Guelph and Kansas City get food forests

On Saturday temperatures hovering at freezing couldn't keep people away from the first round of planting for Guelph, Ontario's first food forest. It was cold, but worth it...

  
The concept is sweeping North America and it says a lot when cities with 125,000 residents dedicate 27,000 square feet and join the movement.

Congrats to Kansas City as well, a 10,000 square foot food forest is being planted there, the second in the city. One question for the permaculture enthusiasts out there. Any thoughts for how big a permaculture garden has to be in order to be labelled a food forest? Does it matter? An article from February says there are 50, perhaps 100, food forests in North America. I've only heard of about 25, quick, someone make a list!

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/living/home-garden/article76738647.html#storylink=cpy

A restaurant that serves plants fed gourmet sunlight

I did an April Fools post about verticiel selling "artisanal air", but here's something that sounds like an joke but is actually real. A conceptual artist/philosopher tried to start a restaurant for plants. Not just any restaurant for plants, one that serves gourmet sunlight!  Wow! Perhaps I shouldn't be amazed, this comes from a man who tried to genetically engineer God.

GILA word of the week: Bee highway

The FAO has definitely been busy. This week it announced that Cape Verde has it's first FAO urban agriculture program. Earlier in the month the FAO released a collection of findings from scientists and economists who have taken stock of climate change impacts on food and agriculture at global and regional levels. The document investigates, among other things, how climate change will impact crop production in Africa and grain production in Russia and neighboring Ukraine and Kazakhstan.

-I hope these entrepreneurs can do it, however it will be an uphill climb. By 2017 a Brooklyn duo hopes to produce the first rooftop wine from rooftop vineyard.

-Norway is creating a bee highway. What is that you ask? Private individual, state bodies, companies, and associations post their little slice of green on the website polli.no to map out a bees’ safe route across the Oslo.

-A graduate student has published the first summary, I believe, stating the limits of community gardens in creating communities. One of her preliminary findings (in the Netherlands) is that those who garden together don't often become friends outside the garden, however they are more likely to ask for help from others. As this story hit the web, so did one which focuses on urban agriculture and measuring what it actually yields, in terms of food production and money.

-Chicago laps the fields in rooftop farms, 13 have been documented, compared to 3 in Chicago and only 2 in Toronto. I wonder how many exist outside North America?

What does California's drought mean for the green roof industry?

Some would argue it's long overdue, others think it doesn't go far enough, but the fact that California has it's first water restrictions ever is a game changer. The state has entered a different era and with a mega-drought possible for the state and multiple regions, what California does now may end up being a template for many parts of the American Southwest and Plains.

The living architecture industry is still burgeoning in North America. In a sense, that's great. The industry still has room for growth and innovation. I predict a few things will happen:

-In the green roof industry we'll see more options developed as system providers and developers react appropriately to a new normal. We will probably see more research into drought tolerant plants and maybe even development of "green roofs which aren't green", beige roofs, if you will. I'm thinking xeriscaping on rooftops, with sand being the medium of choice, for the semi-arid regions especially.

-The green wall industry will go through some changes as well. Plants from tropical regions are favored in the industry. With water becoming a more valued resource, I think we'll see green walls featuring a wider array of plants and maybe even more green walls incorporating preserved plants and bryophytes.

The next few years will definitely be interesting!

The big question...will food one day be a government regulated industry?!

In New York a few organizations have banded together to establish a rather large shade food forest. Stay tuned, this is definitely a first for that area.

-Here's an awesome infographic detailing the major ways buildings can grow food.

-It was just last week I was writing about agrihoods, here's one in Chicago in the works. 

-A number of people are drawn to aquaponics because it offers self-sufficiency. Two brothers hope that one day every Native American tribe will have their own operation.

