Among the many secrets of the cannabis world, there are 10 bizarre ways growers guard pot farms that go beyond the usual security measures. Many already know about the infamous Emerald Triangle on the Lost Coast. Cannabis farms in this area of Northern California have remained hidden from detection for decades within the dense redwood forest. The tallest trees in the world are the perfect canopy of cover and a natural guard against intruders.

10 Booby Traps

Just as pirates planted booby traps in caves to ward off thieves from their tantalizing treasures, so have pot farmers used these devices to protect their lucrative investments. These traps range from trip wires that trigger fragmentation grenades to acid-filled buckets suspended in the trees. Growers have even been known to dig pits with hidden nails and sharpened sticks to impale intruders.

In Cleveland, Ohio, County Sheriff Keith Wood was the victim of such a leg trap. His boot was pierced with a long nail positioned beneath a thin wooden slab. Wood said, “We routinely see them. Traps are always something we have to be mindful of. There’s a lot of money involved, and (growers) are trying to protect what’s theirs.”

Unfortunately, a trap recently backfired on a grower in New York. Daniel Ricketts used several methods to protect his farm, including barbed wire and a leg trap that is often used for coyotes. However, it was an invisible piano wire he had planted that nearly decapitated him as he steered his ATV directly into it full throttle.

10 Bizarre Ways In Practice

9 Secret Bookcase Doors

It’s everyone’s dream to have a bookcase that secretly opens up to a hidden room. Now imagine the room is filled to the brim with blossoming green buds and the pungent smell of marijuana.

It’s no fairy tale. In a man’s garage in Texas, a bookcase rested against the wall hiding a secret door. Police found a specialized key that triggered a magnet behind the door. It opened to a dark stairwell that led them to an underground chamber where they were greeted with $1 million worth of marijuana.

In another case in Essex, England, a man owned a pub called The Joker. Behind the pub’s seemingly innocent bookshelf, there was a small metal door. His secret might never have been revealed if it hadn’t been for a slight hole in the wall that enabled police to see the heat lamps and hydroponic system.

In another major slipup in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, two newlyweds were arguing in the basement when the wife noticed that a mirror and bookcase had been moved. She entered a door into a room she hadn’t known existed to find her husband’s illegal operation in full swing. He whacked her upside the head with one of his plants, and then she called the police.

8 Robots

In recent years, there has been a movement toward using robot security patrols for outdoor marijuana crops. In California, the growers of Canndescent tested out this idea with the help of the company Sharp Intellos. They implemented automated unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) to guard the perimeter in the evenings.

Todd Kleperis, chief executive officer of Hardcar Security, explained that robots are the most effective in this endeavor because humans are naturally flawed. He said, “At night, guards sleep, they play video games, and spend time on social media. It’s fraught with human error.”

So robots are the natural solution. Kleperis said, “If you’ve ever been shot at, it’s very scary. These robots can take a gunshot better than a human.” Robots do not return the gunfire but merely alert the humans when something is amiss. However, Kleperis mentioned that he is considering adding a pepper spray function in the future.

7 Armed Scarecrow

A sophisticated operation with campsites, water pumps, and 10,000 1.8-meter-high (6 ft) marijuana plants was discovered near Dallas, Texas. The 5-acre site, just outside a rest stop, was so well hidden that it was only discovered via an anonymous tip.

First, police approached the site with a drone. Then they needed a bulldozer to clear a path through the dense woods. When they arrived, the only guard in sight was a sinister scarecrow positioned in a hammock with a tilted hat over its face, boots on, and a fake rifle strapped across its chest.

The presence of a gun makes it clear that the dummy was a deterrent, not for hungry crows but humans who have strayed too far from the rest stop.

6 Thin Black Screen

Sometimes, growers choose to hide in plain sight. In this case, nothing but a thin black veil whipping in the wind hid the illegal merchandise from an aerial view. Nothing else seemed to be needed as this operation was being conducted in the remote Mexican desert.

