A zoo in the United Kingdom has come up with a novel approach to locally sourcing some of its food for animals and dealing with the challenge of limited space: vertical farming.
The Paignton Zoo in South Devon, working with Valcent Products (Eu) Limited and its VertiCrop farming system, has just finished planting its first crop of lettuce.
According to Valcent, the Paignton VertiCrop project is capable of producing 11,000 heads of lettuce every four weeks or so. The idea is to plant the greens so that the zoo can harvest fresh vegetables daily for the animals that eat them.
Eventually the farm will have vertical plots of red chard, mizuna, mixed leaves, various herbs, edible flowers, wheat grass and barley.
The grow area at the zoo sits in a specially constructed polytunnel and has computerized controls that automate water supply, irrigation and the environment around the VertiCrops. There’s also a conveyor belt for loading and unloading plant trays.
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The farming system is expected to help the zoo cut its feed bill by about £100,000 (almost US $165,440) a year.
Valcent says other benefits of VertiCrop farming include:
• Crop yields that are as much as 20 times greater than those from traditional farming.
• A 5 percent to 10 percent reduction in the water and nutrients required for growth.
• The ability to produce crops year-round in a controlled environment that can be customized for climatic regions.
• Enables farming regardless of soil conditions in almost any location.
The VertiCrop system also is to serve as a learning lab for the zoo, its visitors — and prospective Valcent customers. The company says more than 50 of them will be touring the site in the next three months.