-I was reading an article about how vertical farming have yet to take off in New York City, despite the best efforts of many enthusiasts. One entrepreneur thinks things could heat up as urban agriculture systems become embraced as amenities.
For me there a few things which are hard to square. If food is essential why is it so lightly regulated? One day, could we see food be more closely regulated, since so much of our food is made up of a regulated resource...water. With California experiencing droughts, will politicians there (maybe in 10 years???) and in other drought stricken locations advise, then perhaps incentivize, farmers to grow certain water friendly crops? Will home owners battle farmers for the rights to water and how they can use it?
Will the government one day be responsible for growing food for everyone...and locally?


Speaking of land battles, here's one happening today in Ontario as farmers disagree with conservationists about the use of an urban park.

Sod houses on the Canadian Praries - circa 1886

As every green roof enthusiasts knows green roofs have been around for centuries. One particular type, sod roofs, have been commonplace in Scandinavia since prehistory. Did you know they were built in North America too? A few months ago I stumbled upon this picture in the Concise Historical Atlas of Canada.

Above the picture it reads "Sod house, oxen and hay rack. Killarney, Manitoba. Photograph, circa 1886." And below the photograph: "Courtesy J.A. Victo David Museum, Killarney, Manitoba/Western Canada Pictororial Index, Winnipeg, WCPI 354-11394".

Another resource to add to my bibliography for when I write "The history of North American Green Roofs, pre-1970"!

GILA words of the week: gated agriculture and cemetery farming

-Romania has it's first horticultural therapy program, but if doctors William Brid and Matilda van den Bosch had their way, horticultural therapy would be part of the publicly funded national health service!

-Everyone wants a Highline, an iconic green roof with seemingly unlimited appeal. But not everyone can have one. Read the comments at the bottom of this article, there are some undiscovered stand-up comedians waiting to be signed!

-Baltimore has a few interesting GILA ideas on the go. The first is called "Green Tracks". There are several component to he project, but the one I'll mention here is using the area along the Amtrak corridor for community gardens. I hope they keep an eye on possible existing contamination and contamination over time.
The second is allocating some of the 14,000 vacant lots in the city for flower production. Nice work Baltimore!

-We all know urban agriculture is huge. How big? Researchers have found all the farms together cover an area the size of Europe. And those 456 million hectares (1.12 billion acres), 15% is in the city proper. Urban agriculture will be crucial, especially in Africa. with half of the continents inhabitants living in cities by 2030. In Kenya a company wants to be a pioneer in providing the produce. The idea? Gate some land and lease it to prospective farmers.

Which gets me to wondering. With development pressures could we see more urban agriculture in marginal or previously taboo lands? In the Philippines a new urban agriculture garden has opened in a cemetery. It seems the cemetery has rich, unused pland within its gates. in the future, could we one day see food production happening anywhere soil is available?

Rooftop spirulina entrepreneurs have expanded production!

The last time we checked in with this company, they were just getting started. Now, they have begun exporting to Europe and will have multiple sites in Thailand very soon. Are we witnessing a new success story in the making???

Earlier in the year we saw one aquaponics producer theorize that growing medical marijuana may be where their business is heading. Another aquaponics advocate, who has gone out of business and now operates the New York outfit as an educational center, is thinking the same thing.  Synergistic thoughts or the latest trend?

Turn Candlestick Park into a giant aquaponics farm

I know, I know that I made a pledge not to talk about wild renderings. But I couldn't help it this time.
This one is wild, but with a little tweaking perhaps doable?

A couple of weeks ago I saw this urban farming design to retrofit Candlestick Park. (Paul McCartney's concert in mid-August was the last scheduled event.) What will happen with it now?

Who knows what the price tag would be for something like this. Astronomical, I am sure. But something should be done with it soon, did you see how the Silverdome looks after 10 years of disuse?

 

In 1975 the Silverdome cost $55.7 million to build, which is roughly $245 million in today's dollars, according to Deadspin. In 2009, it was purchased at an auction for $583,000.
Such a shame.

Something should be done, and fast. I think the second picture is key. It's going to be expensive to retrofit and the urban farming is a great idea, but what about if we could make it half as expensive? By that, I mean make the stadium a huge aquaponics operation. The floor is a fish farm and then the water can be pumped up into the stands (where the plants grow) and trickle its way back down.

