When I shipped that tanuki trident from the auction site.... I made up the lower box (12 x 12 x 12), filled the first couple of inches with styrofoam peanuts. Then laid wet paper towels on the soil surface, and wrapped the plastic pot/lower trunk in 2 seperate black garbage bags. Taped it very thoroughly. Set it into the lower box, put styrofoam peanuts in up to the rim of the pot. Then I placed some really stiff bubble wrap (styrofoam would work too) around the trunk and pot like a collar, but not all the way to the box sides. I then used canebrake bamboo that I cut to size, making sure that the bamboo would sit on top of the stiff bubble wrap and be taller than the top of the tree. Four bamboo supports. Then I cut a piece of styrofoam to fit inside of the supports, like a roof over the tree (to keep the bamboo in place) and another one over that (to keep the bamboo and styrofoam together) and taped that scaffolding thoroughly. Then I filled the lower box with peanuts, making sure to snug them in. Finally, I slid another 12 x 12 x 12 box over the tree, and down to meet and overlap with the flaps of the first box, and taped it throroughly. I filled the second box with peanuts all the way to the top and closed it up. This way, I had a long skinny box (12 x 12 x 20) with a bamboo scaffolding inside that I could really reach into and get everything in place.
It arrived in perfect condition, and probably took the buyer 20 minutes to disassemble!!
Joanie