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A plant thief has been caught in action dressed all in black, wearing gloves and filling his bag with flowers plucked out of their potters on Agricola Street in Halifax.

About 10 potters filled with red, yellow and pink Begonias were put on Agricola’s sidewalks by the North End Business Association a few weeks ago to beautify the street.

“This isn’t a city project, it’s actually paid for by the local business community, so that hurts,” said Patty Cuttell-Busby, the executive director of the North End Business Association.

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She said the association has lost about $253 worth of flowers since they were stolen.

Some of the flowers were right next to Yasmine Grocery, which unbeknownst to the thief, has a CCTV system that caught him in action.

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“The thief comes quite prepared,” said Cuttell-Busby, who notified the non-emergency police line after seeing the footage.

A still image from the CCTV footage. Yasmine Grocery

The theft took place on the first night the potters were put out. They were later replaced.

“There’s been kind of like a slow theft of flowers happening over the last two weeks, though since Saturday there seems to be an escalation in the number of flowers that have gone missing.”

Holes from where the flowers got stolen. Global News/Aya Al-Hakim

Many of the potters now are near empty of flowers.

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The association put up a post on their Facebook page on Wednesday calling upon the thief to stop.

“To whoever is doing this, you know, this is really for everybody’s enjoyment and I really wish you’d stop stealing our begonias or any of our plants,” Cuttell-Busby said.