Sound crazy? Not when you consider shopping malls have spontaneously become fish ponds already! Here's one in Thailand where someone introduced a small population of Koi and Catfish.

What do you think?

Monsoon rooftop gardens + app to help Californians save water

-I definitely want to see more articles like this! Here's how to set up a succesful roof garden for monsoon veggies like sheem and borboti!

-Both Montreal and Charlottetown (P.E.I.) are turning to green roofs, Montreal is looking to streamline their approval process and Charlottetown is investigating green roof legislation. 
 
-A few weeks ago I wondered whether a place like Syria should be using more temporary agricultural systems  than rooftop farming, it just didn't seem feasible to dodge bullets while tending to rooftop gardens. It seems aquaponics systems are now being used in Gaza.

-I'm not sure if vertical farming can work, but my takeaway from this article is that the business is as much about operations (in particular, software) as it is about offerings.

fighting in Gaza has forced farmers and herders to abandon their lands and has paralysed fishing activities, bringing local food production to a halt and severely affecting livelihoods, the United Nation’s FAO warned last week.
Recovery in the agriculture sector, once hostilities cease, will require significant external assistance over the long term. And this is where we see opportunities for alternative agriculture systems for smallholder farmers and families. Aquaponics and hydroponics can be done on rooftops, and it is especially meaningful in areas where water is severely limited.
The FAO estimates that the recent fighting has resulted in substantial direct damage to Gaza’s 17,000 hectares of croplands as well as much of its agricultural infrastructure, including greenhouses, irrigation systems, animal farms, fodder stocks and fishing boats.
According to the latest update Gaza has lost half of its population of poultry birds (broilers and layers) either due to direct hits on their shelters or lack of water, feed or care resulting from access restrictions.
Around 64,000 head of small ruminants are in need of animal feed and water in order to avoid further animal deaths and the additional erosion of herders’ productive assets.
Meanwhile losses by Gaza’s fishing sector so far are estimated at 234.6 tonnes over the period 9 July – 10 August –equivalent to 9.3 percent of local fishers’ yearly catch.
“Up to now, ongoing military operations have prevented detailed assessments of damages to agriculture from being completed,” said Ciro Fiorillo, head of FAO’s office in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The Gaza Strip imports most of what it eats — however locally produced food represents an important source of nutritious and affordable food, and some 28,600 people in Gaza rely on farming (19,000 people), livestock raising (6,000) and fishing (3,600) for their livelihoods.
“Under the most recent ceasefire many farmers and herders are now able to access their lands, however resumption of food production faces serious obstacles given the damages sustained and shortages of water, electricity, inputs and financial resources, as well as ongoing uncertainty regarding the possible resumption of military activities”, said Fiorillo.

- See more at: http://www.greenprophet.com/2014/08/why-gaza-needs-hydroponics-and-aquaponics-for-food-security/#sthash.IciZDFYI.dpuf

-How can food transform healthcare for both the patient and provider? Will Allen will speak at the Transform symposium to let us know.

-What some thought was impossible has come to pass, Canadian Pacific has torn up some community garden plots over 15 years old. Naturally Vancouverites are not happy.

-Chicago's urban fruit orchard featured rare and unusual apples has gone quickly from concept to reality and is now a go.

-Climate Central has published a study which states 57 of the 60 largest cities in the U.S. have significantly higher temperatures than adjacent rural areas. In some cases those discrepancies had reached a difference in daytime highs by 27 degrees Fahrenheit. Yikes! Denver is going to need more green roofs and green infrastructure...soon! Florida has done something quite interesting, they've purchased some land to close the gap in their greenway and trail system so now it looks like you can travel from west coast to east. What do you think, Denver? A good idea?

-Despite a three year drought, one of the worst in 500 years (what!!!), Californians still aren't saving water. Hopefully an app, will raise awareness...even a little!

