Lucky Trees

From the Wall Street Journal

As Chinese Pine Away
For 'Lucky' Trees,
Illegal Trade Grows

Inspector Brooks Patrols Hills
To Nab Smuggling Gangs;
Prosecutors Lose a Case
By WENDY LEE
October 23, 2006; Page A1

HONG KONG -- Roger Brooks, a senior inspector for the Hong Kong police department, used to spend his time chasing petty thieves and investigating murder cases. Now he is trying to nab a new kind of criminal: men who steal "lucky" trees.

The tree that Mr. Brooks is trying to protect is the Buddhist pine, or luohansong -- believed by the Chinese to bring good luck. Smuggling gangs from mainland China come to Hong Kong's forests at night to steal scores of the evergreen trees. They dig them out of the ground, chop off leaves and limbs to make them more portable, and pile them in boats.

Mr. Brooks, 39 years old, calls the thieves a "thorn to society."


The Buddhist pine has long been admired in China. Its open leaves let sunlight through, scaring away shadows and giving it valuable feng shui, or natural harmony, according to Hong Kong botanists. Its fleshy red seeds are believed to resemble disciples of the Buddha. And a popular proverb holds that its owner will never be poor in this lifetime.

Until now, most Chinese were too poor to afford to buy decorative trees like the luohansong and test the proverb. And the few who collected the tree bought small, potted versions that can be pruned like a bonsai. But with China's economy booming, middle-class businessmen want the luohansong for themselves, especially mature trees that have grown in the wild and are even more prized for their sinuous form.

A wild luohansong can fetch more than $1,000, Hong Kong police say. Sellers of the tree in southern China, however, say they have sold wild luohansong for tens of thousands of dollars.

China's economic boom -- and the tree's lucky reputation -- could prove unlucky for the tree itself. Academics and environmentalists predict that if the smuggling continues at current rates, Hong Kong's parks may become bereft of the Buddhist pine in 50 years. The tree can take 10 years to produce seeds.

"I have never seen people treat living trees like that," says C.Y. Jim, chairman of the University of Hong Kong's geography department and a tree expert.

The craze for the conifer is also bringing mixed fortunes for sellers of the tree: While sales are up, so are brazen attempts to steal them. Knife-wielding thieves recently broke into Weng Yongquan's nursery near the southern Chinese city of Chaozhou, killed his dog, and stole away with some of his trees. Now, Mr. Weng says he sleeps in his garden every night to deter poachers.

While the slow-growing tree, known to scientists as Podocarpus macrophyllus, grows in China and other parts of Asia, it is most easily accessible on Hong Kong's tree-lined coasts, just a short boat ride from the Chinese mainland. The poachers feed their booty into the black market, and the trees end up for sale in southern Chinese cities like Guangzhou. The evergreens are purchased by both mainland businessmen and Hong Kong Chinese on shopping jaunts, say Hong Kong authorities.

The smuggling creates a cat-and-mouse game between tree thieves and Mr. Brooks, who leads patrols of the area's rugged foothills. So far this year, police patrols have seized 292 trees and arrested 77 poachers in Hong Kong.

"It's like finding a needle in a haystack," said Mr. Brooks during a recent patrol, wearing camouflage and wraparound designer sunglasses. He and five accompanying officers braved a haze of mosquitoes and the blazing sun as they made their way over slippery boulders and dense brush, scanning the river's edge for the bare roots of stolen trees.

Even when police find the poachers, catching them is difficult. During a recent raid, police used helicopters to ferry in as many as 120 officers clad with night-vision goggles. At around 3 a.m., the police set off flares and moved in. Half a dozen surprised young men dropped their trees and vanished in the brush, according to Mr. Brooks. Cornered poachers often jump over cliffs to avoid capture, he said.

Although the thieves gravitate to the remote parks near Hong Kong, they have also been known to dig up the prized pines right in the backyards of well-heeled Hong Kong residents. Some in Hong Kong now bring their potted miniatures indoors at night.

Buddhist-tree thieves can get two and a half years in prison, says Stanley Chan, Hong Kong's senior assistant director of public prosecutions. But there is a catch: Prosecutors must prove the pines are from Hong Kong. This year, 32 suspects escaped conviction and were instead deported to the mainland, according to Hong Kong police. Many suspects claim their stash was from the mainland, says Mr. Chan. Frustrated prosecutors are considering costly testing on the soil that remains on the roots.

Last March, prosecutors lost a case on appeal in Hong Kong's High Court involving seven smugglers found on two boats laden with Buddhist pines, heading away from Hong Kong and toward the mainland. One suspect said he had gone out on a pleasure trip and had no idea how 26 trees got on his boat, according to court documents.

The stolen trees make their way to places like the 24-hour Ling Nan Flower Market in Guangzhou. Li Xiaoping, who started his store 20 years ago selling the tree, says it has become so popular that during the tree's peak spring planting season, he can sell a cart of his nursery-grown trees to other sellers every 10 days for about $750 -- a small fortune in China.

Mr. Li also buys smuggled trees from the wild at the request of his customers. He declined to name his sources. "This is business," he said. "So long as someone wants it, we have to get it."

No one seems certain how the proverb about luck came about. The tree is often free of diseases, and Prof. Jim of the University of Hong Kong conjectures that "if the tree is healthy, then probably people will be healthy. If they are healthy, they can make money." Some of the Guangzhou merchants claim the consumers themselves made up the proverb to feel better about spending so much money on a tree.

Kee Pui-yi, a 46-year-old who works for the Hong Kong government, hasn't had luck with her tree so far. She bought in to the craze about a year ago, spending $12 on a small potted pine. But after carefully tending to her tree, it died six months later. She then bought a second tree, which sits by her living room window and is now close to dying. She says she plans to buy a third one soon.

"I really hope good luck will happen," she says.

Hong Kong legislator Choy So-yuk didn't fare much better. Ms. Choy was given a small luohansong by a friend. Despite tending to her tree meticulously, she notes that the pine has yet to bring luck. Then again, when she tried to register it with the city's environmental protection department as a wild luohansong, she found out it wasn't wild at all, but raised in a nursery