Many growers proudly advertise their local origins, but when David Rosenstein of Evo Farm sells his produce on Sunday for the first time at the Mar Vista farmers market, he says he will be talking “not about food miles, but food feet.”

Rosenstein has built an innovative prototype aquaponics farm, combining aquaculture and hydroponic (soilless) vegetable cultivation, in a neighbor’s backyard. Each of these systems by itself generates copious waste, but when they are synergized, the fish provide the fertilizer for the plants and the plants filter the water for the fish.

Ancient Mesoamericans practiced a primitive form of aquaponics, cultivating plants on rafts on lakes. Modern aquaponics systems were developed in recent decades by several researchers, including James Rakocy at the University of the Virgin Islands. There are now many aquaponics enthusiasts on a small scale (“barrellponics”), but Rosenstein may be the only one practicing it commercially in Southern California, he says.

Rosenstein, who at 37 has a boyish appearance and earnest manner, combines intense idealism with a practical, can-do approach. He grew up in the San Fernando Valley and on the Westside, the son of a electronics manufacturer, and graduated from UC Santa Cruz with a degree in sociology. The next summer he drove a tomato truck in the San Joaquin Valley, where he acquired a distaste for industrial agriculture. He spent much of his 20s working as a geotechnical engineer and indulging his passion: rock climbing. More recently, he helped produce environmentally conscious programs for public television and became inspired to make a difference himself.

“I decided that food is the common thread that can solve the world’s problems, such as climate change, peak oil, chronic disease, even economic contraction,” he says. “To be part of the change, I wanted to be actively involved in bringing food closer to people.”

Two years ago, he and his wife, Cecile Lopes, took a class in aquaponics and decided to establish an experimental farm near their home in Mar Vista. He posted an ad on Craigslist, looking for homeowners who would let him build a greenhouse on their property, and he received numerous responses from all over the city. But his wife, who works in corporate finance, was pregnant with their first child, and “the last thing I wanted to do was spend two hours commuting every day,” he says. So he searched on Google Earth for nearby oversized but underutilized properties, slipped fliers in mailboxes and found a neighbor who agreed to let him build a structure in return for all the vegetables that his family could eat.

Rosenstein came up with a one-of-a-kind design for a 500-square-foot greenhouse that produces lots of food in a small space, is highly water-efficient and operates completely off the utility grid. Over the winter of 2010-11, he and a friend built the structure, with three fish tanks and racks of vegetables, stacked to take advantage of the varying temperatures from top to bottom.

As he worked to adapt the aquaponics system to the local water chemistry and climate, Rosenstein found out the hard way what not to do. In warmer areas such as Hawaii and southern Florida, for instance, tilapia is the fish of choice for aquaponics systems, but even the moderate Los Angeles winter proved too chilly for the heat-loving fish. After a cold snap last December, the water temperature sank into the death zone, and the fish ended up in the compost pile.

“Tilapia just don’t make sense here, because you need to heat the water,” says Rosenstein. “You’re fighting nature.”

He restocked his three 250-gallon tanks with several species of catfish. When he tosses pellets of feed into the tanks, it looks like the tanks are boiling, as hungry fish roil the water. Little do they know that the more they eat, the more quickly they will outgrow the system and end up in a fish fry. Currently, however, Rosenstein is not looking to sell the fish, because the revenue would not justify the expense of a commercial aquaculture license, which would be required, he says.

His main focus is in growing vegetables, including 50 kinds of lettuce, Asian greens, basil and tomatoes. He has 1,000 plants growing for harvest and 9,000 seedlings in his nursery, where they are tended several hours daily by the nursery manager, Yuni Lee, an artist who lives nearby. Until recently, Rosenstein had been giving away the produce to friends while experimenting to find varieties that produce well and taste good.

Now, however, he is excited at the prospect of selling his harvest for the first time on Sunday at the Mar Vista market, five blocks from the farm. He will bring living plants with their roots still attached so that if they don’t sell they can be replanted in his system. Currently he doesn’t have enough to sell every week, but he will return when production allows.

Unlike some farmers market vendors who carefully guard their secrets, Rosenstein is eager to teach others. Last weekend he hosted several hundred visitors on a tour of his growing facility, and he’ll be giving a class on the Art and Science of Aquaponics on May 26-27.

