on time & were in awesome shape. But, they didn't have any room to move at all as I had ordered around 40.

 

[Glenc]

Just my luck I guess. Got to remember it only takes ONE bonehead person to not do a good job and it makes everyone involved look bad. Good to hear your order was fine.

 

[fish_4_all]

How is the plant doing? I just got some today and wanted to know if you had any luck with it. Mine looks in really good shape for coming from my LFS but could be emersed from the way it looks. Would really like to see a picture if it lived through the ordeal.

 

[Glenc]

I did really well with that first order. That was awhile back. Although the plants were in rough shape when they arrived, they came back and thrived in my tank. Grew really well. I gave them all away as Ammania S. is a big plant, got a bit to big for my 20 gallon. I recently ordered Ammania S. again as I missed the beauty of it. This time it arrived in great shape, 12 stems total. aquariumplants.com came through. Nice healthy plants and generous portion. Way better than the first time around. It is usually grown emersed, will shed most of the leaves as it adapts to submersed. Takes a couple of weeks, once it gets growing it is a beautiful pink-orange. Here is a shot from that first batch.

 

[fish_4_all]

If you look at my post, is that what it looks like emersed? I just got it and that is the best I can get from the pictures if it is Ammannia S. My LFS only labeled it as Ammannia, no clarification other than that.

 

[Glenc]

LOL, I'm chasing you around here! Your plant is emersed. It will look like my pic in a few weeks under water. My Ammania looked just like yours does now when I first got it. It will change