The Great Seed Panic of 2020

The Experiment

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4.5 • 2.8K Ratings

🗓️ 15 July 2021

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Last summer, an unexplained phenomenon gripped nightly newscasts and Facebook groups across America: Unsolicited deliveries of obscurely labeled seed packages, seemingly from China, were being sent to Americans’ homes. Recipients reported the packages to local police, news stations, and agriculture departments; searched message boards for explanations; and theorized about conspiracies including election interference and biowarfare. Despite large-scale USDA testing of the packages, the mystery remained: Who sent the seeds and why? This week on The Experiment podcast, the host Julia Longoria speaks with the writer Chris Heath about his investigation of mystery seeds for The Atlantic, the byzantine world of international e-commerce, and the dangers of both panic and reason. Further reading: “The Truth Behind the Amazon Mystery Seeds.” This article is part of “Shadowland,” a project about conspiracy thinking in America. A transcript of this episode is available. Be part of The Experiment. As #TheExperimentPodcast keeps growing, we’re looking for new ways to tell stories and better serve our listeners. Please visit theatlantic.com/experimentsurvey to share your thoughts with The Atlantic and WNYC Studios. Use the hashtag #TheExperimentPodcast, or write to us at theexperiment@theatlantic.com. This episode was produced by Katherine Wells and Julia Longoria, with help from Honor Jones. Fact-check by William Gordon and Michelle Ciarrocca. Sound design by David Herman and Hannis Brown.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Just start from the very, very beginning, like set me in time.
0:07.4	Where should we start?
0:08.9	Last summer, people might be aware there was a story that bubbled in the media for a couple
0:13.9	of weeks.
0:14.9	In the summer of 2020, writer Chris Heath noticed a strange national news story.
0:21.5	It has been happening all across the nation, including right here in our area.
0:25.0	You know, it's in most people's newspapers and it was on TV all over the place.
0:28.6	It was behind this rather odd phenomenon.
0:32.2	People across the country are getting unsolicited packages.
0:35.0	Listen to this.
0:36.0	No idea where it came from.
0:37.4	I didn't order it.
0:38.7	People have been receiving mysterious packages that they did not order.
0:42.7	People all over America had started receiving these completely baffling packages that appeared
0:47.9	to have Chinese writing on.
0:49.5	Packages, some of them seen here from the Tampa Bay Times, are usually marked with Chinese
0:54.0	characters.
0:55.0	And inside were packets of seeds.
0:59.6	Some of them being called mystery seeds and they have appeared in mailboxes in more than
1:01.1	two dozen states.
1:02.1	The USDA has now put out a warning saying not to open these packages or even plant the seeds.
1:08.1	There's nothing on the package that seemed to explain what the seeds were, but they were
	...

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