What do you think about hydroponic farms?

Comparative cost between hydroponic and regular lettuce?

I’d also be curious about susceptibility to e-coli – better or worse with hydroponics?

@elbanditoroso How would e.coli be present with hydroponic growing?

I’m not sure how the price compared, I’ll try to pay attention to that next time I shop. Maybe I can look online. I needed Bibb lettuce and this was the only one I saw so I didn’t pay too much attention to the price. I think it was $5 for two heads. I made three dinner salads with it and almost all leaves were in great condition.

My sister grows all kind of hydroponic produce. I’m sure her setup is really made to grow pot but she uses it for kale and other stuff. It actually yields a lot.

When I worked at a local farm in Lexington, MA, one of our partner farm was a greenhouse hydroponic farm up in Maine. They grow amazing, on-the-vine tomatoes, amongst other things.

I’m all for it because it’s always local (within 100 miles), not subject to weather or bugs — thus no/little organic pesticide needed.

Hydro/Aquaponic grown food is better than organic. There is practically zero risk of disease, zero chance of e-coli or other pathogens related to dirt grown food.

It is extremely water efficient. There’s no top-soil erosion. It doesn’t need pesticides or herbicides. There’s no runoff polluting waterways. And Aquaponic systems don’t even need fertiliser (except fish food). Growth rates are quicker than in dirt.

I think there should be massive investment in this form of crop growing. It should replace industrial farming, which is damaging to the environment, flora and fauna.

Hydro/Aquaponics can be done almost anywhere. I’ve wanted to setup my own small aquaponics system right inside my own home for a while now.

I once was looking at the Taj Mahal of greenhouses. It was a geodesic dome style with solar powered vents and fans. It had a large fish tank in it and semi-hydroponic grow pots. I say semi because it wasn’t grown in water, it was grown in a small amount of dirt, but fairly shallow. The water from the fish tank was used throughout the cycle. It was pumped out to water the plants. The water drained down through the plants and the dirt and was recycled back to the fish tank. The fish benefited from the nutrients obtained as the water filtered through the dirt and the plants benefited as the fish waste in the water was spread back into their soil. I’ve been curious why, other than initial cost, this sort of growing area hasn’t caught on more than it has?

I think DisneyWorld has that set up with the fish and water. I remember on the ride through the hydroponic garden there are fish tanks nearby or maybe we see them during the ride, I don’t quite remember. Some of the vegetables have Mickey ears.

@JLeslie E-coli comes from contaminated water. If the water source for hydroponic growing is not clean, e-coli can be transmitted on the lettuce leaves.

@elbanditoroso That’s typically through animal manure, or water using manure that’s contaminated with e-coli. It’s a practice used in dirt farming.

For hydroponics, you just use plain water. The system is largely closed, with the only water loss being from evaporation, and the only input being fertiliser.

In an aquaponics systems which uses fish poop to feed plants (the ammonia is converted to nitrites and then nitrates through bacterial filters) the only input into the water is fish food.

@JLeslie: I think that’s in Epcot.

@jca2 It is. It’s in The Land in Epcot. I think the ride is actually called Living with the Land.