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Fantastic Plants Mail Order Nursery - experiences?

Dave in NoVA • N. Virginia • zone 7A

7 years ago

Has anyone had any good/bad experiences ordering plants from Fantastic Plants Nursery out of Memphis? Reviews seem OK.

Fantastic Plants

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Comments (6)

gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)
7 years ago
Have you checked with Dave's Watchdog? Overall very positive feedback (46 positive, 1 negative, 1 neutral).
Dave in NoVA • N. Virginia • zone 7A
Original Author
7 years ago
Yes, I did. Just wanted to be sure they were legit.
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This experience is from four seasons nursery which is directly affiliated with burgess seed to my understanding My wife and I ordered close to a hundred trees from four seasons over a year ago. We ordered them in early spring, but four seasons refused to ship them until late fall, in october. We called four seasons multiple times to inform the that they needed to ship them as early as possible since we are over 7500 ft in elevation, they informed us that they would ship them early enough for us to plant them and get them established before the winter. When we recieved our trees we already had snow on the ground, we called four seasons and informed them of this and were told to keep the original packing reciept and ship it back to them and they would replace the trees and send them again in the spring. We were told to write on the replacement request that we needed a spring shipment not fall. We did this and patiently waited until spring. Spring came and guess what? No trees... We called four seasons and got the runaround. They refused to replace our trees stating that our year warranty had expired. We explained everything written above but to deaf ears. Instead we got a I dont give a @#$$ attitude. These people are crooks. Their warranty is not worth the paper its written on. Their customer service is pathetic at best. They are unorganized and do not care one bit about the customers they are supposedly here to serve. Do not do business with this company. David Newton Grants N.M.
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Nice Barbara, thanks! I'm always searching for new online sources since frankly it's the best way to find rare and unusual conifers - having a comglameration of sources. I plan on making a 'nursery review' post one of these days with detailed experiences(and photos) with all the nurseries I have bought from. Breaking them down into four or five catagories and explaining what I like about each. I may not be able to get Forest Lakes Nursery into my first review post, but perhaps it can be a revolving post where people on here share their experiences with retailers. After all, conifer nurseries are an exclusive breed and Spring will be right around the corner. Just glancing at Forest Lakes Nursery is a nice experience. Very well laid out catalog with information about the plants and nice prices as well. Have to give them an order some day. Will
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In USDA 6 you can get away with fall planting of fully hardy kinds, this is the preferred time to plant whenever possible anyway. In fall plants are often taller, an entire growing season having just ended. But big tops in small pots are not preferable, if roots are circling and compacted these will have to be opened up to assure long-term success. Mauling roots in fall defeats part of the purpose of fall planting, as replacement roots from cut root ends will not appear until top growth starts in spring. If undisturbed root systems are installed (early enough) in fall, existing root tips then immediately push a considerable distance into the surrounding soil - immediately giving the new acquisition a good start. Plants installed during any other season will not get as good a grip on the ground until the first fall after planting, fall is the only time when the roots get to have all the fun - the rest of the year the energy budget is prioritized for other parts of the plant or the plant is basically sleeping (winter). Elongation of new roots formed in spring is minimal, the tops also being active at this time and taking their share of the available energy - which is at a low point because of winter having just taken place.
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Z Man, A greenhouse can turn the clock back and cause spring time to come months earlier, primarily by the use of heat to break dormancy. You want to push back spring, not prolong fall by keeping your figs in a warm fall greenhouse. Progressively shortened day lengths after June 21st. actually prolong fig ripening causing dry, flavorless, tough skinned figs as the days get shorter and shorter through fall. For best quality figs you want the figs to ripen quickly, beginning in the heat of July, August through September, not into October and certainly not into November. Figs, depending on the variety, take 90-120 days to ripen from the time tiny figlets start to show. Early ripening fig tree varieties are crucial. It takes new spring growth, starting from totally dormant buds, no sooner than 40 days of new extending growth for the first figlets to begin forming at leaf axils when you pinch off the growing tips right above where the 5th. to 6th. leaf has formed on a stem. This hastens earlier and more uniformly concurrent figlet formation and their timely ripening. The oldest leaves start growing figlets first, and progressively up the stem as the leaves mature. The figs ripen up the stem in the order that they were formed corresponding to leaf age. In a greenhouse you want your trees to start breaking dormancy in February to no later than March. Greenhouse growing is no cakewalk. Humidity as in greenhouses, is a developing figs mortal enemy...fungus=rot=no figs. Figs love dry heat, lots of heat, and as much sun as you can give them. I would strongly suggest you grow you figs in both manners, greenhouse container and in ground as Bob Duncan does. I think Bob's method is the easiest and possibly best. Fig growing in temperate climates is challenging. Desert and Mediterranean climates are the most ideal for figs. Moses
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Dingo2001 - Z5 Chicagoland
7 years ago
Dave I ordered from them and was very pleased. Nice stuff and great customer service. I would order from them again.

Julie
Dave in NoVA • N. Virginia • zone 7A
Original Author
7 years ago
Thanks Julie!
User
7 years ago
last modified: 7 years ago
I've ordered from them quite a bit over the past two years ($1000+ plus in plants) and my experience has been mixed. I've had several plants that have been damaged in transit, and some that weren't really healthy or were smaller in size compared to what you can find in a good retail nursery. If you have customer service issues, which I did on several occasions (damaged, missing, and unhealthy plants) they don't answer their phone and it takes them a couple days to get back to you on email. Their inventory system isn't very good so occasionally you won't get something that was ordered, but you don't know until the shipment arrives and it's not included. This is a small family run operation.

On the positive side they have some unique hard to find plants and are friendly to work with.

Note: I just tried to access their website and their domain registration expired in mid-January. Don't know if this means they are out of business or just haven't paid GoDaddy.
davidrt28 (zone 7)
7 years ago
last modified: 7 years ago
Hhhmmmmm...leaving the domain unregistered for over a month? Does not look good. If this is another mail order nursery closing, it would not surprise anyone. Hate to say it but we are almost overdue for a major closing...it was quite a while ago now that Colvos Creek and Girard in OH stopped trading. I can't prove it but I suspect that while most of the economy came back from the recession, rare plants will never be what they were before 2008. "Smart" phones have made it an even more short attention span world that it was, and collectible plants are the ultimate non-instant gratification item. Or one of them anyhow.

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