GMG's Friday Find: Use Fish To Grow Food - Meeet the Aqualibrium Garden

Imagine a closed-loop ecosystem that can fit anywhere offering the freedom to grow food year round.  That was the vision of the designers of the Aqualibrium Garden, a product that can be used as an aquaponic or hyrdroponic system.

A sleek design that is part fish tank, part garden is small enough to comfortably fit in an urban apartment or small space dwelling.  It utilizes the latest trend of  aquaponics, which is essentially the symbiotic relationship between fish and plant life.  The bottom section of the unit is the fish tank where the waste from the fish is a perfect plant fertilizer. The upper section is where the plants live, their roots providing the perfect biofilter to absorb and purify the fish's water.

The GrowUp Box - An Urban Microfarm

It's becoming increasingly popular to recycle and upcycle pretty much anything and everything these days. From bottles to shipping containers, people are finding more and more ways to use items in new and exciting ways.

Urban farming business, GrowUp has started and successfully completed a Kickstarter campaign to build a demonstration project that will run throughout summer 2013, the GrowUp box.

The Grow Up box is made of an upcycled shipping container and it has two levels. The top level has plants and the bottom level contains Tilapia fish. GrowUp designed the box to be almost entirely self-sustaining with only minimal input needed. The plants are growing using almost entirely natural light and the plants will help purify the water while the fish waste will fertilize the plants on the level above. This is commonly referred to as aquaponics - a closed-loop farming method that combines hydroponics and aquaculture.

Currently growing in the Grow Up Box greenhouse are seedlings, microgreens, and lettuces.  It's said as many as 400 salad and herb varieties can be grown at one time.

The GrowUp Box will be hosted this summer and will be open to the public from the end of May.   Grow Up also has more plans in store including plans for London’s unused rooftops and derelict urban spaces. For more information on GrowUp and the GrowUp box please visit their website.

James
Garden Media Group