Native plant finds on private land

What are your options if you find a stand of native plants on private land? If a farmer plants a crop and you go on his land and harvest some for yourself, there's no room for debate. You're stealing. Farmers generally don't plant woodlands, yet on the matter of trees there's still no doubt. If you cut a saw log on someone else's land, you're stealing. For many other things the issue of theft is debatable. One farmer I often trespassed on would sometimes ask me if I was hunting gensing. He asked it in a tone that implied simple curiosity rather than objection, but that may have been a ruse to lure me into an admission. I never hunted gensing on anyone's land. I think that would be theft because gensing is of unquestionable monetary value. These gray areas can be resolved by asking yourself this question - Does the landowner place any value on the thing you want to acquire?
Rocks for instance. I have visited retail establishments that offered decorative rocks for sale. A big boulder might cost over $100. But to a farmer, field rocks are a nuisance, something to haul off and get rid of. I like to collect rocks to make small decorative ledges and to place in erodible spots like the top of my pond dike. The neighboring farm, which has been row cropped to the point of exposing the upper layers of bedrock in places, is like a rock quarry for me. I sometimes make forays onto that farm after it's been gone over with a ripper to see what's been turned up. I once collected a limestone bench rock from that place that was so big, I couldn't even lift one side of it. I used a 6 foot pry bar to get it up onto some round posts and rolled it the 200 feet or so to my fence line. I then used my tractor and a hayfork to take it to where I wanted it. The neighbor never inquired if I had seen any suspicious characters in the neighborhood who might be rock thieves.
Now to plants - No doubt about it. If I gather a mess of roasting ears from my neighbor's corn field, I'm stealing. If my cows break out and eat some of my neighbor's corn, I'm responsible for their damage. But what about the ground hog who lives in my barn lot and crosses the road to eat my neighbor's corn? Am I responsible for that ground hog's actions? Damn, I hope not. It would set a dangerous precedent (for me) to hold a ground hog's host responsible for its actions.
Speaking of dangerous precedents, I recently brought up the idea of telling a landowner that a wild flower stand had monetary value and was told that saying anything about money to a landowner would set a dangerous precedent. If you offered money to one landowner, all would soon come to expect it.
Uh, that was my point! People always prick up their ears at the mere mention of money. Aquisitiveness may be the only trait that is universally shared. So how do you use money as an element of persuasion without offering money yourself? The appraisers on Antiques Road Show don't tell those who have brought in their finds, "I will personally give you x dollars for your rusty widget." No, they give them an estimated retail value at auction. And although no money has changed hands, feelings have changed. The rusty widget kept in the back of the garage will now be placed on the living room mantle piece.
But what monetary value might these native plants have? I looked through Roundstone Seed Company's wildflower list to check on retail prices. I found that a plant I host on my own farm - Swamp Milkweed - at $495 per pound, is the 4th most expensive wildflower seed that they offer in bulk. There are many wildflowers for which they list no bulk weight price. Goat's Rue for instance. I paid $5.30 for a seed packet of Goat's Rue that probably didn't weigh .01 once. Could I turn the Swamp Milkweed on my place into money? Doubt it. The whole stand probably wouldn't have more than a fraction of one pound of seed and wouldn't pay for the sweat it would take to hand harvest it. While I probably won't attempt to turn my swamp milkweed into a cash crop, I confess it raises my personal valuation of it to know that it's expensive. And I suspect that many in my neighborhood, who place zero value on aesthetics, biodiversity, history or anything else of that sort, might see that old field corner with new eyes if they thought the things on it were worth money.

הועלה ב-יולי 14, 2018 08:52 אחה"צ על ידי frank-lyne