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Grower Turns To Indoor Saltwater Farming To Grow Sea Beans
Heron grows its sea beans via an indoor saltwater farm using hydroponic technology for a few reasons
Salicornia. Picklegrass. Sea asparagus.
Sea beans are a salty, long, thin vegetable that grow in saltwater.
These are just a few of the monikers Sam Norton has heard in talking to chefs about his new vegetable. However, he prefers to call them sea beans--them being a thin, long asparagus-like vegetable that grow in saltwater. It was a vegetable Norton knew of growing up in Southeastern U.S. and in turn, he studied sea beans and seawater agriculture in grad school at College of Charleston. It was there he won the Department of Agriculture’s inaugural ACRE (Agribusiness Center for Research and Entrepreneurship) startup competition in 2018 and so, Charleston, SC-based Heron Farms was born.
Seawater agriculture
Heron grows its sea beans via an indoor saltwater farm using hydroponic technology for a few reasons. “We found after a few experiments that if we kept growing them outdoors that we would run into the same problem other outdoor growers were running into--land-use constraints, salt management, seasonality, etc,” says Norton. “We decided we could solve those problems by taking them indoors.”
Sea beans are grown using hydroponic technology at an indoor saltwater farm.
Heron’s first harvest was April 14th of 2020--admittedly a challenging time. “We realized on March 10th all the restaurant customers that were going to carry our products were about to shut down,” says Norton. So the company, which was growing indoors in a shipping container farm temporarily on loan via fellow Charleston grower Vertical Roots, pivoted to retail to position its product as a premium vegetable versatile enough to eat raw, boiled, sautéed and many more ways. It’s since moved out of the Vertical Roots facility to launch its own indoor farm where it has been since August of 2020 with 30,000 square feet of saltwater marsh planted.
Retail interest
Heron’s pivot to retail has paid off in an age where home cooking and trying new products are trends that have emerged in the pandemic. Consumers are sharing on Instagram the different ways they’re using sea beans. (Norton notes it’s largely used as a garnish or as a replacement for micro greens.)
Consumers use sea beans in a number of ways, though most often as a garnish or a replacement for micro greens.
Yet, as the vaccines roll out throughout North America, restaurants and other foodservice operations are coming back online, demand could change again for Heron. “We’ve seen demand pick up actually in the past 30 days, especially in the Northeast,” says Norton.
However, that increased demand is in rhythm with Heron Farms’ plan to scale up its indoor production by launching another site in Charleston in the next six months.
For more information:
Sam Norton
Heron Farms
Tel: +1 (847) 224-3242
Sam@heronfarms.com
www.heronfarms.com
31 Mar 2021
Author: Astrid Van Den Broek
© FreshPlaza.com
PODCAST: What Do Saltwater Vertical Farming And Sustainable Coastlines Have In Common?
In the podcast, Heron Farms, a sea beans cultivator, is featured. Heron Farms uses its vertical farm and is also restoring marshland from their home base in Charleston, South Carolina
A podcast by Evolve.ag
Recently Evolve.ag held a podcast on 'What do saltwater vertical farming and sustainable coastlines have in common?'. Their series focuses on what's trending in food and food tech.
In the podcast, Heron Farms, a sea beans cultivator, is featured. Heron Farms uses its vertical farm and is also restoring marshland from their home base in Charleston, South Carolina.
In this episode, Wendy Yared, a food anthropologist, speaks with Sam Norton, the founder of Heron Farms. Inspired by the marsh he grew up playing in, he started the first saltwater vertical farm in the US. Heron Farms grows a type of Salicornia, also known as a sea bean. This plant provides high levels of nutrients like vitamin A, vitamin C, and, not surprisingly, sodium chloride. Chefs sometimes use it as a replacement for salt on fish dishes, like Crudo or ceviche. Beyond the farm, they're also using Salicornia to remediate salt marshes.
They talk about the ecological benefits of Salicornia and how marshland restoration can help turn seawater into a resource instead of a concern for people living in coastal areas. During the podcast, they also dive into the challenges of starting a vertical farm. And how important it is to balance the negative aspects of controlled environment agriculture, like expensive lighting and plastic, with activities that support the ecosystem.
Click here to access the podcast.
For more information:
Wendy Yared, food anthropologist
26 Feb 2021
The Nation’s First Saltwater Hydroponic Farm In Charleston, SC
Did you know that it’s possible to harvest crops using saltwater? Charleston is home to the first-ever indoor saltwater hydroponics farm that utilizes ocean water – aka the world’s most abundant resource – to grow food
Heron Farms saltwater hydroponics | Photo provided by Heron Farms
Agriculture is cool, but Lowcountry agriculture is even cooler.
Did you know that it’s possible to harvest crops using saltwater? Charleston is home to the first-ever indoor saltwater hydroponics farm that utilizes ocean water – aka the world’s most abundant resource – to grow food.
Saltwater hydroponic farming at Heron Farms | Photo provided by Heron Farms
Heron Farms, located at 1783 Harmon St., was established by Sam Norton in 2018. Sam grew up on a barrier island off the coast of South Carolina where his family home flooded more frequently + severely every year due to the sea level rise. The same issue was seen during his trip to Bangladesh, where he witnessed saltwater intrusion into coastal rice paddies upending the lives of many farmers in Asia.
This led to the idea of treating sea level rise as a free resource that could be used for agriculture instead of just an environmental problem.
Sam’s concept took shape and won the ACRE Startup Competition from the SC Department of Agriculture + the Charleston-based Harbor Accelerator Startup Competition. Following these achievements, Heron Farms was created and the idea became a reality in June 2018.
So, how does saltwater hydroponics work?
The first step in understanding the process is studying up on general hydroponic farming. Simply put, this method of indoor farming eliminates soil use by utilizing an alternative root anchor for plants + growing them directly in water (think: “hydro” = water). The inside setting eliminates the barriers of land use constraints + seasonality of crops. Plants receive controlled amounts of water, oxygen, nutrients + light that promotes the growth cycle. The difference with Heron Farms is that in all other cases, fresh water is used.
Why saltwater?
Along with the reasons mentioned above, the micronutrients of seawater that are transferred into the plants are a great source of minerals in our daily diets. Additionally, seawater irrigation allows the company to use less freshwater than any farm in the U.S.
What crops are grown?
Heron Farms sea beans | Photo provided by Heron Farms
Heron Farms’ first crop is sea beans – salicornia europaea – an edible plant that grows in the salt marsh. These types of saltwater-tolerant plants are known as halophytes, which have evolved to tolerate salt across its whole life cycle. Learn about cooking + eating sea beans here.
What makes this local company even cooler? For every pound of sea beans sold at Heron Farms, the company replants a sq. ft. of salt marsh along coastal South Carolina + Bangladesh using a custom seed-dropping drone. So far, 30,000 sq. ft. have been planted.
Heron Farms has been invited by Seawater Solutions to present at the 2021 UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, where the Charleston-based company will build a second saltwater hydroponics farm.
Heron Farm’s future location in Glasgow, Scotland | Image provided by Heron Farms