one day, about a decade ago, Seth Swoboda was mowing his lawn when he noticed something strange. He looked up at this big black oak tree and saw that the canopy was thin and the leaves were all curled and contorted.
“The tree looked like it was starting to die,” Seth said.
Then he looked around and saw those contorted leaves on some of his other trees too. By then, though, it was already too late. The trees would mysteriously die.
What was happening at Seth’s place in rural Illinois was happening all over the state and the Midwest.
Seth asked his neighbor, a biologist, what could possibly be killing his trees. And his neighbor had a hunch. He thought herbicides were drifting from farmland onto Seth’s property and wreaking havoc. He just had to prove it.
Credits:
Host: Dan WanschuraProducer: Christian Elliott
Editing: Morgan Springer
Additional Editing: Dan Wanschura, Ellie Katz, Claire Keenan-Kurgan
Music: Blue Dot Sessions
This episode is based on a story Christian Elliott wrote for bioGraphic Magazine. Read it here.
Feature image by Prairie Rivers Network- A dead oak tree that later had to be cut down on Seth Swoboda’s property outside Nashville, Illinois.
