. >> reporter: tony kaufmann and his family started dealing in ginseng in the 1950s20s. he's a classic middleman. >> oh my goodness. do i really want to do this? oh my gosh. this is like monopoly money. holy mackerel. you know they have banks? >> reporter: when the asian economies were soaring two years back, tony had a banner year. >> we probably did close to a couple million dollars we handed out to the public. >> a couple million dollars walking around in west virginia? that's pretty good. >> reporter: ginseng grows wild from south appalachia to canada. the ginseng gold rush is causing a huge problem for law enforcement who are tracking down on illegal harvesting. >> what are we seeing here? this is huge amounts of ginseng. >> yeah. it's thousands and thousands and thousands of plants that will never be able to reproduce this year. >> reporter: this illegal ginseng, seized from poachers, is harvested from fragile plants on public lands, out of season, destroying the roots forever, and threatening wild ginseng with extinction. >> how seriously do you take this offense?