Urban Harvest KC wants to whet your appetite for aquaponic farming
Eric Person moves between garden beds, his left hand holding a spray wand attached to a container of liquid compost. He is trying to prevent mites from attacking a small field of microgreens, the cash crop funding the expansion of his new farm, Urban Harvest KC. The temperature is near freezing outside, but Person appears comfortable in a T-shirt and a Kansas City Royals cap. He checks his watch, glances up and winces as he looks directly into a 400-watt bulb above the garden bed.
A pair of grow lights – the only illumination in what was most recently the back room of a Mexican bakery – shine down on Person, 38, and his business partner, Jason Irish, 33, as they tend to their crops: wheatgrass, hops, strawberries, peppers and tomatoes. Surrounded by walls, never touched by daylight, these and other plants are part of Person’s aquaponic farm, an indoor ecosystem of plant and marine life. (See sidebar.)
The beds are arranged in plastic bins suspended a couple of feet off the floor by wooden frames, suggesting a row of bunks. White PVC piping delivers water from an opaque white cube in the corner of the room – a 375-gallon fish tank, home to 24 goldfish, which hums to the rhythmic heartbeat of its pump.
Person knows that the lights and the black shade over the street-level window might lead people to wonder just what Urban Harvest is growing. He remembers the first time he tried to tell the beat policemen in his neighborhood what he was planning for 2100 Summit.
“The officer told me, ‘I’ll keep an eye on you,’ ” Person says. “We laughed, and then he said, ‘No, seriously, I’m going to be keeping an eye on you.’ “
