the US Postal System

[Dave (imported)]

A day ago, I posted my story about trying to mail certain items (coal/water/oil mixture) as advice about mailing testicles through the US postal System.

Today, quite by accident, I found a web page that describes how you can ship some rather strange things at a Post Office...

Here's the original post:

In my career as chemical engineer, I once started calling to see if my technician (a responsible fellow) could travel on an airplane with about 500 grams of powdered coal agglomerated with heavy oil in 5 gallons of water. Agglomerates in water are an ugly, oily mess. Stains, slips, behaves non-newtonian and quite impossible to carry on a plane.

You have to declare any shipment or any package that goes on a plane or in the mail.

Don't forget that the Post Office X-RAYS packages nowadays. A jar will show up and the PO will open the package.

They won't like it not being declared.

LEt me tell you - the day I tried to do this was the most frustrating day of my life. They wanted MSDS. They wanter indemnified. They wanted insurance. They wanted a guarantee that nothing bad was going to happen. Considering the agglomerates permanently stained everything they touched. I couldn't say they were harmless. I had no MSDS because this was "our" own mixture and never subjected to testing (like burn baby burn testing).

Worse, the next morning, my boss giggled, patted me on the head and told me to get my technician a government car and have him drive to the other place.

Unless you get a courier to drive your separated testicles across the country -- they ain't flying, shipping, mailing, trucking, railroading or much else.

Save yourself from a very frustrating experience.

The list if what you can do is interesting and possibly worthy of comment (for fun, of course)

For instance, I've received live ladybugs in the mail but never scorpions.

This list is not comprehensive…

You can mail these things:

526 Mailable Live Animals

526.1 General

Some animals are mailable under proper conditions. See the specific instructions as noted for the following kinds of animals:

Live bees, 526.2 and Exhibit 526.21.

Live, day–old poultry, 526.3 and Exhibit 526.33.

Live adult fowl, 526.4.

Live scorpions (only under limited circumstances), 526.5 and Exhibit 526.5.

Other small, harmless, cold–blooded animals, 526.6 and Exhibit 526.6.

Note: Regarding dead animals or parts of animals, see 526.7 and Exhibit 526.7.

http://pe.usps.com/text/pub52/pub52c5_007.htm

You can't mail these:

525 Nonmailable Live Animals

525.1 Live Birds

Live birds, other than the type of day–old poultry specified in 526.31, are nonmailable. In addition, day–old poultry vaccinated with Newcastle disease (live virus) is nonmailable. The following are some examples of nonmailable birds:

Canaries.

Cockatiels.

Finches.

Parakeets.

Parrots.

Adult birds, except those specifically permitted under the conditions in DMM 601.9.3.4 and 601.9.3.5.

Be aware that the preceding list is not all–inclusive. Generally, all types of birds not listed in DMM 601.9 are nonmailable.

525.2 Live, Warm–Blooded Animals

The following are examples of other live, warm–blooded animals that are nonmailable:

Cats or kittens.

Dogs or puppies.

Guinea pigs.

Hamsters.

Mice.

Rabbits.

Rats.

Squirrels and flying squirrels.

525.3 Reptiles

All snakes, turtles, and poisonous reptiles are nonmailable.

525.4 Poisonous Insects and Spiders

All poisonous insects and all spiders, except scorpions under limited circumstances (see 526.5), are nonmailable. Other nonpoisonous and non–disease–conveying insects are permitted as stated in DMM 601.9.3.9 and in Exhibit 526.6.

http://pe.usps.com/text/pub52/pub52c5_006.htm