Baldwin Greenhouse and Nursery has a new hydroponic unit that's being used to grow strawberries. Hydroponic is a method of growing plants not in soil but rather in water. The new greenhouse houses 4,000 strawberry plants inside that were planted in March.
"I've got to give a shout-out to American Farmland Trust and Tractor Supply Company because they were the ones that supplied the grant that allowed us to build this," said Mary Podoll. "So Jared's had this idea for a long, long time, growing strawberries hydroponically. All plants need something to keep them straight and instead of soil, we're using perlite. But as you can see, the roots are coming out so wonderfully."
Baldwin Greenhouse plans to harvest the strawberries themselves and have them for sale at their customer service point of sales building and possibly at farmer's markets. "So we hope people will come out and get their strawberries," said Podoll.
The water is checked several times a day to make sure that the pH is where it needs to be and that the fertilizer is going through the system to feed these strawberries.
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