The world’s largest aquaponics farm has been in operation only for a couple of years at Northfield in Jackson County, but it’s already expanding.
Superior Fresh, near Interstate 94 and Highway 121, in 2017 started selling leafy greens from its facilities, which include a closed-system Atlantic salmon production unit and leafy vegetable growing system.
“There are an awful lot of changes taking place here at the farm,” said Superior Fresh president Brandon Gottsacker.
Ground was broken for Superior Fresh on the 720-acre farm which, along with the salmon and vegetable-growing operations, has more than 75 acres of land planted with native seeds, 30 acres of woodlands and savanna clearings, more than 2,800 new trees and shrubs and more than 600,000 herbaceous plants.
The primary operation opened in 2017 with a 1-acre fish house and a 3-acre greenhouse; the greenhouse was expanded to 6 acres in 2018. The latest expansion will have a 2-acre fish house and a 12-acre greenhouse.
The farm is the nation’s only land-based Atlantic salmon operation. Water containing waste from the fish is cycled to the farm’s greenhouse, where vegetables are fed by the fish-waste.
Gottsacker said the system provides an environmentally friendly way to grow its organic-certified fish and greens, with the vegetables having removed the fish-waste from water that’s discharged from it. While nearly 2 million gallons of water is in the system at any given time, Gottsacker said it requires only eight gallons per minute of new, fresh water to make up for water lost through spills and evaporation.
Information provided by Superior Fresh said its greenhouses allow it to grow 30 times more produce than can be grown on the same footprint of a conventionally grown field of produce. Plans are for the farm to annually produce 3 million pounds of greens and raise about 1.5 million pounds of salmon.
The farm is an example of what can be done to help feed the world’s growing population and to provide locally produced foods year-around, according to Gottsacker. He noted that foods such as salmon and greens primarily are shipped to the Midwest from coastal areas or even from other countries.
“All Atlantic salmon is farmed in net-pens in places like Chile and Norway,” he said. “Over 90 percent of our salmon is imported,” he said.
Gottsacker said that, even salmon grown in the United State is shipped thousands of miles – with much of it sent to China for processing and then returned to the United States. But the salmon and greens grown at Superior Fresh are being marketed in the Midwest, including to many schools near the farm.
The market for salmon is growing as people become aware of health benefits from omega-3 nutrients, Gottsacker said, and the Superior Fresh salmon are being fed a ration designed to grow with more omega-3 than might be found in other salmon.
There are 80 employees at Superior Fresh, and Gottsacker said there will be about 115 employees by this time next year. He said they’re all local employees; he initially was worried about the availability of workers but the local workforce has stepped forward. The employees are knowledgeable about the farm’s operations and, best, appear to be happy working at Superior Fresh, he added.
The work-environment has something to do with that happiness, according to the company’s president.
“This time of the year, it’s cold and windy, and you walk into a greenhouse, and it’s 75 degrees in there, the sun’s out and it feels like summer,” Gottsacker said.
None of the project could have happened without the vision of the project’s investors, Gottsacker said. That’s a challenging proposition in this sort of operation, he added, because it took two years to grow the first salmon marketed from the farm.
“They really understand the big picture and the big vision,” he said. “We really feel we can change the world, and it’s happening right here in Wisconsin.”
If profitability is an important factor that needs to be linked with a big picture and big vision, Gottsacker said it’s all fitting together.
“The sustainability piece of this is what’s so exciting, that you can build a sustainable ag business and still make it profitable,” he said.
– Scott Schultz
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