The Wizard of Oz - The first green roof on film?

Today marks the 75th anniversary of the Wizard of Oz. 75 years!!! Do you remember the scene, soon after the intrepid travelers meet the tin man, that the wicked witch tries to turn the scarecrow into a bonfire? (If you've got the movie there, fast forward to the 46:20 mark). I've watched a lot of old movies and as far as I can tell, this may be the first green roof on film!

Perhaps I should start a series of green roofs in popular culture?

Which seeds will sprout on a green roof...without care?

There's still much for us to learn about green roofs.  One question to answer is which plants will grow in a primarily inorganic medium without help. Here's what I tried on a rooftop recently...

Sugar beets, broccoli, white tomatoes, yellow tomatoes, green peas, okra (clemson spineless), okra (burgundy), dinosaur kale, green pumpkin, white pumpkin, banana melon, cucumber, nasturtium.

These seeds were a bit old, mind you, at least four years. Any idea which ones grew?

Two winners, white pumpkin and dinosaur kale! I wonder how each would do with a little TLC!
That's an experiment for next year.

Trend alert? Rooftop vegetable gardens on residential condos

I'll let you be the judge. Two articles in the last month have touted the additions of rooftop gardens, sometimes edible, sometimes not, to pricey developments in Miami, London, Singapore and beyond.

Panasonic enters the vertical farm race + green infrastructure's many faces

Singapore may be the global leader in vertical farming companies.  With precious little land available for farming, they've had to look up or continue importing their food. Panasonic has jumped into the fray, hoping to add "agriculture to their potential growth portfolio." Could this be the start of something big in the industry?

-A county government in Kenya has recruited a private company to set-up aquaponics projects in five cities to increase jobs for youth and food production.

-Solutions for Change has earned itself even more cash, $1 million dollars, to expand aquaponics program to provide 1.6 million servings of greens. These folks know how to raise cash!!!

-Talk about comprehensive, take a look at this article (on all of the links!!!) about the strategies, tools and role parks (especially those in and near Los Angeles) can play in combating climate change.

-Utne magazine proposes that another form of green infrastructure, trails, are the new town square and farms have the potential to be agritourism destinations.  

-Tacoma's food forest is 6 months old. Here's an update on how it is coming along. I love how the adults are keenly focused on the trees, the baby is staring right into the camera.

Urban farming under gun fire

Urban farming for refugees in Syria is a risky, but necessary part of daily life. Two facts from the article really stand out to me, first that farming on rooftops is often done under the threat of snipers (!) and secondly that some refugees picked up farming techniques from youtube.

-Washington State is making people who want to keep small livestock take a certification class, I think they're the first state to do this. Smart. Urban agriculture is likely to cost the city extra money for animal control services (rounding up loose or abandoned animals), so this makes a lot of sense. 

-On the east coast a $1.5 million dollar federal grant awarded to Virginia State University will go to refurbish an old building and turn it into an urban agriculture hub featuring both aquaponic and hydroponic systems. 

-Here's a school aquaponics facility which hopes to add snails to its offerings.

-When Land8 talks about urban agriculture it seems to happen in spurts. Two weeks ago they published a helpful 10 principle article for creating food-producing landscapes and then a follow up article which delves into the challenges of urban agriculture.

-As practitioners know permaculture can mean many things. Here's how one group makes it synonymous with activism.

-A rise in community activism and pressure on governments to scale back and save money in the face of declining revenues has led to more do-it-yourself groups. The trend is taking off in San Francisco and Vancouver as residents help build mini-public parks using their own tools and ultimately time and money.

GILA words of the week: Emotional farming, Just green enough and environmental gentrification

A few officials in India are calling their new horticultural therapy initiative "emotional farming". A clever term which could stick elsewhere.

