Maine company farms year-round using organiponics at UMaine aquaculture center

UMaine Alert

Posted: April 19, 2024 - 1:32 PM

At approximately 9:24 a.m. on Friday, April 19, a University of Maine graduate student was struck by a university vehicle on Long Road at the University of Maine campus in Orono. The student reports that they are at a local hospital with minor injuries.

Emergency services, including the Orono Fire Department, University Volunteer Ambulance Corps, University of Maine Police Department, Orono Police Department and Penobscot County Sheriff’s Office responded to the scene.

The university vehicle involved in the incident was a Chevrolet Express van. It was being operated by a university employee.

Counseling services and support are available for students, faculty or staff who may have been affected. The Counseling Center can be reached at 207-581-1392 and the Dean of Students Office can be reached at 207-581-1406.

The scene has been cleared and Long Road is now accessible. An investigation is being conducted by the University of Maine Police Department with assistance from the Penobscot County Sheriff’s Office Crash Reconstruction Unit. Any witnesses to the incident are encouraged to contact Lt. Noel Santiago at noel.santiago@maine.edu.

December 15, 2015 Economic Development, Outreach

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNsU6LhJmG8&feature=youtu.be

Transcript

For 18 years, Jeff Walls of Stockton Springs has been on a mission to find a viable way to farm in Maine year-round. His solution? To farm using a method called organiponics. Organiponics combines gardening with hydroponics, a method of growing plants in water without soil. In Walls’ system, waste from rainbow trout and worms provides nutrients to grow plants like kale, tomatoes and strawberries. In the process, plants filter the water for the fish, and excess waste from the fish and plant production feeds the worms. The result is a sustainable food system that produces vegetables and fish for consumption. Walls’ company, Applied Ponic Technologies, is housed in Greenhouse #4 at the University of Maine’s Center for Cooperative Aquaculture Research (CCAR) in Franklin. Located on Taunton Bay, CCAR’s extensive facility houses a variety of fish hatcheries and aquaculture business incubators where entrepreneurs can get help with their business plans, secure investment capital and design full-scale commercial fishery farms. In this video, Walls talks about his food system and how CCAR has been an invaluable resource in helping him get his business started. To learn more, visit ccar.um.maine.edu.

For more information about these and other innovation and economic development initiatives at UMaine, visit umaine.edu/econdev.