South Korean Plant Poacher Jailed After Being Caught with $600,000 of Rare Plants
I had no idea that plant poaching was even a thing:
The leader of an international plant poaching ring has pleaded guilty to digging up thousands of succulents from remote state parks in California to ship to Asia to sell for giant profits, federal prosecutors said.
Byungsu Kim, 46, of South Korea, was accused with two co-conspirators of flying to Los Angeles in 2018, and then driving to small state parks in northern California where they illegally dug up numerous Dudleya plants.
The plants are prized in Asia, but take years to grow in nurseries, so those growing in the wild along the California coast have become a major target for poachers, authorities say. Black market Dudleyas can sell for up to $1,000 each, wildlife experts say.
Market Watch
What do they do with these? some medicinal use? Around here in Michigan, there’s a long tradition of Koreans going to some remote rural area and gathering some plant or another. Lots of they go up north near Camp Grayling to pick Kosarii in the woods, or down by Cabelas in Dundee to pick “gotenamul” in the spring (they were picking it in a park until they got busted with $500 fines. My wife and I travelled all over digging up Korean plants and bringing them back to our property to plant-we now have a real Korean farm-maybe the biggest patch of Minarii in the state, and they come from all around to cut it. We also have about 100 Korean pear trees, but a late April snowstorm and freeze killed off all the blossoms this year.