Flower growers are warped by 'scary' nighttime raids

Two horticulturists who fought back after crippling losses from torrential rains earlier this year feel violated, after discovering thieves repeatedly sneaked in to steal their flowers at night.< /p>Key Points: Flowers were stolen from Julie and Erin Dore's farm early Monday morningThe Dores believe they were repeatedly targeted as the raids angered the hard-working mother-daughter team.

"I was pissed; if I found out who it was I would hate to think what I would actually do, I'm so angry," Erin Dore said.

"I was just shocked there were such desperate and sad people."

Erin Dore says no one else in the area grows or sells purple delphiniums like these stolen from the farm. (Submitted: Erin Dore)< /figure>

Julie Doré contacted her daughter Monday morning after two stems of their signature purple and white delphiniums disappeared overnight.

The flowers had taken six months to grow.

"I was planning on having a day off, a holiday," Erin Dore said.

"We'd like to do a wedding on the weekend, so we were pretty tired, and she just texted me and said, 'Did you harvest one our big purple delphiniums?'"

The answer was no, and the couple soon realized that snapdragons, gerberas, wallflowers and cornhusks were missing also.

A trail of petals ran out of the property on the street of Gympie's Southside.

The thieves left a trail of broken flowers behind them. (Submitted: Erin Dore)

"Once we started chatting, we realized we thought this had been happening for a while," Erin said.

"I thought Erin dropped a few as she was running to get things and she thought I dropped a few, and we had seen for a few weeks," Julie added.

"So we just don't know how many we've really lost, just a few missing here and there ."