He has had discussions with local homeowners interested in hosting his next venture, a much larger commercial farm that he plans to build this year in the area. He hopes this will allow him to fulfill his dream: that he and Cecile could support their family doing work they love.

“I’m in this for social, environmental and health reasons, but to be a sustainable venture, it has to be financially viable,” he says. “It’s time to turn the corner from being a hobbyist to being a real farmer.”

food@latimes.com

Copyright © 2012, Los Angeles Times

If you count the number of people who are actually actively engaged in aquaponics on a global scale, that number is statistically about as close to zero as you can get.  Yet, this relatively unknown method of food production is not only the most promising next step in agriculture, but also on the veryshort list of things that just might save ourselves from ourselves.

Many more traditionally minded naysayers doubt the potential of aquaponics. Frankly, I don’t blame them. It doesn’t have the years of refinement that other techniques do. Furthermore, with such easy access to “how-to” info online, it can be challenging for hobbyists and entrepreneurs to decipher how to run and optimize a system for a particular goal, which can perpetuate poor practices and result in failure. But somewhere in this ever-growing body of aquaponicists, there are a select few who stay the course, remain razor focused and are discovering the tiny subtleties that will propel this already elegant and essential food system into something even greater – common knowledge.

In a world of peak everything – other than compassion – innovation in how we feed the ever-exploding growth of Earth’s population is a rare remaining hope. If this relatively new species called homo sapiens can survive long enough to unlearn the path of the not-so-green Green Revolution and rethink the critical nature of what we eat, how we access that food and how it is distributed, then we might just find a new trajectory for this spiral we are on.

A new set of definitions is required to begin the discourse that will set us straight. Localis not something that is measured in miles but in feet. Sustainable is more than just something that feels good, it is also profitable, tastes great, and will remain present for the foreseeable future. Resilience is not the ability to fight the ever-changing face of nature, but to actually acquiesce and work from within it until we realize that without it we have just about nothing left.

To think that we can outsmart natures’ system is a fundamental flaw of the modern age. If only we can sit still, observe, and try to understand what systems have worked for the planet long before we arrived, we just might be pleasantly surprised. As it turns out, we have numerous opportunities to replicate and integrate these systems that have stood the test of time. A pond in a forest – arguably on the ‘surface’, one of the simplest systems of all – is likely the one that can have the most profound affect on the future of food.

Just as we have all breathed the same molecule of air that passed through the lungs of Napoleon, a drop of water passes through an extensive lifecycle that at one point or another finds itself in an ever-so-small body of water surrounded by trees. In it is a vast array of visible aquatic species like frogs and fish, as well as plants that surprisingly can survive with roots that are entirely submerged. Birds fly overhead and mammals sip from the banks, and effluent from all finds its way into the body of water. At the bottom is an array of detritivores like snails, fleas, and mosquito larva. On the surface are a variety of algae and in the water column are bacteria and other microorganisms that help tie this whole web together. We don’t need to understand exactly how it is possible that all these life forms can live together harmoniously, or rather symbolically. But, if we can accept that this system has been proven to work for a time measured geologically and that we may benefit by trying to replicate it, we will only have accomplished what the Aztecs did some 900 years ago.

In an area near Tenochtitlan, which today would be called the Valley of Mexico. The indigenous people of the region developed a dam and levy system to capture rainwater and snowmelt from the surrounding volcanoes. On the lake they created, they built floating islands made of reeds anchored by trees they planted. On the islands they were able to cultivate things like Maize, beans and squash that were staples of their diet. These crops were able to not only wick the moisture they needed, but also the nutrients they required to thrive from the lake. At that time Tenochtitlan was likely the largest city in the world estimated to have been inhabited by upwards of 500,000 people. A population that size at that point in history was only possible because they were able to farm in and around the city, i.e. urban farming.

The population was so vast and concentrated that they had another problem – what to do with all of their human waste. They realized that if they deposited their waste into the lake, it was not only more sanitary for the city, but also a feed source for the critters and a fertilizer for the crops. By “stacking functions” they were able to solve multiple problems and create a tremendous opportunity. Their method of farming called Chinampas is likely the earliest form of aquaponics.

