I have no idea if they sell them in NC or not, but I saw some on e-bay. Why don't you phone a nursery or two in your area and ask if they carry staghorns.

I would shake off any loose dirt but leave whatever dirt is snuggled in the roots. Then surround it with sphagnum moss to fill the basket. They seem to like being sideways as though they're on a tree trunk. You can soak the whole rootball every now and again but they REALLY love being misted, I mean like every day! Good luck! I've had mine for a couple of years and I love it!

Ahhh, Australia... How do you keep it hydrated there? I have several staghorn ferns, and I put some wet moss around a piece of wood (no salts in the wood) and then I used copper wire to secure the plant to the whole thing. I kept it in the shade, which, in our zone 8b in south Alabama USA is quite humid. I do not fertilize it at all. I do spritz the leaves, which do NOT like to have dust on them, and neither do they want you to remove the fuzz. A healthy leaf is a fuzzy leaf. What sort of normal humidity do your ferns have? And what size is this plant you are having trouble with? Probably putting some compost tea in a tub/container and immersing the plant in it will help to remove all the overdose of chemicals for a fresh start. Then let it drain. Let me see if I can find a shot of my young plants, some of which even started new babies within the moss before they had fully attached to the wood board. In the summer, I hang my young plants by chains from the tree limbs outdoors, in the shade of course. One thing I discovered was SCALE on some of them, when I had a scheffelera near by. I finally got rid of that scale magnet, and cleaned up the scale on my staghorns, and now they are all doing nicely. Good luck with your young plant. and here are the babies and a good view of the moss. No soil used at all. Keep the moss damp, not soggy.

We have ours on a copper wire and hang it from our porch on the southeast side. We actually grow babies to sell and use the same method. I water them pretty much daily as they like to be moist. I don't think I would put one around a pine tree, they break to easy..(And great, the first time I try and post a picture I don't have one to show. This is not the stag horn fern). Good grief!