Army General Alfonso Duarte said that the black tarp is routinely used by farms to protect crops from the harsh Mexican sun. Due to this blind spot, Duarte explained, it was difficult to verify the type of crops being grown from the air. So soldiers had to travel to the isolated area on foot to be certain.

There, they discovered that the black screen hid a 300-acre plantation that produced approximately 120 tons of pot with an estimated value of $160 million. It was revealed to be one of the largest (if not the largest) marijuana plantations ever discovered in Mexico.

5 Cornfields

America leads the world in corn production, but many are unaware of the agricultural underworld that persists. If you take a stroll through a cornfield, you’re likely to come across a skunky whiff of a different sort of crop.

Cornfields are planted across hundreds of acres, sometimes thousands. Once the corn is planted, the farmer doesn’t set foot in the field again until harvest time. This is due to labor-saving technology and innovations. It’s very convenient for marijuana growers, who can easily hide their plants among the giant stalks of corn.

Cannabis grows faster than corn. It can be transplanted into a field after corn is planted and then grow to fruition before the corn is harvested. In the Corn Belt, farmers routinely find marijuana patches in their fields. There are entire Internet forums for pot growers to discuss the business of hiding their crops in cornfields.

Not only is there ample sunlight but the corn farmers ensure that the soil is rich and optimal growing conditions are met. Plus, marijuana growers plant a network of small patches throughout the cornfields using GPS technology, which makes it impossible to detect. The large industrial-style farming of corn has given birth to this green underbelly of criminal profit that is almost completely untraceable.

4 Prison

In California’s Central Valley, there is a small red dot of a town called Coalinga. As you are driving into town, there’s a billboard with bold lettering that reads, “Jesus is Lord of Coalinga.” It’s a highly religious, Republican community that has voted against marijuana legalization every time it has appeared on the ballot.

The town was bankrupt, with $3 million in debt and high unemployment. Its only asset was an abandoned prison. They tried desperately to sell it, but nobody wanted the building until a strange, unexpected buyer came along: Ocean Grown Extracts. An investor in this medical marijuana company was Damian Marley, son of the reggae singer Bob Marley.

“This is symbolic and a big middle finger to the drug war and to a broken system that hasn’t worked for a long time now,” Marley’s manager said. It’s fantastically ironic that a large marijuana growing operation would take place in a prison which had recently housed convicts for marijuana-related crimes.

3 National Parks

The Forest Service says that its law enforcement officers spend most of their time investigating illegal cannabis operations. California has over 16 million acres of national forest lands, and illegal grows have been found in 40 of its 58 counties. Massive marijuana grows have even been discovered in iconic national parks like Yosemite.

It’s incredibly dangerous when an unsuspecting visitor happens upon one of the aforementioned booby traps that are common. One may be joyfully hiking and twirling in the hills, Sound-of-Music style, only to trip a wire connected to a shotgun shell.

There’s also the use of pesticides, like carbofuran, that are so gross that they have been outlawed in California for more than a decade. Majestic elk and snowy owls consume these lethal poisons and fall dead on the spot. Not to mention the water pollution and trash heaps that the marijuana growers leave behind. Pot farmers are not marijuana-loving hippies that want to save the planet as is often romanticized.

2 Slaves In A Nuclear Bunker

Three men were jailed for converting a former nuclear bunker into an industrial-sized pot farm in Wiltshire, England. They had been operating this site for at least five years. When it was discovered, there were nearly 5,000 plants safely guarded belowground.

Unfortunately, the police also found three Vietnamese men who had been locked behind a 13-centimeter (5 in) door that was strong enough to withstand a nuclear blast. None of them had a key to the door. The men, two of whom were teenagers, appeared utterly terrified.

Detective Inspector Paul Franklin said, “It was slavery, there’s no doubt. […] They were trafficked from Vietnam, they were placed there and told to work.” None of the three men who were jailed faced charges of slavery, however. The victims wouldn’t talk to the cops. It’s likely that there were threats against their families back home.

The next day, another young Vietnamese man was found wandering aimlessly outside a nearby rural village. Police suspect that he escaped by slicing open his metal ventilation tunnel on the roof.