Today, modern aquaponics is in its infancy. Yet it has been in practice in one form or another for at least 30-years with constant innovation and refinement occurring on at least three continents. While there is currently no substitute for well-managed soil, unfortunately not only is soil availability on a steep decline and nutritionally deficient, but it is also unable to sufficiently feed growing populations in the urban environment. If urban farming is to be sustainable – that is, to be environmentally responsible, financially sound and offer an array of food choices including plant and animal – aquaponics is the one option on the table that can satisfy all.

Rarely does hindsight present an opportunity to see forward. Fortunately, though, the indigenous people of Mexico not only provide a glimpse of a sustainable food system, but also the consequences if it is removed. When the Spanish conquistadors arrived, one of the first actions they took was to break the levees and dams. What better way to conquer a society than to remove its ability to feed itself? Or conversely, what better way to save a society than to integrate a food system that has higher yields, uses the least amount of water, can exceed organic standards, taste delicious and can be utilized year-round… right next door?

Aquaponics is the future of food production for a long list of reasons. Most importantly though, it is because it is an open-source platform that is constantly being improved, shared far and wide and will never be owned or controlled by any one individual or entity – decentralized the way food is meant to be.

Originally posted on Seedstock.com 

The world’s population is growing rapidly, and that calls for new ways of thinking about how to produce enough food while also conserving the earth’s natural resources. As a result, agricultural entrepreneurs today are striving to combine the best of traditional farming methods with new technologies in order to create food that is healthy, flavorful and locally grown.

And if that doesn’t sound like enough of a feat, there’s also the challenge of doing it all using a business model that won’t leave the farmer broke.

Southern California has become a region of growing activity for these types of ventures, and Seedstock has attempted to provide a glimpse of what that experience looks like. A panel of agricultural entrepreneurs from the region—including those using soil, hydroponic and aquaponic growing methods—gathered at UCLA on Wednesday to share their experiences.

The entrepreneurs answered questions by the audience and by the event’s moderator, Seedstock founder Jason Reed, providing insight into the burning questions any modern-day starting farmer would want to know: How do entrepreneurs get started in such forward-thinking farming ventures, especially when they don’t come from a farming background? How do they get around barriers like raising enough capital and dealing with zoning issues?

The event panelists included Pierre Sleiman, David Rosenstein, Colin Archipley, Jesse DuBois and Dan Allen.

Sleiman is co-founder and CEO of Encinitas-based Go Green Agriculture, which has a goal of setting up hydroponic (meaning without soil) mini-farms all over the country that are controlled by computerized technology run by the company. Rosenstein is founder of EVO Farm, an organization that runs the only commercial aquaponic farm in Los Angeles. (Aquaponics is the fusion of hydroponics with aquaculture, which includes the raising of fish.) Archipley is co-founder and CEO of San Diego-based hydroponic organic farm Archi’s Acres and the Veterans Sustainable Agriculture Training (VSAT) program, offering combat veterans opportunities in sustainable farming. DuBois and Allen are the CEO and CFO, respectively, of Farmscape Gardens, an organic garden installation and maintenance company based in Los Feliz (in Los Angeles) that aims to help people grow their own food in soil right in the city.

From left to right: Pierre Sleiman (Go Green Agriculture), David Rosenstein (EVO Farm), Jason Reed (Seedstock), Colin Archipley (Archi’s Acres), Jesse DuBois and Dan Allen (both of Farmscape Gardens). Photo: Jessica Vernabe

Breaking Into Sustainable Agriculture

These entrepreneurs aren’t representative of the typical farmer. For the most part, they come from backgrounds in other fields that aren’t related to agriculture. Sleiman studied computer science and business in college before starting Go Green Agriculture, and Rosenstein was a fully employed documentary filmmaker prior to pursuing a full-time career as an aquaponic farmer. (He did work on films about socially and environmentally conscious topics.) Archipley was a Marine sergeant. DuBois wanted to be a screenwriter, and Allen had a political science background.

These entrepreneurs were drawn to agriculture after developing both an understanding of the importance of having healthy, local food and a desire to solve problems plaguing today’s food system. Rosenstein said he got his inspiration from the documentary films he worked on where he found a common thread to the stories he was helping to tell.