Soon after the massively successful first part of the High Line opened there were a few folks who stated, quite accurately, that there were some drawbacks to its popularity. People love the High Line, they want their business and homes near it and so land prices go up and gentrification displaced long term residents. There's a new paper out which advocates greening neighborhoods, but "just enough" to benefit the community, but not enough to displace them. And they point to one example in New York were this has already happened. This is a delicate balancing act indeed!

Urban agriculture growing and dying

It's always good to check in with the folks at the permaculture podcast. Last week we heard what could be done with 1/6 of an acre in a temperate climate.

-Check out this app, it ranks neighbourhoods by environmental criteria like green roofs, community gardens, farmers markets, parks and public transit. It's a great way to help select your next home.

-A children's hospital in San Antonio is building a massive 2 acre garden to teach the community about the relationship between food and health.

-After 360 years a South African community garden will sprout again. Boston is similarly celebrating urban agriculture with their first Urban Agriculture Day.
Unfortunately in Bangalore things are going in the opposite direction. The city, which was a burgeoning urban agriculture oasis, will probably see urban agriculture wither because of development pressures.

-The USA's first urban agriculture kids camp kicked off a couple of weeks ago. I'll add this to my end of the year predictions...I think you'll be seeing a lot more of these in the future.

Don't put crocodiles in your rooftop garden!

It's wonderful when public officials just "Get It!" The mayor of Montreal seems to be one of them, when it comes to urban agriculture. He's encouraging Montrealers to grow food in public spaces and relaxing zoning laws to allow more commercial and residential urban agriculture, in addition to giving them the right to sell to grocery stores or sell on their farms!

-There were a couple of articles about a living wall in California which had failed and is now a communal eyesore. I wanted to see what kind of living wall this was, it seems to be more of a vegetated sound barrier than a "living wall", in my view. What do you think?

-A new title holder for the world's largest vertical garden/living wall has been crowned.

-Check out this handy garden sensor which can relay real-time data about the status of your garden and if you like the idea, support them on Kickstarter.

-We need a 596 acres-esque company in every city! By piecing together every master plan in New York City history they have found sites that were planned open spaces that were behind fences and opened them for public use and helped residents understand why things look the way they do.

-Lastly to follow up on Monday's post about rooftop terraculture, if you're going to do it, make sure to stock your rooftop pool with easy to handle animals. So that would eliminate crocodiles!

Sturgeon in aquaponics + horticultural therapy in South Korea

The aquaponics industry is still relatively new, we don't know which plants and animals will prosper. That's why it's encouraging to see new experimentation with new flora and fauna. Last week
Vancouver Island University's Nanaimo campus unveiled a demonstration aquaponics system featuring sturgeon. Will using a cold water fish help drives prices down, as it would take less energy to heat the tanks? Stay tuned.

-If you'll allow me to take a quick detour from the regular proceedings, I just have to highlight Vox's amazing "40 maps which explain America and its relationship to food".

-Last week gave me another first. It's the first time I've seen horticultural therapy mentioned in southeast Asia. I figured that there were programs there, but often trends in North America are given different names and no one knows what's going on until the dots are connected. In Seoul it appears horticultural therapy is called "professional garden therapy".
By the way, the new American horticultural therapy journal is now in print.

-The folks at Falling Fruit are chugging along with their tremendously useful worldwide foraging guide...the database has grown a lot since we last checked in. There are now over 500,000 sites listed!
Milwaukee can add a few trees to the website as Growing Power got a 4,000 fruit tree donation to spread among vacant city lots.

-Santa Fe Community College has become the first institution to offer an accredited rainwater harvesting course.

-San Francisco has a new Urban Agriculture Incentive Zone Ordinance that will allow land owners to take advantage of a property tax break when they allow a parcel of land to be used for agriculture and educational purposes. Wow! This could go a long way to literally changing San Francisco's landscape as program participants must "guarantee the land will stay in agricultural use only (it can’t be on land with a house for example) for at least 10 years".

-This is turning into an epic post! How about a little permaculture news? One of the first Greek permaculture design course is taking place right now. And if you would like to live the permaculture experience a 100 acres Chinese permaculture community is looking for practitioners and community members.

