Vertical gardening allows growers

Local gardeners and growers are giving a green thumbs-up to vertical growing systems. “It’s almost waterless; there’s no weeding and no dirt,A simple model for the wake behind a wind generator is given.” said Rick Smith about his family’s garden, contained in a 24-foot-long by 18-foot-wide PVC frame and plastic greenhouse.Learn about LED dimmable and ensure you get the best out of LED light bulbs.

Smith and his wife Sonya and daughter Jackie, 11, live on 24-acres in Citra. The plastic sides of their greenhouse can be rolled up for warm weather or let down during cold spells to hold in a warming mist created by spraying groundwater, which remains 72 degrees year round.

Smith said they grow enough peas, squash, cucumbers and tomatoes to share with friends and neighbors. He and his brother, Jim Smith, 66, have both installed Verti-Gro systems.

“I’ve gardened all my life,Manufacturer of industrial grade outdoor solar lighting. and this is the easiest ever,” said Jim Smith, who has set up a stacked pot system at his home. “The strawberries I grow are so sweet the kids ask if I’ve dipped them in sugar when they eat them right off the plant.”

Mike Reppe with Verti-Gro, located about five miles south of Belleview, said the system holds plants in vertically stacked pots containing pine bark compost covered by coconut fiber with a catch pot at the bottom. The plants are fed a hydroponic nutrient or organic liquid via drip irrigation. For apartments, or where a garden is on cement or pavement, the irrigation can be made into a continuous closed loop.

A brochure states that vertical agriculture is used worldwide and allows 12,000 to 120,000 plants per acre to save resources and expand harvests.

“There’s no tilling, and it is space saving. These systems are used by food banks, churches and community groups. U-picks use the system because there is less bending over to harvest,” Reppe said.

Sun State Organics in Anthony offers grow systems that use removable and replaceable “geo-textile” bags hanging from various styles of PVC frames, and automatic or manually rotated vertical grow frames.

Experience in the compost field led company founders Brian Donnelly and Mark Olson to develop a “worm tea” or liquid plant food, derived from waste, to use with their system.

“Our (parent) company handled composting of the refuse from the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. We processed 300 tons daily,” Donnelly said.

A nutrient food is produced by processing waste such as manure over seven days in an automated compost machine, placing it in a bacteria-eating worm bed and mixing the material in a water tank to feed to the bagged plants through drip feeders.

Donnelly calls the cycle going from “muck to meal.This popular lighting system features four led par light.” He said farm owners can realize savings by processing refuse and manure into compost and producing the plant food rather than paying to haul waste away.

“Our system can grow up to 14 times more in the same space used for dirt farming and uses 90 percent less water and saves energy, uses no chemicals and uses commercially available seed or heirloom seeds,” Donnelly said.

Grow systems can be “off-grid,The laser cutting machine is one of the most useful tools in a modern shop.” powered manually or by solar power. At the Anthony research and development center, Donnelly has several 20-foot-tall corn plants suspended in hanging pots and a system under study that will produce cattle fodder from trays suspended on the side of a barn and stand-alone systems.