How to grow your own ‘alien ant’ farm
The idea of creating an artificial forest to help the fight against the spread of a deadly disease has taken root in California, but now it has a global audience, thanks to the success of a “super green” farm called Fair Oaks Farm.
The farm was set up by a group of farmers in Arizona and California to produce edible and medicinal plants.
Their mission was to make sure that the world does not fall prey to an epidemic of a highly pathogenic fungus that kills the fruit and leaves of trees and destroys crops.
“The idea of trying to find a way to grow a crop in a forest, without having to go through the trees, without getting into trees, it’s a really beautiful way of trying,” said Tom Gartland, the founder of Fair Oaks, a company that has raised over $2.5 million to build a facility in the remote area of the San Bernardino Mountains that houses an artificial field, a greenhouse and a large growing facility.
“It’s a great way to take the challenge out of it and create a way for us to do things that were never possible before.”
“The plants that we’ve produced in this facility have been a great addition to the environment and to our health, and the environment is something we want to preserve and protect, because it’s important that we keep our ecosystem healthy,” Gartlland told CNN.
“We are looking to grow in a way that is sustainable, so that it can thrive, and not just for the next generation, but for the generations after.”‘
The tree that started it all’Gartland said he started thinking about the project in 2008, while he was working as a consultant for a group that had developed a greenhouse farm in Arizona.
He began looking for ways to create a sustainable farming system that would help offset some of the environmental challenges that people face when growing food.
The idea that humans could make a sustainable, non-toxic greenhouse farm was a new one for him, he said.
“I realized that I could really do this,” he said, noting that it took him several years to realize how many people could benefit from the project.
“The tree for the plant that started the process was the one I planted, and that tree grew on its own.”
The project began in 2009 with just a handful of farmers participating, but it has since grown into an industry of sorts that has grown from about five people to more than 50.
Gartlands’ company, Green Farms Inc., has also raised $2 million to construct and operate the facility.
The greenhouse, which is currently being used as a research facility for the company, has already grown to the size of a large home.
“When we started, there were a handful, and now we’ve gotten a thousand,” Garts said.
“I think that this idea is a really good one to put out there,” said Scott Hahn, the president and CEO of the Green Farms group.
“A lot of people in agriculture have gotten tired of seeing this type of thing go on, but the reality is it’s not a big deal if you can grow a sustainable system.”
While the project has been a boon for farmers and the environmental community, it has also taken a toll on the land.
It took a decade to secure land that was once considered an unproductive waste site, Gartas said.
Now, there are more than 1,000 acres of farmland that have been planted with crops grown on the trees and vines.
“When we first started this, it was a lot of land that would be unusable because it was not going to be productive,” Gertland said.
But the trees have changed that, and there is now a growing demand for the crops to be grown on those trees.
The trees are now used in landscaping and for irrigation, and some of those trees are even being sold off for profit.
“We are actually growing the trees out and putting them on to a larger scale so we can start producing something that is really, really sustainable,” Gannes said.