Word: walnuts
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...Walnut Creek, Calif...
...molded plastic papoose is propped on what looks like an unscratchable table top whose resins have been stroked into a semblance of rose wood or walnut. A bowl of wax fruit pledges eternal ripeness. An imitation slate counter neatly divides the family room from the kitchen area. Through an expanse of sliding glass doors, the electric company's pylons can be seen striding across the valley, a step ahead of the subdivisions...
Sometimes the thieves will even approach a farmer and offer to cut his deadwood. Then, says Craig Beek, head of Iowa's Bureau of Criminal Investigation, "Zippo, like a flash, they'll take your walnut trees too." Another ploy is to approach the landowner and ask to buy the trees, promising payment when they are sold to mills. The cutters then disappear with the logs, and the farmer never sees them again...
James Vavra, an Illinois game warden, has set up a makeshift defense against the black walnut marketeers. He has organized farmers to be on the lookout for trucks with winches on private property, and to report strange nocturnal sounds to the local sheriff-especially the mmmbrrp of a muffled buzz saw. Last month the system helped catch three thieves in Illinois' De Kalb County. They are now awaiting trial on charges of grand theft, criminal damage to property and criminal trespass...
Despite alert farmers, the tree thieves are still reaping a rich harvest. Mill owners are too happy to see black walnut logs to ask embarrassing questions, and new state laws designed to reduce tree rustling are proving hard to enforce. Thieves at work near Monroe, Iowa, added insult to injury. Spotting a black walnut tree near a house, they noticed that the residents were not at home. In felling the towering tree, however, they sent it crashing onto the house, causing $2,000 in damage. Undaunted, they cut off the top of the tree, took the trunk and left...