“The common thread is that food can help solve all the world’s problems simultaneously,” he said, listing climate change and chronic diseases as some of those problems. “For me, I just wanted to step away from the camera and be one of those people.”

The five farmers gave some key advice for getting a sustainable farm started. Those included starting small; choosing a crop and growing technique that matches with the entrepreneur’s philosophy; coming up with a business model that solves a problem in a new way; and making sure the plan is economically feasible.

Archipley said he has seen his share of young people who are enthusiastic and want to “save the world” through sustainable agriculture. But sometimes that isn’t enough, he noted.

“If you want to be around for a long time, you have to make a profit,” Archipley said. “You’ve got to crunch the numbers. You have to figure out where you’re going to sell your crop. You have to figure out what crop it is. … You have to make those decisions before you actually make that investment.”

One way to give an agriculture startup some competitive edge is through directed crop selection. New farmers should try to find out what kinds of products the local community is demanding, the panelist said. They could also find a niche market to explore, which helps the farmer avoid the gruesome price competition of the subsidized crop markets.

“It turns out Los Angeles is a melting pot of mini-culture. Most of us can’t find the produce that comes from home,” Rosenstein said. “So (there’s) tapping into special markets—cash crops besides the cash crop.”

DuBois said Farmscape allows clients to choose from a wide variety of seed options, and they balance their crop options so they include both the highly specialized “crazy” crops and the more conventional ones.

Soil vs. Hyroponics vs. Aquaponics

While the panelists are all making strides in sustainable agriculture and their goals are similar, there is an obvious difference between them—how they grow their food. They all had their different reasons for why they chose the methods they did.

Sleiman said he chose hydroponics—particularly with the model in which the growing metrics of the mini-farms are controlled by the company’s central office—because it is a simple model that can be spread more easily than aquaponics. (The plant products are grown in water and nutrients are directly delivered to the roots, bypassing the use of soil.) The growth process can be easily monitored by the company’s software system, cutting out the need for a highly skilled employee to handle the metrics.

Other benefits include the use of 60 percent to 80 percent less water than traditional growing methods and higher productivity levels, Sleiman said. He noted that his method also eliminates the need for pesticides. Archipley also grows his food hydroponically, adapting certified organic techniques to the hydroponics model. He said he also found the method to be much more water efficient.

Meanwhile, Rosenstein said aquaponics allows for the elimination of runoff (unlike growing in soil), and it is a “closed-loop” system that replicates a natural process. (The fish waste in the aquaculture part of the process is used as nutrients for the plants, which are grown hydroponically. The plants, in turn, act as a filter the water, which is re-circulated back to the fish.) On the other hand, when using hydroponics, the farmer has to buy the fertilizers and nutrients that feed the plant instead of producing them naturally within the system, he said.

Rosenstein noted that there is no substitute for the richness and quality of food grown in good soil, but the reality of growing in urban settings necessitates the use of other methods.

“The deficiency of the model of growing through the soil is that you can’t get to a scale in an urban environment,” he said. “That’s where aquaponics and hydroponics come in because of the cycles and the density you can get.”

Meanwhile, DuBois and Allen focus their work with Farmscape Gardens on helping people grow their own gardens intensively on small spaces right in the midst of metropolitan areas.

The panelists also gave advice about how to work with investors (develop a clear pitch on how you plan to grow the company; also look to friends and family for early investment). They talked about how to deal with zoning issues, and about spreading enthusiasm about careers in agriculture (reaching out to students in schools and providing paid internships).

Seedstock’s partners in the event included the Entrepreneur Association and the Harold and Pauline Price Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at the UCLA Anderson School of Management. The event was also sponsored by Whole Foods Market, Westwood Village.