-Last but not least is exciting news that two Johannesburg academics have started a multi-stakeholder engagement project that hopes to create opportunities for urban agriculture. The Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Deputy Minister recently said the sector could create 1 million jobs over the next 16 years, perhaps this will be the model for future urban agriculture projects.

HTA members will continue to receive digital versions of the Journal of Therapeutic Horticulture at no cost as a member benefit; however, those who prefer to read JTH as a printed document now have the ability to purchase a print version of the publication. The current edition is already available. This change in publishing policy is the direct result of feedback received during 2013's Membership Satisfaction survey.
AHTA members, as well as non-members, may now purchase a printed version of JTH through Amazon or Createspace, which is a publishing arm of Amazon. AHTA members may order the printed Journal at a significant discount (up to 90%) when they use Createspace.com through use of a promotional code. The promotional code can be found on the AHTA Members' Welcome page.
At present, AHTA is only able to offer the latest edition of the Journal through Createspace; however print editions of JTH are still available through AHTA for most years between 1996 and 2010. These Journals are also still available via the online ordering system found on the Publications page on the AHTA website.
The cost for purchasing a print edition of  JTH is $25.00 per issue for non-members. Members are able to purchase printed editions at cost, which will fluctuate based on the number of pages per issue but is expected to be approximately $5.00 (plus shipping) per edition.
To order a printed copy of the current issue of the Journal of Therapeutic Horticulture, visit the AHTA Members' Welcome page to access the Member Discount Code. Log on to www.createspace.com; click the Site dropdown and select Store. Enter 'AHTA' in the Search field and the current issue will be available. The AHTA discounted price will not appear until you checkout using the Members Only code. Once the purchase is completed, the issue will be mailed to you within 8-10 days. While the Journal is also available on Amazon.com, the “Members Only” discount cannot be used on that site. The discount is only available on the CreateSpace.com site.
For more inform
- See more at: http://ahta.org/news/journal-therapeutic-horticulture-now-available-print#sthash.Izaf0Xlc.dpuf

t is among the oldest living species on the planet, but researchers say sturgeon may be a key to future food security.
International Centre for Sturgeon Studies staff members unveiled a demonstration aquaponics system at Vancouver Island University's Nanaimo campus Friday.
It's a variation of hydroponic, or water-borne, growing that replaces chemical fertilizers with fish waste to nourish plants.
At VIU healthy chives, Swiss chard, lettuce, basil, cress and even quinoa grow on waste water from tanks containing the 250-million-year-old, living dinosaurs.
Visitors dined on a lunch of salads from the vegetables, served alongside grilled sturgeon steaks - all grown from the same system.
"This is the first time anybody has combined sturgeon, a coolwater fish, with aquaponics on this scale," said Don Tillapaugh, centre director.
The system provides a more immediate return on investment after someone pours money into a commercial fish farming (aquaculture) operation, boosting an investor's cash flow.
Tiny microbes release nutrients for plants to easily absorb.
"Studies have shown plants can grow up to 30 per cent faster, as compared to hydroponics."
"In aquaculture, it takes two to three years. .. where you don't have any cash flow. With aquaponics, you can get a head of lettuce in three weeks."
The goal now is to move toward commercial food production.
The VIU program, in existence since 1979, is reaching out to its extensive network of industry contacts.
"The project is to develop scientific information to allow entrepreneurs to decide whether sturgeon farming or aquaponics is a business for them," Tillapaugh said. "It's about food production, not fish production."
DBellaart@nanaimodailyn
- See more at: http://www.nanaimodailynews.com/news/viu-researchers-say-sturgeon-could-hold-the-key-to-future-food-security-in-the-world-1.1129681#sthash.t9PIxH3V.dpuf

