Lyfe Gardens
Steve and Michelle Gandt in their 6,000 square foot aqua greenhouse.
Location: Bangor, WI
20 miles from PFC—La Crosse
Supplier to People’s Food Co-op since 2016
Lyfe Gardens is a small hydroponic farm in Bangor, Wisconsin. Steve and Michelle Glandt have been supplying red, green, and romaine lettuces to People’s Food Co-op of La Crosse since 2016. Their ambitions are truly local. They harvest about 200 heads of lettuce a week. Besides the co-op, they also supply fresh lettuce to two local school districts. As Steve says, “Every town should have 100 family farms supplying local food needs instead of only one or two.”
They began their small farm business in 2014, partly as a project to do with their four children. They built a 6,000 square foot aqua greenhouse, integrating a fish farming operation with the hydroponic vegetables. The plants are grown in nitrogen-rich water supplied by the tilapia fish raised in nearby tanks.
The Circle of Lettuce
The lettuces are germinated in gardeners’ grow cubes, then transferred to flats or rafts with their roots suspended in the nutrient-enriched nursery pool. After a couple of weeks, the plants develop enough root that they can be moved to the Styrofoam flats in the main grow beds. As the older plants are harvested the flats are removed and the remaining flats are moved forward to allow room for new plants to be added. The fertilizer used to enrich the water is helpfully supplied by the tilapia in nearby tanks. And the water goes back to the fish after the nutrients are depleted. The entire water/nutrient system is largely self-contained, except for the fish food and about 1,000 gallons of water replaced weekly – the loss due to evaporation and cleaning.
Steve remembers reading about small acreage aqua-farming in the 1990s, “and by 2015, it seemed like everybody had a system that they were willing to show you on YouTube.” They found someone in Montello, WI who gave seminars on the business aspects of aqua farming, and the Glandts were on their way.
It’s Educational
Michelle and Steve are both schoolteachers and they find that the experience has been rewarding educationally. Local schools visit on field trips, and their own children received environmental scholarships when they went to college. The lettuce is a hit at the local schools. Kids have reported that Lyfe Gardens is “the only lettuce I’ll eat,” according to the farm’s market research.
The Glandts are quick to point out that their produce is very fresh since it goes from farm to your table in hours rather than weeks. The lettuce roots are left on. They find this extends the shelf life of the greens in your refrigerator for up to two weeks.
Lyfe Gardens produces greens all year round – though they take a break in high summer because of the high heat. They are not an organic operation. Michelle reports that when they were setting up the farm in 2015 there were no organic grow cubes on the market that met their needs. At this point, they could go organic, but haven’t seen a need to. They use no added fertilizers or pesticides. Such additives would unbalance the bacterial base of the recycled water system and would harm the fish. For pest control the farm brings in ladybugs to take care of any aphid problems.
The greenhouse does not require a lot of energy inputs. A wood burning stove heats the water throughout the winter, supplemented with about 500 gallons of propane. The entire system of fish-to-lettuce nutrient cycle is self-sufficient. The farm requires lettuce seeds, the grow cubes for starters, fish food, and packaging for the lettuce. The Glandts find that they’re breaking even on the business.
Now that the kids are out of the house the farm has settled into a steady routine. Steve reports that he finds this project more interesting on weekends than sitting on a couch watching sports. It’s a small operation, but they feel they’re adding a benefit to their community and an alternative to the big farm foods typically on offer. “And we’ve never had a recall on our lettuce.”