the thing is. the moulded veg idea isn’t new at all. im fairly certain 1938 preceeded 1989

Pumpkins with human faces have been produced by John M. Czeski, Ohio farmer, after four years of experimenting. To grow the novel fruit, Czeski fashions an aluminum mold of the head he wants to reproduce, and places it around a growing pumpkin approximately the size of a small grapefruit. After the pumpkin has expanded enough to fill the inside contours, the mold is removed. The print of the features remains as the pumpkin continues to grow, and the final result is a lifelike full-size image in the ripened fruit.

The tomato tree…what a love/hate relationship I had with that thing, given it grew in my designated portion of the greenhouse. It was actually a clone (re: just a cutting…nothing freaky) from a plant from CHINA, not Japan like one commenter said. Unfortunately, your tour guide was ill informed as to how it produced so many tomatoes. It actually has indeterminate growth, meaning it grows as much as its training will allow. It was BRED that way, not unlike other crops selected for their high yield rates. It was not freakishly mutated. We experimented the same technique with normal garden variety eggplants, peppers, and other gourds. Its all in the way we trained the plant with trellises. There may have been a little extra nitrogen in the nutrient water to promote growth, but any gardener will tell you that they also encourage their veggies the same way.

The six-year-old uncovered a lack of knowledge by your tour guide, but not huge Disney misdeeds. And given the date of your article, it sounds like you caught a tour during the summer transition to brand spankin’ new college interns, still “green” behind the ears…excuse the pun.

[...] There is a lot to be gained from the research and gardening done at Epcot. After taking the walking tour through the gardens and labs, you quickly learn that there is a lot more to what they do then what the ride shows you. I learned a lot from my experience but learned one major thing – in order for what they do to be useful to me, they would have to share their knowledge, every specific bit of it, in order for me to put it into practice. This is not something the cast members were willing to do.[...]

I think this is the key to making the Land including Living with the Land Boat Ride better. More specific info given directly to the guests, which can only be done with a little more training for cast members both greenhouse interns and boat cast members. But even if it can be made better, its the best ride in the whole park as far as I’m concerned. SAVE THE EARTH below is from an unofficial WDW site

[...] A relaxing 13 minute boat ride takes you on an informative journey through a tropical rain forest, an African desert complete with sandstorm, and the windswept plains of a small, turn-of-the-century family farm. Guests experience the struggles of the past and plans for farming in the future including Hydroponics, Aeroponics and Aquaculture. It’s not just about fruits and veggies, fish farms are on display. Since The Land is a Disney restaurant supplier, You could very well be seeing your entree. Wonder where those Mickey shaped cucumbers in your salad came from? This is where they’re grown. [...]

I noticed on the same site
[...] During the 9/06 refurbishment process, the boats were equipped with automated narration. [...]
so I am now wondering if the boat ride has boat captains at ALL ?!?!? I really hope you had a captain as no automated voice can create the magic as well as a genuine cast member

The world wasn’t created in 1953, and the United States is not the world.

You mentioned the set-aside of land for conservation? It’s not just hundreds of acres. The Disney Wilderness Preserve is actually 12,000, and it’s now controlled by The Nature Conservancy. The theme parks themselves take up 1,100 acres and the additional development about 6,000 more. There are about 10,000 acres remaining of the original purchase, part of which may be added to the conservation area later.

And a carrot should be “long and skinny”? I hate to tell you this, but there are dozens of types of carrots, and a bunch of them are neither long nor skinny. Nor orange, for that matter. ALL carrots eaten today were genetically bred by humans from a wildflower called Queen Anne’s Lace. So saying there is some “natural” carrot shape that should be honored is painfully ignorant. There is virtually nothing that we eat today that hasn’t been modified–purposefully designed, in fact–by our forebears. Making a Mickey-shaped pumpkin does nothing to alter the genetic nature of the plant and is, in fact, far less intrusive than trying to get those pumpkins to be purple or taste different. I consider myself an environmentalist and I’m all for controls on genetic modification, but honestly, the amount of ignorance and uninformed grandstanding on issues like these makes them that much harder to discuss productively.