February 1st, 2012

Originally posted here

It’s easy to list the reasons why we are supposed to love urban agriculture: the food it yields is fresh and local; the farming it requires is fun and social; the effect on neighborhoods is revitalizing and healthy. Critics point to its inability to replace existing production and distribution channels for produce, but what if its impact extended beyond the small farm or immediate community? What if it could solve other problems? One of New York’s greatest environmental challenges is its combined sewage overflow (CSO) problem. Our outdated sewer system is designed to collect stormwater runoff, domestic sewage, and industrial wastewater in the same pipe on its way to a sewage treatment plant. When the rain is heavy, though, volume exceeds capacity and untreated wastewater flows right into our waterways. Green infrastructure is a term that refers to a wide range of technologies and systems to improve water quality through the capture and reuse of stormwater. But the policies that incentivize green infrastructure and those that govern urban agriculture are not coordinated. In some cases, urban agriculture is actively excluded from official definitions of green infrastructure. In an effort to support farming in the city and help scale it up, Tyler Caruso and Erik Facteau set out to prove scientifically the environmental benefits of rooftop and other urban farms, in particular their ability to manage stormwater, with their research project Seeing Green. In describing this project, Caruso and Facteau touch on issues that range from the effect of scientific research on public policy, the shift towards a definition of sustainability that includes performance alongside design, and the need to layer different registers of analysis in efforts to bring about a city that is more responsive to natural systems.

-C.S.

What is Seeing Green and how did it come about?
Erik Facteau: Seeing Green is a research project that studies specific urban agricultural sites in the New York City area in order to demonstrate how urban agriculture should be considered as a viable and important component of a city’s green infrastructure. One of the sites we’re currently looking at is Brooklyn Grange, a rooftop farm in Long Island City; another that we will be looking at is Added Value, a raised bed farm in Red Hook. We’re also looking at the rooftop farm atop the Parks Department’s Five Borough Administrative Building on Randall’s Island.

By measuring evaporation and evapotranspiration rates, we are looking to create metrics to calculate how much water urban farms are managing, through both detention (meaning the temporary storage of excess stormwater) and retention (the indefinite storage of excess stormwater). This will tell us how much water urban farms keep from entering the sewer system, therefore reducing combined sewer overflows.

When you start to get these numbers, you can begin to extrapolate over larger areas of land – whether it’s exisiting farms or underutilized land with farming potential – to determine how much water can be managed and what the best practices are for doing so. Right now, we are looking at a couple different sites as a base line and moving forward from there.

Testing the water at the Brooklyn Grange rooftop farm | photo courtesy of Seeing Green

Tyler Caruso: This project began as a graduate research project and as it has evolved to include a series of interesting collaborations; and the sponsorship of the Open Space Institute has helped us pursue these partnerships. In one project, called “Farming Up,” Alec Baxt and Lise Serrell look at nutrient quality of crops growing in urban environment compared to rural environments. “Don’t Flush Me” is a project that puts sensors in sewage outflow points and notifies individuals about how much wastewater they produce during and immediately after those weather events that cause sewage to overflow into the harbor. Another one is called “Farming Concrete,” for which Mara Gittleman has been calculating the area, weight and monetary value of food grown in community gardens in New York City.

Facteau: Another project we’ve been involved in has been to set up a demonstration project on the roof of the Association for Energy Affordability‘s headquarters in the Bronx. We emulated the green roof condition on part of the roof and installed a container underneath so we could measure the amount of water running through the green roof and then compare that to the amount of water rushing off the impervious surface of the regular rooftop.

Caruso: If you take all of these metrics and you collapse them – you look at the nutrient level of both the soil and the crop, you look at the stormwater management potential, the energy rate reduction, the food production potential — the combined analysis is much more powerful. The guiding idea is this: if you can first define the benefits and know what they are and research them, then you can quantify them, and then you can monetize the benefits — and that’s when it really becomes valuable to private property owners and cities. At that point, the research can begin informing policy. And it can begin informing the development of best management practices around the design of farms. For example, if we observe nutrient run-off, we can help design small wetlands around the drain. If we know how much water an urban farm can manage at a particular soil depth, and how much productivity and costs would be affected by increasing its depth, then we can inform building owners about the best investment to reach the desired productivity and the desired environmental outcomes. It’s a necessary step if we want to see urban agriculture grow in New York City.

Soy Plant tested for Farming Up | Photo: Catherine Yrisarri

How did you both get involved in this topic?
Facteau: My background is in microbiology and mycology, working mostly on plant restoration projects and the symbiotic relationship between fungi and plants. I studied environmental science and forestry in college. And I met Tyler while in the graduate program in environmental systems management at the Pratt Institute.

