Urban agriculture breathes new life into Hawkins Mill

In the heart of the city, a new business idea is taking root.

Frank McNeely is the sole proprietor of Aqua Terra Gar-dens LLC, a new venture that will allow him to grow organic produce in the old Hawkins Mill at the corner of College Street and Kansas Expressway.

McNeely said Aqua Terra is focused on a concept known as urban agriculture, which ex-plores ways to grow produce without using soil.

It's a big career change for McNeely.

Prior to beginning Aqua Terra Gardens, McNeely worked in administration in the trucking industry, and before that he was in the military. But after a lifetime in management, he said he realized he wasn't happy. He looked for something new, something challenging, and discovered aquaponics.

Self-supporting system

At Aqua Terra Gardens, McNeely will grow tomatoes aquaponically in water in the outbuilding next to the mill with the help of talapia fish that will reside in four 1,100-gallon tanks.

"It's a simple process of moving their effluent, or their manure, to the grow beds," McNeely said. "It's basically a form of growing any type of vegetation, whether it be fruit-bearing or just vegetation, in a soil-less environment."

Each fish tank will "feed" four tables of tomato plants, which will be planted in creek bed gravel, a porous rock that is the closest thing to soil used in the entire process.

"An 1,100 gallon tank would have about 900 full-grown talapia fish in it, and we will pump their ... manure ... to these grow beds," McNeely said. The fish will eat high-protein organic food grown at the mill.

"We'll have to monitor the water and make sure the tomatoes are getting what they need, nitrogen and trace minerals, things like that," he said. He will grow and harvest the tomatoes year-round.

Inside the main building, which is an actual working mill, McNeely will grow lettuce, fertilized with the waste of 25 chickens and 25 rabbits he'll raise on-site and nourish with feed he'll grow at the company.

"We'll take their manure and we'll put it into a bio-digester ... which basically breaks down anything manure, compost, anything that's live down to its original state; it's basic mineral salts, humus, and things of that nature," he said.

The broken-down product is slurry, McNeely said, which is an organic, hydroponic solution, which will be used to grow the animals' feeds and the blue algae spores that can be used as a food additive and for mushroom germination. The main building also will have space for tomato-seed germination.

Financial support

McNeely's business which he said is definitely a for-profit venture has applied for grants from the state to help him get started, and he said urban or alternative agriculture is a focus of Missouri Gov. Bob Holden. Holden has a task force examining agricultural issues and finding ways to reinvigorate the interest of schoolchildren in agriculture and organizations such as Future Farmers of America.

One way McNeely will help further those goals is to open the mill to tours for classes from local and rural schools and the general public once the crops are in place.

Plans also include retail space on the first floor of the mill.

"I'm working with the University of Missouri trying to promote a year-round farmer's market for farmers that grow all year but mainly grow food in the summer for the farmer's market. This will give them a place they can bring it," McNeely said.

He'll sell his tomatoes and about 18 different types of lettuce, including cilantro, to individual customers and local restaurants.

He will also sell talapia, popular in sushi and other dishes, but he said they'll only be sold live since he won't be licensed to process them. Eventually, he'll try to grow strawberries indoors at the mill, something aquaponic farmers in Australia have done successfully.

McNeely is quick to point out that what he's doing is nothing new, and he researched the concept for two years before striking out on his own. But he said the timing is right for home-grown organic food.

"I'm not downplaying anything, but choosing your own food and knowing where it's coming from is going to become a big market, I think," McNeely added.

New life for the old mill

McNeely is in a purchase agreement with the mill's owners, the Jim Hawkins family. The mill is still functional, and it will be part of the Aqua Terra Gardens operation.

"We're basically changing this entire building. We're going to take the skin off the roof (and) put in a big greenhouse, let the light in," he said. Several of the walls will have stucco applied to them to help retain heat, and solar panels will be utilized to create energy to move water through the mill into storage tanks and heat it. He's doing the work himself, he said, with lots of help from friends and family, recycling various types of materials for the project.

Germination of tomato seeds will start in mid-October, and McNeely said the seeds can be planted about 15 days after germination. McNeely said because aquaponics only gives plants the things they need to grow and nothing they don't need, plants can mature quickly. A crop of lettuce, for example, can be grown in just 30 days.

The retail space should open at the first of November.

McNeely hopes to create two additional full-time positions, besides his own, after the company is up and running. He already has a barter arrangement with two permanent staff – Aqua and Terra, a pair of kittens who will live in the mill in exchange for their services as mousers.