Aquaponics is a farming method that's been growing in popularity in recent years. It's a process that involves fish and plants growing together in symbiosis; nitrogen rich fish poop is used to fertilize the plants and the plants help to clean the water for the fish.
You can find aquaponic operations growing food in places such as the United States, Germany, Canada, and elsewhere. And it's been used to help grow things like leafy salad greens, tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers.
But what hasn't been grown, in Canada at least, up until now with the aquaponics method was cannabis.
One farmer from Ontario has changed that though with his licensed cannabis operation, Green Relief Inc, that uses the aquaponics to grow.
The operation took several years to perfect and enables them to grow without the use of pesticides. The company is reportedly the world's first licensed producer that is growing medicinal cannabis with the aquaponics method.
“This is the agriculture of the future,... If you’re not latching on to sustainable agriculture technologies now, you’re going to be a dinosaur.” - co-founder Warren Bravo.
They use Tilapia fish in their operation, roughly 6,000 of them, to help them grow more than 4k plants at any given time. By using the aquaponics method they claim to be able to grow the cannabis with at least 90 percent less water than if they had used conventional growing methods.
They also report seeing at least 10-20 percent better yields by growing this way.
Every few weeks they will also donate hundreds of those fish to a local charity organization that provides food for the homeless in the region.
Pics:
pixabay