Caruso: Before this, I was working on landscape design and urban agriculture projects and designing and installing grey water systems in San Francisco. When Erik and I started the discussions that eventually led to Seeing Green, we were looking for a thesis project and decided to work together. At the time, there were lots of projects around that dealt with urban agriculture, and most of them were primarily concerned with the economic or social benefits. They might mention the environmental benefits of farming in the city, but not in great depth. The potential of urban agriculture as green infrastructure was a connection that hadn’t yet been made. In 2010, we started noticing how much City agencies were talking about green infrastructure, and realized that if we wanted our cities to support urban agriculture under the banner of green infrastructure, we would have to quantify the environmental benefits.

Brooklyn Grange | Photo courtesy of Seeing Green

Facteau: The green infrastructure documents from the City that we were looking at all seemed to focus on traditional green roofs. So we started researching how much water these systems could actually handle while simultaneously looking at how rooftop agricultural projects are performing.

Caruso: The grants that Erik is referring to include a green roof tax credit incentive, issued through the Department of Buildings, that specifically prohibits urban farms because of plant selection and because of speculation that irrigation – traditional green roofs don’t require irrigation; agricultural green roofs do – would make rooftop farms less able to retain stormwater than a traditional green roof. That’s a clear example of the city implementing progressive green infrastructure policies that exclude urban agriculture. And in this case, the policy is based on hypotheses that are scientifically untested.

We also find the language of these policies to be more prescriptive than performative. Our methodology for the Seeing Green project looks closely at performativity: how well urban farms and green infrastructure perform over time.

What kinds of tools or precedents were out there to help you analyze, monetize, to quantify or identify proper metrics?
Caruso: I know everyone says this, but I think social media – Twitter, Facebook, etc. – has really helped empower people with a DIY attitude, has helped citizens’ groups to form, has helped individuals collaborate with a science lab.

Platforms like Kickstarter have created more of a sense of “we’re all in it together,” and that attitude has definitely benefited us.

Facteau: Kickstarter was a huge help in getting this off the ground. We had worked out our methodology as part of our thesis project at Pratt, and when we finished that we asked ourselves, “Where do we go from here?” We knew the equipment that we needed, and we knew that farmers and communities would really value the information we wanted to collect. So we used Kickstarter not only to raise money for equipment but also to raise awareness. Groups from England, from Australia, from the west coast contacted us because of their interest in the research.

Caruso: I just spoke to someone preparing a research report on the potential for urban agriculture in San Francisco. Another group in Minneapolis recently requested our collaboration on a large-scale urban agriculture initiative out there. Around the country, and the world, it’s a really supportive community. There are also some big research initiatives right here in New York….

Like “Five Borough Farm,” which Urban Omnibus featured last year. That effort is also trying to push the idea of metrics.
Caruso: Exactly. I think one of Five Borough Farm’s contributions to the field is its focus on the public health perspective. There’s also the work Kubi Ackerman is doing at Columbia’s Urban Design Lab to evaluate New York’s capacity for urban agriculture. We’ve used some of his preliminary numbers to help us make the case that if we have x amount of stormwater, and if we extrapolate from the knowledge of how many vacant lots or rooftops could be used to scale up urban agriculture, then we can start to talk about how to address the combined sewage overflow problem. If we know that we could manage this many gallons through urban farms, and how much money the city spends per gallon on treating stormwater and wastewater, then we can calculate how much money the city could save if urban agriculture were considered one of many pieces of the green infrastructure puzzle. When you compare that to the cost of retrofitting or constructing new sewage treatment plants, and factor in the amount of energy that goes into treating wastewater, the savings become astronomical. Plus, there are all the benefits that urban agriculture advocates have made well known: vacant land is being re-utilized by communities, increasing property values, supporting economic micro-enterprises, contributing to healthy living, decreasing public health costs. Once you start layering all those factors, the potential of these farms or community gardens is phenomenal. 

On the Westside of Los Angeles, in the Mar Vista district, urban farming organization, EVO Farm, is utilizing aquaponics to create a replicable and sustainable farming model that will facilitate the creation of a network of local urban farms that grow and distribute produce that exceeds organic standards.

“Who would want a big giant farm in one place when you could have 100 farms in 100 places?” asks EVO Farm’s founder David Rosenstein.