1 Deadly Predators

In folklore and myth, snakes are often guardians. The snake is the universal protector of sacred trees or, in the case of pot growers, the protector of expensive crops.

In Louisiana, a grower used a python to protect his 2.3 kilograms (5 lb) of weed. On a farm in Essex, England, a marijuana greenhouse had 24 snakes slithering in between the greenery. Two of those snakes were horned vipers, which are highly venomous.

In western Canada, police discovered 10 black bears on a pot plantation with 1,000 cannabis plants. The wild bears had been lured onto the property with dog food to guard the premises. It seems like an army of bears would be a clever intimidation tactic to ward off would-be thieves, but charging beasts with wild eyes and gnashing teeth were far from the reality of these docile creatures.

After the initial shock wore off, police quickly learned that the bears weren’t going to attack. A Royal Canadian Mounted Police sergeant said, “They were tame. They just sat around watching. At one point, one of the bears climbed onto the hood of a police car, sat there for a bit, and then jumped off.”

Guard dogs also monitor pot plantations. In fact, you can buy specially trained dogs for “cannabis protection” online now. Alligators as watchdogs, or “watchgators,” aren’t as common, but they aren’t just a one-time oddity, either. It’s a trend that’s seen from Pennsylvania and Maryland all the way across the country to California.

“Mr. Teeth” was one such gator. At 1.5 meters (5 ft) long, he was found patrolling a grower’s bedroom with 15 kilograms (34 lb) of pot. Another gator was the 25-kilogram (55 lb) Wally, who was discovered in a swimming pool in Hemet, California. Wally was guarding 2,200 plants that would have brought in approximately $1.5 million.

When you hear the phrase 10 times praetorian, you might picture a legion of disciplined soldiers marching in perfect formation. Yet the Praetorian Guard was far more than a ceremonial bodyguard; it was a political powerhouse that repeatedly reshaped the fate of Rome. From its inception under Augustus to its dramatic demise under Constantine, the guard’s actions—whether noble, treacherous, or downright brutal—left an indelible mark on the empire.

Why the Praetorian Guard Matters

The guard started as a collection of elite cohorts attached to magistrates, but it soon evolved into the emperor’s personal shield—sometimes a shield, sometimes a sword. Their loyalty could make or break an emperor, and their ambitions often drove Rome into civil war, intrigue, and even auction houses. Below, we count down the ten most pivotal moments when the Praetorian Guard changed the course of Roman history.

10 Augustus Founds The Praetorian Guard

Although the Praetorians are inseparably linked with the Roman emperor, their roots stretch back to the Republic, when elite units called Praetorian Cohorts served the magistrates known as praetors. During Caesar’s civil war, the number of these cohorts swelled, and both Augustus and Mark Antony maintained several of them.

When Augustus emerged as Rome’s first emperor, he consolidated the scattered cohorts into a single, permanent force: the Praetorian Guard. He had witnessed firsthand how a personal army could secure political power, thanks to Caesar’s own experience. Augustus stationed several cohorts in Rome while dispersing others throughout Italy, assigning them both protective duties for the emperor and policing functions for the capital.

From that moment on, the Guard’s influence surged, gradually becoming one of the most formidable institutions in the empire, capable of shaping policy, influencing succession, and even acting as a de‑facto police force within the city.

9 Assassination Of Pupienus And Balbinus

The year 238, famously known as the Year of the Six Emperors, was a whirlwind of power‑shifts, betrayals, and bloodshed. Within twelve months, six different men claimed the purple, and five of them met violent ends. The chaos began with Maximinus Thrax, the first “barracks emperor,” who rose to power in 235 thanks to the army’s backing, despite the Senate’s opposition.

By 238 a provincial governor named Gordian was urged to seize power, proclaiming himself emperor and naming his son, Gordian II, co‑emperor. Their short‑lived reign ended when Thrax’s forces defeated them, leading the Senate to appoint the elderly statesmen Pupienus and Balbinus as joint emperors. Meanwhile, riots erupted in Rome, and angry crowds turned to the Praetorian Guard—then aligned with Thrax’s supporters—to unleash their fury.

