Mysterious packages of seeds from China have been showing up in American mailboxes all over the country and the U.S. Department of Agriculture has issued a warning to all 50 states to not plant them. However, one farmer from Logan County, Kentucky did not get the memo and she ended up planting them, and here’s what happened.
“I planted them not realizing it was a bad thing. I was in a gift-giving group on Facebook and thought it was from one of the members. I didn’t realize it was a thing until I saw it on the news,” Tiffany Lowery said to WCAX.
Once she realized the USDA said not to plant them she called the Kentucky Department of Agriculture. They instructed her to immediately burn the plants or double bag them and throw them in the trash. Tiffany said she tried to burn them but it was difficult so she triple bagged them. She revealed she had not thrown them in the trash yet.
“We encourage all those who have received unsolicited seeds to bag the seeds and send them to USDA-APHIS Plant Protection Quarantine in Hebron, Kentucky. We have been in communication with USDA-APHIS and they continue to investigate this matter,” Sean Southard, Director of Communications for the Kentucky Department of Agriculture told WCAX.
There is not a whole lot of information on exactly why these seeds are being sent to the U.S. yet but the USDA appears to be very concerned about it. Some speculate that if Americans receiving these packages plant the “invasive China seeds” that they can potentially end up devastating American agriculture.
Others believe the seeds are from sellers who are simply just looking for people to write good reviews about the seeds so buyers will be more inclined to purchase them.
If you receive random seeds from China in the mail, the USDA is asking that you bag them in an airtight bag and ship them to the United States Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service’s Division of Plant Protection Quarantine at USDA-APHIS PPQ, P.O. Box 475, Hebron, Kentucky 41048.
