Dudleya Farinosa Replanting Effort

In April 2018, a team of California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) staff and volunteers spent hours working to replant than 2,000 Dudleya succulents that were seized as part of a poaching investigation on the Northern California coast.
The sheer volume of plants made it necessary to put a call out for help from volunteer botanists. The response was overwhelming. More than 20 succulent experts from the California Native Plant Society and U.C. Santa Cruz arboretum, along with National Parks Service personnel, assisted CDFW wildlife officers and seven environmental scientists on the replanting project. The replanted succulents will be monitored over the next week to ensure the greatest chance for survival.
Dudleya are commonly seen along some rocky shorelines in Mendocino and Humboldt counties, but can only occupy a very specific ecological niche, making them highly susceptible to poaching. CDFW Environmental Scientist Michael van Hattem calls Dudleya “the botanical version of abalone,” in the sense that they are a sensitive species, dependent on their habitat. Without a concerted effort to reverse the effects of such a large poaching operation, van Hattem says, the ecosystem would be irreversibly damaged.