We are huge fans of behind-the-scenes tours and have taken a few different ones at the parks. While the bigger tours like Keys to the Kingdom get all of the hype, there are plenty of smaller tours that are more affordable, but just as fun and interesting. The Behind the Seeds tour at Epcot is one of these tours.

Taking you behind the scenes of the Living with The Land ride, Epcot’s Behind the Seeds tour tells you all about how Disney grows their plants, treats their bugs, and completes their mission for a more sustainable Earth.

Going Behind the Seeds

Your tour will start at the desk right in front of Soarin. After some introductions, you’ll be brought into one of Disney’s labs. This lab focuses on how Disney is using bugs to keep their plants healthy. While we usually think of bugs as pests, they actually play a really important part in overall plant health by…eating other bugs. Any gardener will tell you when a pest begins to eat and burrow in their plants it’s all over. To combat this, Disney is introducing more predatory bugs (like ladybugs) to target these pests.

The labs have examples of infected plants so you can get a look at the pests up close. It’s really cool to see the bugs move around the inside of the plants live and in person! The bug lab is definitely one of the tour’s highlights.

Bugs aren’t the only experiments Disney’s scientists are doing. In addition to the bug lab, you’ll see other labs where scientists are experimenting with the plants and doing regular health check-ups. We have done this tour twice and witnessed different presentations each time. No matter what you see, we promise it’ll be interesting!

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One of the biggest highlights of Epcot’s Behind the Seeds tour is snack time. That’s right, not only do you get to learn all about how Epcot grows the fruits and veggies you see on Living with the Land, but you get to sample one of them too! Sure, it might have tasted like a normal cucumber, but knowing it was grown right there at Epcot made it just a bit cooler.

The Behind the Seeds tour takes you into the greenhouses where you can walk around and ask any questions you want. That sentence may sound pretty simple, but that’s because it doesn’t capture how fun it actually is. Our tour guide was an expert about all the food grown in the greenhouse and gave us some really interesting information on how they grew, what they tasted like and everything in between. There are some places you can’t go, but we had a lot of freedom to walk around and get an up-close and personal view of the plants.

As the ride will tell you, there is more to farming than just plants. Not only do you get to walk right up to the giant tanks of catfish, tilapia, and sturgeon…but you get to feed the fish too!

Our Verdict

Epcot’s Behind the Seeds tour is one of our go-to recommendations for a Disney experience that’s a lot of fun, but a little off the beaten path (literally!). Not only do you get to hear some awesome information, but because it’s a bit of a hidden gem, not a lot of people have experienced it. 

At only $25 per adult and only $20 for kids, it’s one of the more affordable tours Disney offers (and yes, there’s an AP discount). If you’re looking for something new to experience at Epcot, or want a unique idea for visiting friends or family, we highly recommend going on a Behind the Seeds tour.