FEDERAL WAY, Wash. — Thieves stole thousands of dollars worth of bonsai trees from the Pacific Bonsai Museum in Federal Way over the weekend, according to museum officials.
Surveillance video from the museum shows two shadowy figures walking through the museum early Sunday morning before it opened.
Assistant Curator Scarlet Gore said the men kicked in a gate and took two bonsais: a Japanese Black Pine and a Silverberry.
Kathy McCabe, Executive Director of the museum, said the missing trees are more than 70 years old and have rich histories.
“The Japanese Black Pine was grown from a seed in a tin can by a Japanese-American who was incarcerated during World War II,” she said.
According to a press release from the museum, that bonsai artist was Jizaburo Furuzawa. The Silverberry Bonsai, McCabe said, was cultivated by a female bonsai artist, Kiyoko Hatanaka, a rarity in the 1940s.
McCabe said the trees could suffer irreversible damage if they are not returned.
“They will be severely damaged or could perish if not properly cared for and that can happen within days,” McCabe said.
Gore said this is not the first time thieves have targeted the museum. In May 2015, someone stole a juniper bonsai. Two days later, the tree was returned, but it had been repotted and its branches had been severely shorn.
“It spent two years in recovery,” said Gore. The tree is healthy now, and Gore is hoping for a similar happy ending for the missing bonsais.
“That’s our hope that these trees come back, that they will spend the next 70 years here on view for everybody to enjoy,” Gore said.