In a dramatic reversal, the Guard stormed the imperial palace, slaughtering both Pupienus and Balbinus. Simultaneously, Thrax’s own army turned on him, decapitating the tyrant and presenting his head to the capital as a gesture of contrition. The Senate then elevated Gordian III, ending the year’s carnage—at least for the moment.

8 The Guard Makes Galba Emperor And Then Murders Him

When Nero’s reign crumbled in 68 CE, the Senate sought a new ruler and found one in Galba, a seasoned general with a reputation for stern discipline. Yet the Praetorian Guard, ever opportunistic, saw a chance for profit. Their commander, Gaius Nymphidius Sabinus, publicly declared allegiance to Galba, prompting the troops to abandon Nero in exchange for a promised bounty.

According to Plutarch, the sum demanded was so astronomical that it would have required “ten thousand times more evils than those inflicted by Nero” to raise. The promised money never materialized, and after a mere seven months on the throne, the Guard turned on Galba, aligning themselves with Otho, who had his own designs on power.

In a swift and brutal coup, the Praetorians helped Otho seize the palace, and Galba’s own retinue, fearing the tide, switched sides and slayed their former leader. Only one soldier, Sempronius Densus, stood out for refusing to betray Galba, fighting to the death against his fellow Praetorians.

7 Macrinus’s Plot Against Caracalla

The office of Praetorian Prefect grew into a powerhouse, granting its holder unparalleled sway over imperial affairs. Yet ambition often overrode loyalty. Macrinus, who served as Prefect under Emperor Caracalla, saw an opening to usurp the throne.

Macrinus identified a disgruntled centurion named Martialis, who harbored deep resentment toward Caracalla after the emperor executed his brother and routinely insulted him. Exploiting Martialis’s hatred, Macrinus promised riches and favor in exchange for assassinating the emperor.

During a routine campaign, Caracalla stopped to relieve himself by the roadside. Seizing the moment, Martialis approached the emperor and plunged his dagger into Caracalla’s abdomen, killing him on the spot. The centurion was quickly captured and executed, while Macrinus, feigning sorrow, rallied support among the troops and proclaimed himself emperor within days.

6 Two Sets Of Guards Fight Against Each Other

After Otho’s three‑month reign ended in suicide, the throne passed to Vitellius, who promptly disbanded the existing Praetorian Guard and executed over a hundred of its members for their role in Galba’s murder. He then raised a new guard drawn from his Germanic troops, hoping to secure unwavering loyalty.

The Senate, however, backed Vespasian, a commander in the East, leading to a civil war. Unemployed former Praetorians joined Vespasian’s cause, and the two rival factions clashed at the Battle of Bedriacum. Led by Marcus Antonius Primus, Vespasian’s forces triumphed, decisively ending Vitellius’s brief rule.

In the aftermath, Vitellius’s remaining Praetorians tried to negotiate peace, only to be double‑crossed. When Vitellius attempted to flee, his own guards pretended to escort him safely, only to hand him over to Vespasian’s soldiers. He was dragged through the streets to the infamous Gemonian Stairs, where he met a grisly end—making him the sole Roman emperor to die on that very stairway.

5 Sejanus’s Rise To Power

While Augustus founded the Praetorian Guard, its real ascent began under his successor, Tiberius, thanks largely to the scheming of the ambitious prefect Sejanus. As Praetorian Prefect, Sejanus became one of the emperor’s closest confidants and, when Tiberius retreated to the island of Capri in his later years, Sejanus effectively ran Rome’s day‑to‑day affairs.

Sejanus enacted sweeping reforms that cemented the Guard’s power: he relocated their barracks from the outskirts into the heart of the city, constructing the massive Castra Praetoria that would serve as their headquarters for three centuries. These moves not only increased the Guard’s visibility but also entrenched their political clout.

His ultimate ambition was the imperial throne itself. To clear his path, Sejanus orchestrated the murder of Tiberius’s heir, Drusus Julius Caesar, allegedly by seducing Drusus’s wife, Livia, and poisoning the young prince. He also systematically eliminated other potential rivals, purging noble families that might challenge his authority.