According to Rosenstein, an urban aquaponic farm doesn’t necessarily require a lot of space. Rosenstein built what he calls a “suitcase-model,” which requires only as much space as a desktop computer. He uses it for demonstration purposes at the local farmers market. Rosenstein believes that with numerous small farms distributed across cities, food miles would be reduced, jobs would be created, and communities would be able to grow heirloom varieties and other foods that do not transport well.

“For me, if you can’t walk to your farm it’s not local,” says Rosenstein.

How It Works

Aquaponic systems combine hydroponics with aquaculture to create a more optimized and sustainable food production system by solving for problems that occur in the individual systems. With hydroponics, a grower often must rely upon commercial fertilizers in order to enrich the water, while in aquaculture the fish farmer must constantly monitor the toxicity levels of the water that results from fish effluents (waste).

In aquaponics, the fish effluent in the water provides an organic nutrient source, or natural fertilizer, for the plants being grown in the system. The plants in turn consume the natural fertilizer and in the process filter and purify the water, which is subsequently recirculated back to the fish.

Similarly, the fish in the EVO Farm’s aquaponic system are fed nutrients, which they subsequently convert into waste in the form of ammonia. With the aid of a bacteria biofilter, the ammonia in the water is converted to nitrites and eventually nitrates, essentially creating a liquid fertilizer.

The nitrate infused water then flows to EVO Farm’s two deck system of rafted plants with roots submerged in the water to pick up the nitrates and other nutrients from the water in turn acting as another filter before the water is fed back into the fish tanks where the cycle begins again.

Over the past year the EVO Farm aquaponic system, primarily designed to grow leafy green vegetables, has produced more than 40 varieties of lettuce, tomatoes and other herbs. Rosenstein conservatively estimates the system can produce more than 5,000 pounds of produce.

Compared to traditional agriculture systems, Rosenstein says that aquaponics is at least 90 percent more water efficient with the only water loss coming from evaporation and the water that the plants themselves absorb. To counteract this loss, Rosenstein has installed a rain capture system.

“If you had enough storage capacity you could run the farm all year long off the grid,” he says.

Rosenstein encountered many challenges and faced a steep learning curve as he worked to develop the EVO Farm prototype in his backyard. One bump along the road included the death of the Tilapia in the system caused by a cold snap that hit Los Angeles. He has since added fish that can handle cooler temperatures. He notes, though, that the Tilapia were composted and will make their way back into the EVO Farm system as they decompose in the form of compost tea.

From a ‘learning garden’ to the Learning Garden

The EVO Farm prototype in Mar Vista is only the tip of the iceberg. Rosenstein has been contracted to build an aquaponics-based farm setup at the Learning Garden at Venice High School in Los Angeles, which is used to instruct high school students. UCLA also uses the garden to teach some of its horticulture classes.

“Through the Mar Vista Garden Tour, I stumbled upon EVO farm and I was amazed that it was so close,” says Tina Gruen, coordinator for the Venice High School Culinary Arts and Sustainable Agriculture Academy.

Gruen noted that EVO Farm’s ability to accommodate groups as well as Rosenstein’s facility in explaining how aquaponic systems work made her want to bring him in as a specialty teacher for Venice High School students.

“My vision is that every school will have an aquaponic system in the future and aquaponics will become as second nature to students as to who wrote the Bill of Rights,” Rosenstein says. “It’s a fundamental necessity of life – not that those things aren’t quite as important.”

“Hopefully, this will just be like the ABCs for kids,” Gruen says. “It will become a lifestyle.”

The Future

Rosenstein is preparing to select a site to build his next EVO Farm in Mar Vista that will be more than 20 times larger than his current farm and capable of producing north of 100,000 pounds of food each year – enough for an entire neighborhood in Los Angeles.

“You can actually have unique colors and tastes,” Rosenstein says. “Chefs would go nuts over that stuff – well some chefs.”

Rosenstein believes that the EVO Farm model could be sustained through CSA partnerships and sales at local farmers markets. He has also received interest from several individuals who would like him to build aquaponic systems in their backyards, as well as interest from a local developer who would like one built on the roof of a building a few years down the road.

“From a business perspective it’s way better as far as risk, but I am not here to just make money,” Rosenstein says. “I am here to be the farmer.”

Website: Http://www.EVOFarm.com
Twitter: @EVOFarm
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/EVOFarm