Ah, the gorgeous plenty of nature: plants, trees, shrubs, and flowers all around us, whether in tended gardens or wild preserves. The colors, the textures, and the scents delight us. So much so that it can encourage a dark side, and its name is desire: the urge to “adopt” a plant that isn’t ours. 

I am not immune. Every wild fern I come across beckons like the apple in the Garden of Eden. Tucked into cavities between boulders or stretched out in a fern field, their verdant finery is so… tempting. What could the harm possibly be to take just one?

I am not alone in the wondering. Welcome to the world of plant pilfering — whether pocketing a fallen succulent leaf from your local garden center, lifting a common pollinator plant from your local park, or even brazenly snipping a single peony from a neighbor’s garden (surely, they won’t miss a single bloom?). 

Plant lovers are a chatty lot, and dozens of gardening forums and Subreddits are deep in the conversation on this topic. Those who do not pinch do love to tell — and show as well. An anonymous member in the well-named Nosey Neighbors Facebook forum for folks in South Bend, Indiana, posted images of a woman executing an early-morning hibiscus heist — including a snap of the getaway vehicle’s license plate.

Plant-swiping from private property can be serious business. One 18-year-old was arrested in Polk County, Iowa for plucking a single flower from each of two houses. “I picked one flower, and I’m going to jail?” she can be heard asking on video captured by a police officer’s body camera. (She then excitedly asked if a mugshot was in her future.) For the record — the court records — picking a neighbor’s flowers is both misdemeanor theft and criminal trespass. 

As for our public parks, they are treasures to us all, but not a buffet table: Removing any plant or other material is generally illegal. If you were caught green-handed, the park official could ban or arrest you, depending on the park. Visitors are sometimes allowed to forage for nuts, berries, and mushrooms — for personal use only, so leave your duffel bag at home — but these regulations vary from state to state and park to park, so it’s best to confirm the policy before you pocket any souvenirs.

Becoming enamored with and excavating certain plants can trigger much harsher consequences. Currently, 884 plants are protected by the U.S. government’s Endangered Species Act of 1973. And many of these plants aren’t even mildly exotic: In Pennsylvania, the Smooth Purple Coneflower tops the list of at-risk plants; in Kansas, it’s Mead’s Milkweed. Even the humble trillium, which flourishes in woodland settings all across eastern America, has 33 endangered species — including the Persistent Trillium, in defiance of its very name. 

The most endangered plants are those collectors covet: carnivorous plants, rare orchids, succulents — you know, Instagram plants. Cacti may seem engineered to survive anything, but 31 percent of all cactus species are now at risk of extinction. And in North Carolina, the harvest of Venus flytraps was upgraded to a felony. What happens if you decide to transplant one of these beauties into your garden or onto your windowsill? Fines of up to $10,000 and up to six months in jail — more, for repeat offenders.

Here’s why one little plant, spirited away from its home, can make such a difference. “All species provide some function to help the ecosystem thrive,” says Dr. Joshua Daskin, Chief Scientist at NatureServe, a non-profit organization that provides scientific data to guide conservation. Even a common bit of greenery can prevent erosion, sequester carbon, or help pollinators do their vital work.  Pull on a single root, and its tendrils are attached to all of nature.

Time to meet another kind of plant thief, known as a “proplifter” — a person who pockets leaves and stems from plants at garden retailers to take home and propagate. One proplifter posted on X for all to see that at least “half” her houseplants came from “ripping off leaves” from plants at Home Depot. 

The practice may have started innocently enough: Eagle-eyed plant lovers spy a fallen leaf or stem or vine in a store, pocket the bruised treasure, and nurture it into splendid health.

But like most things, it’s a problem of scale. And, yes, entitlement, as proplifters have been known to filch leaves and stems directly off plants, damaging the plant in the process. 

Michael Fiore of Smith’s Gardentown in Wichita Falls, TX, is a fourth-generation garden center owner/operator, with 4.5 acres of greenhouses. In a video, Fiore explains it’s the actual plant growers who pay the price. For most of the plant stock in big box stores, the grower doesn’t get paid until a plant is purchased. “If a plant doesn’t sell” — because it’s looking less than perfect because someone swiped part of the plant — “It’s the grower who gets stuck with that loss,” he says.

Some growers have taken serious steps. Fiore visits wholesale nurseries around the country to stock his stores, and when he visited Aroid Greenhouses in Florida a few years ago, they had a staging room where visitors had to place backpacks and purses in a locker, so there was no way to hide a cutting or a plant. “It was pretty wild,” he says, “But they had plants in there that were four and five thousand dollars.”

My own budget for plants is not nearly so grand. But truth be told, I quite intentionally never add up what I spend each year on my gardening exploits. Because to me, it’s all priceless, anyway. Which, by the way, is the opposite of free.

So I’ll continue to fuel my love of plants and the natural world by walking among them and undoubtedly being tempted at every turn. But I’ll leave what I covet exactly where it is, no matter how sharp my delirium of desire. After all, the inspiration I find always takes root and stays with me.