Drug Task Force Seize Opium Poppies Mistakenly Grown for Bridal Bouquet

An Australian flower farmer was shocked this week when her bed of pretty pink poppies resulted in a visit from the local drug task force.

Kate Dixon lives in Tasmania, Australia, and has been growing flowers as part of her floral business, Clifton Blooms, for two years.

Largely providing floral arrangements for weddings and events, Dixon is always keen to grow her own beautiful blooms.

"I grow a mix of Australian and South African native flowers," she told Newsweek. "Old-world, cottage-garden favorites—hence why I was growing some of these lovely ornamental poppies."

Dixon frequently shares pictures of her flora on Instagram, and that is how she ended up receiving a call from the Department of Natural Resources and Environment Tasmania (NRE Tas).

"They said to me, 'We've seen your photos on Instagram and we believe that they are restricted poppies,'" said Dixon.

Before long, representatives from NRE Tas were in the garden, digging the plants to take to a botanist at the University of Tasmania in Hobart for testing.

When the results came back, it was revealed that Dixon had accidentally been growing two banned species of poppy: the opium or breadseed (Papaver somniferum); and the Iranian, Persian or the great scarlet (Papaver bracteatum).

Both of these poppies are commercially grown in Tasmania under tight restrictions and used to extract the alkaloid material they contain, which includes morphine, thebaine, and codeine.

However, the poppies are also sometimes illegally planted to create opium tea or heroin, which comes from the gum of opium poppies.

The NRE Tas officers returned and removed more than 50 plants from Dixon's farm.

In the U.S., under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, Papaver somniferum is considered a Schedule II substance—putting it into the same category as methadone and fentanyl.

However, growing these poppies in the U.S. remains technically legal, as long as they are purely for food use or to accentuate your home or garden. The Opium Poppy Control Act of 1942 tried to prevent Americans from growing poppies altogether, but it was difficult to enforce, and the act was repealed in 1970.

Despite some ambiguity in the law and the likelihood that officials would turn a blind eye to one or two plants in a front yard, the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is far from relaxed when it comes to enforcing the rules.

In 2013, a 40-acre opium poppy farm was shut down in Washington State after an undercover agent caught the owner claiming to sell 500 pounds of dried poppy a month.

"I was very shocked, to be honest," said Dixon, recalling the moment she found out that her plants were an illegal substance. "They're available to purchase in run-of-the-mill hardware shops here."

Earlier in November, Food Standards Australia New Zealand issued a national recall of poppy seeds due to the potential presence of high levels of thebaine—the opioid alkaloid.

Meanwhile, the government warned residents against drinking poppy-seed tea that has been linked to more than 32 cases of poppy-seed toxicity in Australia since October.

"People have died from it," said Dixon. "It is a health issue, and obviously I don't want to be doing anything illegal."

When the NRE Tas team arrived to remove the plants, Dixon said they were very kind. "They were lovely, so nice about it," she said. "They're just doing their job. It was a mistake—there was no ill intent on my part."

But after having her plants confiscated, Dixon wanted to spread the word and took to social media to talk about her experience.

"I said you need to make this information more accessible for people to know about poppies," she said. "I know that there are so many other people who have these poppies in their backyard, and they may not know it's a health risk and that it is actually illegal."