A furious row has blown up in the UK's leading succulent society over the practice of taking desirable specimens from the wild, with the chair resigning in protest over the behaviour of his fellow enthusiasts. Succulents have risen in popularity in recent years: they are attractive and hardy. A succulent won the Royal Horticultural Society plant of the year award in the UK in 2022, while the plants have also become wildly popular in Asian countries, leading to a massive boom in demand. However, the drought-tolerant plants are often sourced from the wild. South Africa is home to a third of the world’s succulent species, and a huge number of plants come from there, according to scientists. There is also a growing succulent smuggling crisis in California, where some rare types grow. Some countries have taken drastic action: it is, for example, illegal to take cacti out of Mexico.