t is among the oldest living species on the planet, but researchers say sturgeon may be a key to future food security.
International Centre for Sturgeon Studies staff members unveiled a demonstration aquaponics system at Vancouver Island University's Nanaimo campus Friday.
It's a variation of hydroponic, or water-borne, growing that replaces chemical fertilizers with fish waste to nourish plants.
At VIU healthy chives, Swiss chard, lettuce, basil, cress and even quinoa grow on waste water from tanks containing the 250-million-year-old, living dinosaurs.
Visitors dined on a lunch of salads from the vegetables, served alongside grilled sturgeon steaks - all grown from the same system.
"This is the first time anybody has combined sturgeon, a coolwater fish, with aquaponics on this scale," said Don Tillapaugh, centre director.
The system provides a more immediate return on investment after someone pours money into a commercial fish farming (aquaculture) operation, boosting an investor's cash flow.
Tiny microbes release nutrients for plants to easily absorb.
"Studies have shown plants can grow up to 30 per cent faster, as compared to hydroponics."
"In aquaculture, it takes two to three years. .. where you don't have any cash flow. With aquaponics, you can get a head of lettuce in three weeks."
The goal now is to move toward commercial food production.
The VIU program, in existence since 1979, is reaching out to its extensive network of industry contacts.
"The project is to develop scientific information to allow entrepreneurs to decide whether sturgeon farming or aquaponics is a business for them," Tillapaugh said. "It's about food production, not fish production."
DBellaart@nanaimodailyn
- See more at: http://www.nanaimodailynews.com/news/viu-researchers-say-sturgeon-could-hold-the-key-to-future-food-security-in-the-world-1.1129681#sthash.t9PIxH3V.dpuf

t is among the oldest living species on the planet, but researchers say sturgeon may be a key to future food security.
International Centre for Sturgeon Studies staff members unveiled a demonstration aquaponics system at Vancouver Island University's Nanaimo campus Friday.
It's a variation of hydroponic, or water-borne, growing that replaces chemical fertilizers with fish waste to nourish plants.
At VIU healthy chives, Swiss chard, lettuce, basil, cress and even quinoa grow on waste water from tanks containing the 250-million-year-old, living dinosaurs.
Visitors dined on a lunch of salads from the vegetables, served alongside grilled sturgeon steaks - all grown from the same system.
"This is the first time anybody has combined sturgeon, a coolwater fish, with aquaponics on this scale," said Don Tillapaugh, centre director.
The system provides a more immediate return on investment after someone pours money into a commercial fish farming (aquaculture) operation, boosting an investor's cash flow.
Tiny microbes release nutrients for plants to easily absorb.
"Studies have shown plants can grow up to 30 per cent faster, as compared to hydroponics."
"In aquaculture, it takes two to three years. .. where you don't have any cash flow. With aquaponics, you can get a head of lettuce in three weeks."
The goal now is to move toward commercial food production.
The VIU program, in existence since 1979, is reaching out to its extensive network of industry contacts.
"The project is to develop scientific information to allow entrepreneurs to decide whether sturgeon farming or aquaponics is a business for them," Tillapaugh said. "It's about food production, not fish production."
DBellaart@nanaimodailyn
- See more at: http://www.nanaimodailynews.com/news/viu-researchers-say-sturgeon-could-hold-the-key-to-future-food-security-in-the-world-1.1129681#sthash.t9PIxH3V.dpuf

What's a tree worth?

Green roof enthusiasts, here's an annual conference I wasn't aware of that I would recommend checking out...next year. It's called the  International Conference on Building Envelope Systems and Technologies. This year it's in Aachen, Germany and unfortunately there's only two days left.

For those willing (and able) to trade time (if you help with a few things around the farm) for education you can get free accommodations, meals and a permaculture design certificate in Africa. Where in Africa? I have no clue. Contact them and find out!

-The next trend in urban agriculture could be mobile fresh markets. Here's a handy-dandy financial snapshot of the markets already up and running across North America.

-What is a tree worth? A few organizations have tried to put a price tag on them over the years. In a world where almost everything needs to be (it seems) justified economically, this is an interesting attempt by TD Bank to give us an idea. $700? That seems a little low.