Sejanus’s downfall came abruptly in 31 CE. Tiberius, perhaps finally realizing the threat, dispatched a sealed letter to Rome accusing Sejanus of treason. The Praetorians turned on their former leader, and he was swiftly executed, ending his brief but dramatic bid for power.

4 Assassination Of Elagabalus

After Macrinus’s brief reign, the Severan dynasty resurfaced when Julia Maesa, Caracalla’s aunt, engineered a revolt that placed her 14‑year‑old grandson, Elagabalus, on the throne. Though youthful, Elagabalus’s four‑year rule was marked by scandalous religious rites, extravagant banquets, and a lifestyle that shocked traditional Roman sensibilities.

The emperor’s excesses alienated every major constituency: the Senate, the populace, and crucially, the Praetorian Guard. Even his own grandmother, Julia Maesa, turned against him, plotting his removal. By 222 CE, the Guard had grown weary of his decadence and decided to replace him with his cousin, Severus Alexander.

When Elagabalus entered the Praetorian camp, the soldiers turned on him, slaying him in a brutal public execution. His head was severed, his naked corpse dragged through the streets, and his mother, lover Hierocles, and other close associates were also put to death. The Guard’s decisive action ended a turbulent chapter and ushered in a more conventional reign.

3 Praetorian Guard Chooses The Wrong Side

By the early fourth century, the Praetorian Guard had become a seasoned political force, but its loyalties were not always wisely placed. During the civil war that pitted Maxentius, Licinius, and Constantine against one another, the Guard threw its weight behind Maxentius, who had previously bolstered its numbers after Diocletian had tried to curb its influence.

Maxentius’s gamble backfired spectacularly at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in 312 CE. Constantine’s forces decisively defeated Maxentius, who drowned in the Tiber River during the rout. Constantine then turned his attention to Licinius, ultimately defeating him as well and consolidating power as sole emperor by 324 CE.

Recognizing the Guard’s unreliability, Constantine dissolved the Praetorian Guard in 313 CE, dismantling their barracks in a public spectacle and redistributing the surviving soldiers to distant provinces. This act marked the end of a three‑century institution that had once been the empire’s most feared elite.

2 Conspiracy Against Caligula

The year 41 CE was a whirlwind of intrigue for the Praetorian Guard. First, they assassinated Emperor Caligula, then they thwarted a plan to restore the Roman Republic, and finally they crowned Claudius as the new emperor.

Caligula’s increasingly erratic and despotic rule made him a target for several conspiracies. The decisive plot was led by Praetorian tribune Cassius Chaerea and the centurion Cornelius Sabinus. According to Suetonius, Chaerea approached the emperor in a deserted corridor and, with his men, stabbed Caligula thirty times. The Guard then moved swiftly to eliminate Caligula’s wife and infant daughter.

Chaerea had hoped his actions would pave the way for a republican revival, but the majority of the Praetorians preferred the stability of imperial rule. When the conspirators realized the Guard would not support a republic, they rescued Claudius—the last surviving member of the Julian line—protecting him from harm. With the Guard’s backing, Claudius was proclaimed emperor, while Chaerea and his fellow plotters were executed for treason.

1 Auction Of The Imperial Title

The most egregious abuse of power by the Praetorian Guard unfolded in 193 CE, when they literally auctioned off the empire to the highest bidder. The debacle began when the Guard turned on Emperor Pertinax, who had attempted to curb their excesses and restore discipline.

In the wake of Pertinax’s murder, his former father‑in‑law, Sulpicianus, offered the Guard a generous sum to secure their support. Seizing the opportunity, the Guard opened a public bidding war, inviting any wealthy Roman to compete for the throne.

A senator named Didius Julianus outbid his rivals, paying a staggering amount to become emperor. Unsurprisingly, his purchase sparked outrage across the empire, igniting the Year of the Five Emperors. Julianus’s reign lasted less than three months before he was executed, illustrating the peril of allowing a mercenary guard to dictate imperial succession.