"Rare Plants" and the Illegal Plant Trade feat. Alocasia 'Silver Dragon' and Philodendron 'Silver Sword'

You might have heard us talk about the illegal plant trade and how it relates to popular “rare” plants. To catch you up, people are going into the wild to illegally harvest succulents, cacti, aroids, orchids, carnivorous plants, etc, selling them mostly online or in open air markets. The Alocasia Silver Dragon and Philodendron Silver Sword are considered “rare” bc they’re not cultivated on a wide enough scale to consistently keep them in stock / regularly available at your local nursery. The Alocasia Silver Dragon is a “cultivar” or “hybrid” (a man-made cross of two Alocasia species, denoted by “var” before the species name), while the Philo. hestatum “Silver Sword” is a plant native to SE Brazil. The Alocasia is the result of 2 different Alocasia species that were genetically crossed to create the silver dragon cultivar. You’ll never find a silver dragon in the wild because humans created them in a lab! The Philo. Silver Sword was taken from the wild at some point in the past, not created in a lab (we’d need to research when/who/how it was first harvested and cultivated).

According to the IUCN Red List  (an online database that describes if a species is plentiful in the wild, at risk, endangered, extinct), the Silver Sword is “least concern,” though it was last assessed in 2010. Indoor plants have boomed over the last 5 years, so any illegal poaching of the Silver Sword has not yet been described by the IUCN. Why? Not enough ppl are becoming botanists, and the conservation of plants is massively underfunded. We wish we knew how plentiful the silver sword might be in the wild, but unless we take a flight to Brazil, the answer might not be easy to find. People have also driven certain species to extinction by telling the public where they’re still growing in the wild… so in some sense it’s also good for this info to stay limited to those within the world of conservation.  

For all these reasons, we’ve waited to stock any lesser cultivated, hard to find Alocasias, Monsteras, Philodendrons, etc. until they’re available (and much cheaper!) from our regular suppliers. When a lesser cultivated plant gains popularity (especially online via social media), but it’s not yet widely available at your local nursery, the act of looking online and importing/shipping a plant has become a common practice among plant enthusiasts. The connection with the illegal plant trade and buying online is that unless you can get official paperwork from the seller that they’re an accredited grower, their sourcing might be suspect. Not only that, ppl also steal cuttings from plants in botanical gardens because they know they can propagate them for $$$.

It takes a few years for larger growers to catch up with demand, and it takes time for the varieties to go through enough quality control to make sure that they will withstand all the transport / acclimation needed to get a plant from greenhouse to plant shop, and finally to your home. For a while, large greenhouses mainly catered to office buildings, malls, etc…not like nowadays, when the market has shifted to the individual. I always think of the meme “woman can’t figure out why plant which evolved to live in Borneo Rainforest keeps dying in her studio apartment.” Shipping plants puts them into significant stress and requires a buyer who is prepared to nurse it back to health. There’s an obvious market for “rare” varieties, and our main growers are certainly beginning to catch up with that demand. 

We would rather wait to stock these varieties until the industry has caught up, which not only guarantees that the plants are healthier but also free from being illegally harvested. The other benefit is cost- as our growers catch up with demand, the price of “rare” plants goes down! We’re super excited to see our suppliers stocking harder to find plants, and we hope you will be as fascinated and awe-inspired by them as we are.