{"id":111350,"date":"2015-07-02T17:38:16","date_gmt":"2015-07-02T23:38:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/have-you-seen-this-plant\/"},"modified":"2015-07-02T17:38:16","modified_gmt":"2015-07-02T23:38:16","slug":"have-you-seen-this-plant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/have-you-seen-this-plant\/","title":{"rendered":"Have you seen this plant?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"\"
Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald photo illustration<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

This time of year, the city is a glorious riot of flora: Potted plants dot Main Avenue, and public and private gardens swell with blooms.<\/p>\n

Yet not all is rosy for pro-flower Durango residents, thanks to a thorny problem: plant theft, a criminal act that, in the last few months, has brought a couple of residents into open conflict in the streets and spurred one enraged downtown gardener to install security cameras in her flower beds.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s infuriating,\u201d Garden Club member Marsha Schuetz said. Every summer, she said, flower bandits strike the rose bushes at the Santa Rita Rose Garden, most likely working in the middle of the night with shears and a getaway car.<\/p>\n

This summer is no different.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just irritates the heck out of us. They wait until they\u2019re in full bloom, then descend and take whole bouquets \u2013 a dozen or two dozen roses at a time,\u201d Schuetz said. \u201cTaking that many in the cloak of darkness; it\u2019s planned, although you don\u2019t know whether they\u2019re eco-terrorists or taking them for a wedding.\u201d<\/p>\n

Durango Police Department spokesman Lt. Ray Shupe said plant-stealing is infrequent in Durango, and mostly, such thefts are misdemeanors because the damages aren\u2019t monetarily significant.<\/p>\n

But victims of plant theft say the emotional impact of the crime is outsized, experienced not as a financial loss but a personal one. Most are left to speculate about thieves\u2019 baffling motivations.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy would someone do that?\u201d Shuetz asked.<\/p>\n

Durango Botanical Society member Cindy Smart said though Durango\u2019s gardening world can be high stakes, she doubted anyone would steal flowers out of garden-envy.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe it\u2019s greed,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In fact, this summer, the owner of one residential garden in downtown Durango told Durango police that she saw someone leave her property in the middle of the night holding a box that she estimates contained $240 of her looted flowers then get \u201cinto a white truck with lettering on the door.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to police reports, it was the second time burglars had targeted that property in two years. The victim is installing security cameras, so she refused to be identified.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a professional job,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Yet Diana Wilkening, owner of Botanical Concepts Garden Center, said Durango has no \u201cblack-Dahlia\u201d market for illicitly purloined plants and it would be \u201cextremely risky\u201d to flog them to Durango\u2019s few nurseries, where workers can easily spot hot vegetation.<\/p>\n

Based on police calls, plant thefts don\u2019t conform to a single, over-arching pattern. Sometimes, the bounty is shrubs; other times, it is flowers.<\/p>\n

In March 2013, when someone brazenly swiped flowers from the Original Durango Dawg House, the business, which overlooks the well-lit intersection of Main Avenue and College Drive, caught the opportunistic perpetrator absconding with a potted plant on video.<\/p>\n

So far this summer, police have received two reports of plant theft, one from south City Market, the other from a Durango resident,\u201d Shupe said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not very prevalent \u2013 I don\u2019t think we\u2019re seeing a trend,\u201d Shupe said.<\/p>\n

But victims of plant theft interviewed by The Durango Herald said they never reported the crime to law enforcement. Shuetz said the Botanical Society volunteer gardeners did not call police about the beheaded roses. \u201cWhat can they do? You can\u2019t shame people with no shame,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Last week, Durango resident Kristen Smith \u2013 who loves the flowers that grow in the city lot across from her apartment at the Florida Road roundabout \u2013 caught two green-thumbed robbers red-handed on her daily commute into town.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis lady was carrying a newspaper bag with an iris that had been dug up from the root, and her male companion was carrying a trowel,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

Incensed, she confronted the couple, who she thinks later returned the iris, disgraced.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a terrible crime. I just don\u2019t know why someone would do that. But I didn\u2019t call the cops,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n

Carolyn Bowra, executive director of the Animas Museum, said almost two years ago, staff workers were \u201chorrified\u201d when they went to water the plants and discovered that an entire rose bush that had recently been donated to the museum had disappeared \u2013 apparently snatched in the night.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re a nonprofit, for crying in the sink. Volunteers tend our gardens, and when there\u2019s plant-napping, their generous good work is violated,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Though still angry about the boosted rose bush, at the time, Bowra didn\u2019t feel able to report the theft to the police.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t want to be that crazy lady who calls 911 and says, \u2018Somebody stole my bush, but I don\u2019t know when.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Victims of plant-theft attribute their reluctance to report the crime to various factors, both spiritual and practical, including sudden loss of faith that justice can ever be done in a world where flowers go missing and skepticism that the police will be able to do anything about it.<\/p>\n

Durango police\u2019s Shupe said plant thefts are indeed \u201chard crimes to solve.\u201d Unless the thief is caught in the act, most plant-theft investigations go cold.<\/p>\n

The Herald discovered only one instance of plant theft in recent years that ended in the thief\u2019s apprehension. In October 2013, the Durango Police Department ticketed one woman for malicious injury to property after a witness spotted her helping herself to flowers at Mercy Regional Medical Center, damaging six plants valued at about $20 a piece.<\/p>\n

According to the police report, when confronted, the woman told police, \u201cI was just picking a few flowers.\u201d<\/p>\n

cmcallister@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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