RFID to Thieves: Just stay away from Saguaros

Filed in archive Implementation on March 13, 2009

I thought it was just impossible to uproot Saguaro Cacti (one of the tallest cactus plants) and tow it away but the act of thieves at the Saguaro National Park proved me wrong. I would say hats off to these guys to have been able to uproot and carry off these gigantic cactus plants which could weigh several tones but these thieves didn't seem to realize that walking off with park property was a crime.

Since it's nearly impossible to keep a manual watch on nearly one million saguaros at the park, the officials have decided to deter such bold acts of thieves which could fetch them as much as $2000 per catch by putting RFID to use.

RFID tags implemented in cattle stock will be inserted in the saguaro using needle and are expected to last for more than two hundred years. These chips are priced at $4 and if your mind calculator terms it as an expensive proposition since it involves a million saguaro then hold on as only the cacti in their prime would be tagged because targeting too young or too old saguaro is not practical for the thieves (the young ones wont fetch much and the older ones cant be carried away easily).

Here the use of RFID tags can neither help to track stolen cactus plants nor sound an alarm but people feel that since technology is being used they could be easily tracked and might get caught by the law. This aspect is certainly acting as a huge deterrent for thieves as of now. There has already been a case where a man walked off with more than $1 million worth of saguaro over and we certainly won't like to have another millionaire in the making!!