A cannabis plant which survived on a central Whitianga street has been destroyed by the council.
Pictures supplied to Newshub showed the sizeable plant in a garden bed on Whitianga's Albert Street.
"It looked fairly old," a source told Newshub. "I've driven past there heaps and never noticed it before."
After bringing the plant to Thames-Coromandel District Council's attention on Monday afternoon it was removed and destroyed on Tuesday morning, a spokesperson confirmed.
While the plant looked relatively well-established it's possible it wasn't grown intentionally.
Associate Professor of Botany Janice Lord told Newshub it's not the first time she's seen cannabis growing in city centres.
"I actually had a case like this in Dunedin!" she said.
"Some soil brought in to fill landscaping beds around the new Forsyth Barr Stadium sprouted some healthy little cannabis seedlings which the contractors brought to me for identification,"
Lord says it's more likely the seeds were present as a contaminant in the soil.
"Not that someone deliberately sowed pot seeds into a public garden!"