Produce Farming's Future?

Last Saturday, we toured Ouroboros Farms in Half Moon Bay, California. www.ouroborosfarms.com,  Ouroboros Farms is a commercial aquaponics farm. Our tour guide was Ken Armstrong, the owner and manager of the farm.  The farm (located in a large greenhouse) sells lettuce, tomatoes, spinach, basil and other produce in addition to a limited amount of fish.

What distinguishes this from a traditional greenhouse operation is that it is an enclosed eco-system that begins with feeding fish organic fish food in giant fish tanks. The fish waste is then circulated to the produce beds and becomes the nitrogen rich food that enables the produce to grow. The hydroponically grown produce, in turn, cleans the water by soaking up these nutrients. Then the water is returned to the fish tanks and the process starts over again. 

Several advantages of this farming technique include:

• It uses significantly less water than traditional farming and other hydroponic farming techniques. This is especially important in the drought stricken parts of the western states.

• Aquaponic farms can be built just about anywhere in urban, suburban or rural areas, including empty parking lots and in city warehouses.

• The produce grows from seedling to harvest in just five to six weeks, a much faster rate than produce grown on traditional farms. In addition, those aquaponic farms located indoors or in temperature controlled areas can grow fresh local produce year round, enabling more crop cycles each year than a traditional produce farm.

• Since the produce is harvested with roots intact, it stays fresh longer, hence has a longer shelf life than traditional produce.

Below is a 6 minute video of Ouroboros Farms that appeared on the PBS Newshour.