Growing vegetables is a very rewarding aspect of many peoples lives.
It is wonderful to plant a seed and cultivate and care for it and be rewarded with lovely fresh produce for the family right from your own backyard.
I think they taste even better when you have put all that effort in and watched them grow from nothing as well.
Personally I love growing vegetables for the above reasons, but also and maybe more importantly I know what's in them, or not in them.
After growing vegetables for years I really cringe when having to buy them from the supermarket.
They don't taste as good, I KNOW they have been sprayed and am starting to think the beneficial value of a lot of these store bought veggies is almost zero.
Recently I discovered an article on Aquaponics...
I had never heard of it before.
I have heard of hydroponics which seemed fun but the fruit and vegetables they produced always were quite tasteless.
Aquaponics is similar but instead of adding nutrients to the water tank, you grow fish in the tank.
These fish feed your plants, pretty much everything they need.
It is amazing how fast these plants grow and I find I can plant and grow a vast quantity more seeds in a much smaller area than I can in my soil vegetable garden.
Once I had everything set up and running, I basically only have to check the water levels and feed the fish...
and that's it! The time factor I have to put in is almost nothing compared to the weeding and watering I do with my soil vegetable patch.
This is a fantastic idea for anyone low on space, or with unfertile soil, or who is just plain excited about different possibilities for growing organic vegetables.
The vegetables I have grown actually taste better than the ones I grow in soil, so I have found myself addicted to this new idea! It's a perfect mix of nature in my opinion.
I feed the fish, the fish feed the plants and the plants clean the tank for me.
To continue the idea a bit further I am going to try some trout this winter so I'll have two meals growing in the one tank! If you enjoy gardening and value the idea of fresh organic veggies I absolutely recommend giving this a try, they're incredibly easy to set up, and refreshingly low on effort required.
You can set one up in your garage, on your veranda or even in your lounge! Enjoy!