Tropics Hydroponics Farm
By Linda McCullough
Celebrating our one-year anniversary this month, Tropics Hydroponics Farm, run and owned by Brian and Linda McCullough, has already found it necessary to expand. We specialize in growing high quality Bib lettuce as well as beefsteak and cluster vine ripened tomatoes. As our name suggests, we grow using hydroponics, which means we use no soil. Our plants receive all of their nutrition through water from our own wells, which has been purified through reverse osmosis, ph balanced and enriched with a special blend of nutrients and micro-nutrients.
Some of the benefits of growing with a hydroponics system include superior taste, quality, appearance, uniformity, and extended shelf life of the product. In addition, growing with hydroponics requires about 1/10th the space and 1/10th the water as compared to traditional farming requirements, so our carbon footprint is actually much smaller than with traditional dirt farming. In addition, we never have to deal with weeds and our crops have very limited exposure to insects.
We have been selling our lettuce and tomatoes since the first of the year at the LaReine Farmers Market on Saturday mornings and from our farm on weekday mornings. However, our primary market is the hospitality industry. We deliver our produce to local restaurants and also send tomatoes to St Thomas every week where they are distributed to the finer restaurants. The challenge we are running into now is keeping up with the demand. Folks just love the quality and flavor of our tomatoes and lettuce, and they keep coming back for more.
In response to the demand, we are currently expanding our greenhouse operation from 2,800 sq. ft. of covered space (plus 2,100 sq. ft. uncovered), to 8,400 sq. ft of covered space. This will double our number of tomato plants, ultimately allowing us to make our products available to even more of the finer restaurants here on St. Croix and on St. Thomas who have been wanting us to supply them.
So far, building the business been a fun challenge. We moved here from Wisconsin wanting to build something that we thought would be a benefit to the community. It seems to be working. Not only are we able to provide superior quality, fresh tomatoes and lettuce year round, but we are also able to serve as a working model here in St. Croix, showing that agriculture is good business, and demonstrating the potential that hydroponics offers. Over the past few months we have welcomed several school field trips and many folks who just wanted to come and see how it all works.
Away from the farm, Linda is working to complete her thesis film, which is the last step in achieving a Master of Fine Arts in Film & Video from Columbia College Chicago. Brian performs as a solo artist at various venues around the island, and leads a three-piece band in an open-mic night every 1st and 3rd Tuesday at Off the Wall on the North shore.
You can find Tropics Hydroponics Farm about half way down the road (Frangipani) that goes from Salt River to Mon Bijou, two properties east of the new bridge. We are open weekday mornings from 8-12, and whenever the gate is open. If you would like directions, or to place a restaurant order, please give us a call at 340-227-5546. Eat fresh, buy local!
