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dangerbunny does texas |
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Mississippi
Looking for rare trees and invasive non-native plants is not a sport I would recommend for travelers in Mississippi. Years ago, early one Sunday morning while slowly driving through a small town in Mississippi, I was carefully looking at the trees. I had spotted a number of ginkgo saplings and seedlings when I noticed red lights flashing in my rear view mirror. I was being closely followed by not one but two police cars. As soon as I was stopped, one car blocked me from the front and the other from the rear.
Since I was going less than 20 m.p.h. I thought this would be a minor stop, for a tail light perhaps. The sergeant was quickly called on the radio, which I thought seemed strange for a minor violation. Soon I was completely surrounded by armed police. Fortunately, since there was no traffic at this time of the morning, there was little community interest in this major drug bust.
A quick perusal of my car turned up a sun-bleached, pinnately compound leaf from Texas. I assured the assembled police force that this was not Cannabis sativa, a plant with a palmately compound leaf, but rather the leaf of a mesquite. It was one left over from a class I taught, I explained. This fell on deaf ears. What is a mesquite anyway? Mesquites are rare as cats teeth in northern Mississippi. Within 30 minutes my car had been searched from stem to stern. A search dog arrived and enthusiastically "lept" out of the police car, bounded over to my car and proceeded to professionally sniff each of my car tires.
We all stood and watched the dog work. Right away the dog found an interesting bag of seeds. One disappointed officer looked at them and said slightly incredulously, "These are acorns". I agreed, and noted that they were live oak acorns to be more specific. Calls went out on the radio, broadcasting my license number to neighboring town, distant towns and even to Alabama.
Next, the dog looked at my plant press but he wasn't interested in cardboard and blotters. The dog continued exploring the bags and finally looked up at it's handler, at a loss. The original officer opened another paper bag and told me that it was a bag pecans. I listened, and mentioned that they were really shag bark hickory nuts. They opened every bag in the car and the trunk but early on I stopped correcting their identifications.
Then there was a short huddle and a decision was begrudgingly reached that I could go. I did! On the way back to Texas, a presidential caravan would not have had more security than I did. Every time I would cross a county line, a new deputy would take up the slow pursuit.
If other botanists have been the cause of as much wasted police time as I have, botanists should put large signs on their vehicles. No doubt real weed smugglers appreciated my efforts as an unpaid decoy. Actually, when you see a car with a plant press strapped down on top, that is a good sign that you have nabbed a botanist or, at least, a student botanist. I never returned to Mississippi to try to find more ginkgo trees escaping from cultivation. I kind of avoid the state a little bit.
