Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

http://www.herbanfarms.com/the-greenhouse.html

Is this a good commercial model?
it seems they are doing well, yes a mono crop it's easyer to manage!
the farm look professional and expensive.
I wonder if they recover the set up cost?
Any body knows about them?

The fact that nobody has a single comment on this enterprise it demonstrate that they are a good quality commercial model, normally people on this forum point out a company that has not a solid foundation or the definition of commercial versus hobby farm!
I presume there are commercial working model then....

I missed this one sorry. Massive set up. Looks expensive, I wonder who is paying for it

Sorry.. somehow missed this thread... yes they are known..but not widely, until more recently...

To date they have kept a fairly low profile...like most real farmers.. they're just been too busy farming.. to worry about fluffing their egos online...

Cheyney University.. is their collaborative partner... so who knows what sort of grants money might be involved...

The model is basically a Nelson & Pade model...

In 2010... they were seeking a $200,000 operating capital infusion...

That explain why it's a second farm with that identical set up.
Capital infusion? I guess selling courses and system would not pay bills on the long run, especially when the market get saturated with AP guru giving courses....
If you are selling produce that will keep you going, presuming you have a good established market and can guarantee continuity!
Food demand it is always higer than education degrees.
Especially when most people think AP can be done with a shallow degree of knowledge, In the last three year I've been studying RAS aquaculture ,commercial Horticulture and intrinsic farming methods to strenghten the link between them, and it's not just about fish/plant/bacteria.
There is a lot more going on in this equation when you get down to the minuscle detail.

Experience is knowledge everything else is information!!

They don't give training or offer courses... they're farmers...

That's why noone has really heard of them...

They're not interested in squwacking in the square with the rest of the self noting pidgeons...

I thought you meant N&P needed the money!

On the other hand if it was Herbanfarms to ask for the capital infusion that tell you that selling just basil pots and whatever fish they produce maybe it's not completely covering the cost.
I went throug the list of buyers they supply the basil too and it appear to be hestablished on the horticultur side.

While it does look like a very clean operation... the fish are not mentioned... A 'revenue stream'... but not the variety, prep or sale of same... So, have the fish become a 'bennie' for the worker bees? [$16 an hour, and 4lb. of fish a week??]

I am very sorry to see monoculture. Except, and this will be a big deal for any operation-- in order to get the 'loan' for the set up, one would have to provide the numbers for a cash crop that was dependable... marketable... and rapid turn around. I'm sorry to see that they are delivering. Not for their business model... for the nature of the thing. What ever the rounds are each day... that vehicle is doing its circuit... again, a mono cultural production... so only one thing provided to those markets. I wonder... will the expansion include new variety? It sure looks good.

Huge... but good.

I've found this thread on another AP forum from somehone who has been there!

"I went and visited these guys a few weeks ago. Their father started it with the two boys and have now turned it over to the boys. They lease the property from the University and they paid for everything themselves. The only involvement with the university that would effect their bottom line would be the fish. A professor at the university takes care of the fish. They do not produce fish for sale and in fact have had some of the same fish for over two years. Some biggins in the tank. They have about 3500 talapia. They grow basil only. I think it is 28,000 dozen per year. They are in 91 supermarkets. Have been doing this since 2006. I was told they had to make a decision in the beginning to either reduce the amount of fish or get a filter. They opted to a reduction in fish and it has worked."
David

Seems they are living the dream.... nice

Nice when it works. I had posted some links to a local firm (Bioshelte, Amherst MA) and they went under. I think exactly because of the wrong decision that these people made correctly... intensive fish farming. When you get into high density, your costs escalate.

Two comment about this. in about 90% of all the builds i have looked at one thing always pops to mind... Isn't all that space used to house the tank wasted space? Their tank looks huge. Why would you not put grow beds or floating rafts over that? Can anyone enlighten me?

The second comment is that monoculture like that can be dangerous. A second factor that led to the bioshelter downfall was they did the same thing, grew only basil. When global markets became a reality, the US was flooded with cheap basil from mexico and the market price dropped like a stone. All the expensive fish culture equipment mean tbioshelter could no longer match the imports and boom!

Poppa

You certainly have one point regarding monoculture... its dependence on the market... but the one that worries me is the potential for a single pathogen trashing your operation.

Since they are not taking the basil to flower/seed... this may not be their issue at all. No bees bringing in anything from outside...then they might be able to keep the grow beds clean.

Their option to limit the fish says a couple of things... they either really love basil, don't fear any outside market, or their 'market' is loyal... and the market for fish... or anything else... has not presented itself. I'd love to talk to the prof, and see what he's monitoring. # of food per # of fish? # of food per # of product + development of fish? Overall development of fish in the filtered environment for some kind of extrapolation??

As a person who (just saw Neil DeGrasse Tyson on a morning show-- promoting the exploration of all space...) longs for the days when humans will set out across the black-- seems to me that AP is an answer to that, too... Anybody remember the talk of L5 (Lunar point of orbit-- a place to build a space station that would remain stable in orbit) With a little spin, water would stay in its trough, and one could produce protein and produce for a population... the commercial issues would have to have been worked out... and we need to find out if bees can do space...

I't would be nice to know if they did it because of the reason you post, but i suspect that the expense of fish @ commercial levels just makes the product too pricey.

I assumed that Nelson and Pade system has some sort of conical/swirl/axial/tricle/etc... filter
And yeas fish food is the highest runnig cost of the farm, secon is electricity (in my case) and I believe that the more fish= the more labour...... unless they use automation(that has it's limitation and con's too)
If it would be me I would transform the whole crop in premium ITALIAn PESTO.
In my personal situation add value to the product it's the only way to go, high set up cost and high running cost mainly associated to the fact I'm using organic fish food and electricity in UK is way too high.
We could incorporate solar PV panel but that would push up the cost even higher, we'll see in the nest few year when the price come down and the invested capital on set up cost is recovered.