Sago Palm Thefts Rise as Thieves Discover Small Trees’ High Value

Marie Bunnell awoke Monday morning to find a gaping hole in the front yard of her Yorba Linda home. Down the street, Andree Noeppe stepped outside to discover a similar hole in his front yard.

Someone had made off with their miniature palm trees during the night.

These Sago palm thefts are just the latest to hit Yorba Linda. In the last month, dozens of the small palms have been stolen, police say.

The trees make an attractive target, police and landscapers say, because they can sell for hundreds or even thousands of dollars, depending on their height. The palms grow so slowly--about one inch a year--that mature trees are considered prized additions to a garden.

“I always warn the people who want to plant them in the front yard that it is better to plant them in the back yard where they can keep them under lock and key,” said Gary Huddleston, manager of the Country Garden Nursery in Placentia.

Sago palm thefts also have been reported in Cypress, Fullerton and Garden Grove over the past year.

In Los Angeles County, sheriff’s deputies reported that a number of the small palms were uprooted and stolen in the Santa Clarita Valley about two months ago. Sago palms have also disappeared in the San Gabriel Valley and around Whittier, nursery shop owners say.

Up until a month ago, police in Yorba Linda would receive only an occasional report of a stolen Sago, said Lt. Chester Panique of the Brea Police Department, which provides police protection for adjoining Yorba Linda.

Nowadays, “we might get seven or eight taken in one night,” Panique said.

In almost every case, Panique and other police officials in the region said, the palms were taken from residential areas, where homeowners show them off in their front gardens. Because the trees have shallow roots and reach only about five feet high, they are easily uprooted and carted away, officials said.

In the case of Monday’s Avenida de Marcia double theft, Panique said someone “just pulled out” the trees belonging to Bunnell and Noeppe. Each tree was valued at around $500, Panique said.

As in almost all such thefts, Brea police have no suspects and express skepticism that the trees will be recovered. The trees, Panique said, are virtually impossible to trace and identify, and criminals therefore feel safe peddling them.

The Sago palm is indigenous to South Africa and Mexico. It was transplanted earlier this century to Southern California, where it has thrived in the region’s Mediterranean climate, said Jack Wick, regulatory consultant for the California Assn. of Nurserymen in Sacramento.

Sago trees, because of their high prices, are more likely to be found in upper-income neighborhoods, said Lynn Strohsahl, an Irvine nurseryman and past president of the Southern California Nursery Growers Assn.

Although seedling trees 12 to 18 inches high can be had for as little as $20, nursery industry officials say that a medium-size Sago will run about $500 and that the older and taller the tree, the higher the price. Sago trees more than 100 years old fetch prices as high as $15,000, Strohsahl said.

Harold Smith, 73, a retired grocer living in Garden Grove, said he planted his first Sago tree when he moved into his home about 35 years ago. Smith said he added three more over the years because “I like them very much. It’s just a nice tree.”

But last fall, thieves hauled off three of Smith’s beloved Sagos. He then chained the fourth to the ground--and it has remained safe.

“I drove a metal stake in the ground six feet under and put the chain on that,” Smith said Monday. “There’s no way you can cut this with bolt cutters.