Stolen mushroom owner loses his Shiitake

Durban - The theft of a prop mushroom, which stands as tall as a man and adorned with lights, has angered the owners of a Durban events company after the toadstool was pilfered two weeks ago.

Cheers Hiring is now offering a R3 000 reward for their mushroom's safe return.

The company's David Cheek said that shroom had gone missing from an event two weeks ago, during the early hours of the morning.

"In this case, a client hired the mushroom and it went missing during an event two weeks ago. From what we can tell, between 04:00 and 08:00 one large mushroom went missing," he said.

Cheek described the missing mushroom as "huge" and said it would be difficult to hide.

"It is huge and it is made of fibreglass with the polystyrene core. It has lights so the whole thing illuminates.

Ransom note

"This is the weirdest thing, the only thing I can think of is that some drunken person thought it was funny to put it into a car and drive off with it," Cheek added.

He said that they had decided to offer a reward, as making another mushroom of similar size would be time-consuming.

"For us to make the prop is extremely time consuming so we are offering a R3 000 reward for anyone who finds it."  

"Listen, we can see the funny side of this. Someone even emailed is a faux ransom note and we were in hysterics, but it would be nice to have it back," he said.

In the ransom note, the perpetrator writes: "We HAvE yoUr PREcIOUSmuShrOOm. IT'S Safe.foR nOW. if YOu WAnt Tosee MUshroOm AGaiN, wEwAnt R6000 cASh. Letus kNow wHEn you HaveMoney aNd
we WiLlSPEAK TheN. GooD bii [sic]"

A 'threatening' photo was also sent to Cheek

If you know the whereabouts of the missing mushroom, email jeff.wicks@24.com.