Silverhill Seeds postage

[Brenna Green]

As I'd largely be ordering wet-winter, dry-summer species, I wouldn't be placing an order until after Silverhill takes their holiday break, so January, possibly even February. I wouldn't expect to get seeds in time to plant this season even if I ordered today.

Uli: thanks for mentioning that Silverhill combined packets. I will need to make sure they *don't* do this if multiple people want the same seed, as the USDA limits the seeds per packet on a small lots permit. Such a weird limit, 50 seeds or 10 grams, and no clarification if it's the larger or smaller of the two or either are fine. (I'm trying to imagine 10 grams of Lachenalia seed!) 

Gastil, Ron: I'll keep you in the loop. If I go ahead I'll start a new thread. 

Brenna

[gastil]

Hi @Brenna Green,

Good plan. And that reminded me to also look at Gordon Summerfield's seed list that comes out this time of year. 

I was re-potting 7 trays of seed pots this past few weeks, dumping out the contents and examining the bulbs grown from seed from NARGS and a PBS SX back in 2020. Tedious work, but fun. Some species grew really well and were ready to move up to a bigger pot. Some were empty. So now I have more of an idea what species I want to try again. Some of those species have already had their first flower and subsequently a positive ID. 

The seed lists, PBS included, are long and can easily overwhelm my patience to look up each one to determine if it is something I both want to grow and my climate makes possible to grow. So, if I were smart, I would start from my Wish List and then find those in the offered lists. 

Here are some seed pots' contents: 

[Uli]

I just got an email from Silverhill mailing list, here is an extract for international customers.

2023 Christmas Closure – International

We will be applying for the last Phytosanitary Certificates on the 20^th of November and the latest postage will be on the 5^th of December.  Please make sure you have placed your order and paid before these dates.
 If your payment hasn't reached us by the cut off date, your parcel will be kept in our air-conditioned room until the New Year. We will start sending parcels again from 8th of January 2024.

[Too Many Plants!]

A CAUTIONARY Silverhill Seeds ORDERING HEADS UP... a friend (a long-time SH customer) and I placed a larger order (almost $400 US) with Nina @ SilverHill seeds in May 2023. Per Nina's recommendation, we had our order go via S.A. Post. After about 3 months of trying to track our order, we corresponded with Nina and found out it was stuck at the S.A. PO. Then after a couple more emails, Nina told us the PO is now defunct and going under. Our order along with many others sent via their PO are now stuck in limbo at their PO. After MANY correspondence back n forth with Nina, she recently stated they're now making efforts to try and retrieve their stuck customer orders. We continue to hope and cross our fingers...

[Martin Bohnet]

I'm a bit surprised to read about encouraging the use of S.A. Post - In my experience, both the Website and the personal communication dis-encourage the usage of S.A.Post for international shipping,and that fits our own experience with the Gladiolus book. See above.

PS:I've removed your other topic - let's keep all Silverhill Info in one topic - Organizing info is one big benefit of the forum over the list....

[Too Many Plants!]

Hi Martin, my friend had ordered from Silverhill many times over a couple of decades I believe. He and his family were going through some tough times, so with his blessing, I took the lead in doing an order we were splitting. This was my first-time ordering from SH, and I ran things by him before finalizing, as well as asked many questions via email to Nina. She never cautioned me about concerns of not getting our order at all, or having it go MIA at the SA PO. As well as my friend saying they had always used SA Post and received their orders, all be it they took a while, and some orders longer than others. So, I had no idea this was a concern, and based on MANY emails with Nina, this situation sounds completely new, separate, and final.

[CG100]

The SAPO has been totally unreliable and riddled with thieves for several years. Apart from Silverhill, I buy from 3 other supliers in RSA, and they haven't used the SAPO for at least 4-5 years, which is when I first bought from them, so quite probably longer.

I have tried sending seed to RSA in ordinary envelopes and even they were stolen.

Another minor glitch is with the RSA issuing of phyto' cert's - the exporter selects what is to be shipped from a list, and with a flora like RSA has, that list is , not surprisingly, not comprehensive. The exporter has two options if something is not on the list - apply for it to be added and then sit and wait, or declare the item as a species that is on the list. Any hybrids - several hybrid bulbs are well-known in horticulture in RSA - will travel as one or other parent as hybrids are not listed.

[CG100]

It looks like Silverhill may be having problems.................

I placed an order about 2 weeks ago and have been waiting for a postage quote, which appeared on the order on the wesite towards the end of last week.

I contacted them twice via their online form, once to ask about the delay in a quote for postage and once to ask why the total cost, including postage, had not been raised as an invoice and sent via email.

Neither was answered.

Today, the order has completely disappeared from my account, replaced by one that I placed nearly three years ago. I have now sent an email direct, rather than via the website.

[MarkMazer]

They sent a notice out several weeks ago that they would close for the holiday season. I'd try again in January.


Mark Mazer
Hertford, NC

[CG100]

They sent a notice out several weeks ago that they would close for the holiday season. I'd try again in January.

Yes, I received it here and the last date for shipping orders was/is 1st? 2nd? week in December (I can't be bothered looking it up, although Uli's post above contains all anyone needs..). Closing for Christmas in the 1st/2nd week of November would be very odd indeed.

I am also unsure why that would lead to deletion of my order from the website after it had sat there and been updated with postage costs for around 2 weeks, and been replaced by an ancient order that was not there in my order history previously....................

With the order deleted, I can't be sure when I placed it, but I looked up dates beforehand and had plenty of time.

[CG100]

Well, it took over a day for Ondine to answer, but it looks like the Silverhill website has been compromised or somehow failed again.

I have to resubmit the order via the webiste and as insurance, by email as well.

Bang goes plans for receiving the seeds before December/Christmas.

[Randy Linke]

Ondine is usually very good at replying as soon as she can.  Sometimes she is just overwhelmed.  

Closing for holidays is often very different in other parts of the world.  Don't expect anything to happen in August in Spain and a fair part of Europe, and December/early January here is packed with holidays and long closures.  Even my wife's quarterly self employment tax submission deadline is later than normal for the fourth quarter as they factor in the fact that no one is working.  It is actually a pleasant change, one just has to accept it and get used to it.

[CG100]

As above, the problem is with the website - it is always falling over.

This time it "lost" my order and two messages, all sent different times.

A quick look back through emails and it has done similar things before........................

Everybody, just beware.