I have a cousin who lives in Fla and I live in Iowa. Is there a way I could ship her tomatoes if they are firm and wraped and packed well?
can you ship tomatoes
I doubt it, unless they were not totally ripe and you could put them in shredded paper and a very sturdy box. It CAN be done, obviously - growers do it, but it would be incredibly expensive, I would think.
I might try it. They have those flat rate boxes now that the postage isn't to bad. She sent my husband and I a $50.00 gift card from a good steak house where we live and she says she don't get good tomatoes in Fla, so thought I might do her a little favor in return. .
I'd be afraid that it would be tomato juice when it arrives. Tomatoes are very fragile and they'll take a lot of banging around. Packages and cartons are thrown around loading and unloading
I've shipped successfully from SC to FL and NY. Used the flat rate boxes labeled fragile, but not perishable (no refrigeration). I wrapped each in bubble wrap, and lined the box with it, but packed them pretty closely together.
I think the key was that they were not ripe. I picked and shipped when they were still firm and not (but almost) fully colored. I had experimented with table-ripening, and sent them at a stage where they would ripen in 4-5 days. I warned the (very happy) recipients that they would need to sit out (not in the sun) to ripen, do NOT refrigerate.
I also only sent "perfect" tomatoes. No cracks, splits, or marks. None of the Maters were lost during shipping, or after.
They were surely not as good as those I pick fully ripe, but much better than is available to many people not near a good Farmer's Market or tomato-growing friend :).
Plus, they got to try green-when-ripe, black, purple and orange tomatoes.
Hey guys, this is a little late, but in the future, send them on the Bus. My inlaws shipped me some of the best tomatoes, Dad took them to the Bus station, and we picked them up, in Houston, when the bus pulled up from Mississippi. They were in perfect condition! Mom put me some green, and simi-red ones, AWSOME!!!
Great information! Can you tell us how to go about shipping on a bus?
and how much did it cost krispi and for what poundage?
That I do not know, cause Dad did it.