Sun State Organics's Blog

Florida Algae Solution

July 21, 2016 Florida Algae Solution

Remediation of WaterwaysSun State Organics is proud to offer our patented solution for cleaning up the Algae problem in Florida. Our solution can be applied anywhere in the world and it will quickly clear waterways. Our solution is safe to humans, animals and marine life, will quickly clear the waters and it is approved in Florida and in use today.The ProblemFlorida, known for its’ miles of pristine beaches and sunshine, brings tourists from all over the world with significant economic impact. However, currently these pristine beaches are plagued by smelly, toxic algae in South Florida, beaches. The current algae problem is hurting Florida economically and devasting our tourism industry and businesses. The algae can be traced to several causes including cattle ranches, farms and neighborhoods as far north as Orlando. These phosphates, from this vast area, drains into Lake Okeechobee, where all this phosphorus feeds the growth of these horrific algae blooms, which are ultimately...

Students Stock Schools Produce

April 22, 2016

The "Farm to School" program has students getting their hands dirty while feeding lunchrooms with hundreds of pounds of fresh produce from the Hub at the Horizon Center in Gainesville. "The average day we plant, we harvest." Hard work that pays off, according to student Simon Williams. He is one of the many students who work at the hub. "My favorite part about it is harvesting, planting and composting." Kelli Brew is the coordinator for the school district's program. "Students are learning here, job training, also facilitating getting hundred and hundreds of pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables into the meal programs for the school."...Read More ​http://www.wcjb.com/local-news/2016/04/students-stock-schools-produce

A Beginner's Guide to Organic Gardening

January 20, 2016 A Beginner's Guide to Organic Gardening

A Beginner's Guide to Organic GardeningGardening is hardly complex when you know what you’re doing, since all of us have planted a seed at one point or another throughout our lives and watched it grow and blossom or die due to lack of care. Creating a garden that produces fresh food and flowers each season may be more complicated than that, especially for those of us who never did any gardening growing up. The following guide will give you more information on the subject of planting and making use of available biomass around the garden so you can make for organic gardening as best as possible. When you are done with this you will have what it takes to take on basic gardening tasks with confidence: Making the bed Roughly about three weeks before you think about planting, you should allow the soil to dry off so it won’t clump when you decide to do the planting itself. Take a fistful and sink a fork into the earth. Loosen it up a bit and add a half inch or so layer of compost....

Sun State Organics Videos

January 18, 2016

Sun State Organics VideosSun State Organics Part I: IntroductionSun State Organics Part II: Composting VermicultureSun State Organics Part III: Vertical GrowingSun State Organics Part IV: Vertical LightingSun State Organics Part V: Conclusion#ssoWrap{text-align:center;display:block;}.ssoVid h1{font-size:32px !important;color:#004226 !important;border-bottom:1px #004226 solid;padding:5px 0px !important;margin:20px 0px !important;font-family: 'Lato', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif !important;}.ssoVid h2{font-weight:bold;font-size:24px !important;color:#004226 !important;margin:30px 0px 10px 0px !important;font-family: 'Lato', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif !important;}.ssoVid iframe{margin:10px 0;}

School district wins grant to increase locally produced foods in schools

December 17, 2015

School district wins grant to increase locally produced foods in schoolsPublished December 16th, 2015ALACHUA COUNTY, Fla. -- Their goal is to get more locally grown produce in schools. The Alachua County public school district is preparing to use a new grant to expand their Farm to School hub. That's where students grow and process produce to distribute to a number of schools in the county.        It's been about two years since Buchholz High School senior Arthur Seabrooks started participating in the Alachua County Farm to School program. Seabrooks says it's a little more fun than being behind a desk for six periods.    "It's actually some days it's okay some days it's not but you still got to push yourself to be eager to work out here,” Seabrooks says.    The school district recently got a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture of a little more than $80,000 dollars. Coordinators with the program say this will help them provide more fresh produce in the school's lunch...

Organic Hydroponic Crops? Not in My Opinion

October 8, 2015

By Eric Sideman, Ph.D.In the late 1960s I watched a play by Megan Terry called Home: Or Future Soap on public television. The set was a single room that had no view of sky, ocean, sun, snow, hills or rivers. People lived their whole lives in this single room; never left their rooms; and those rooms were set on top of and beside more rooms. Rooms and rooms and rooms. Air, water and food were piped into each room, and waste was piped out. People did not think this was a bad way to live: Everyone lived like this, and it was all anyone knew.The play had many messages, but the one that stuck with me is that we cannot judge what makes another person happy, or what is important to another person, or what one person thinks is good or bad. While some things are clearly bad, most can be good or bad depending on our opinions. Sunlight may be important to one person but a disturbing source of glare to someone else who just wants to read a book. Some people may be perfectly happy living their...

The Coming Global Food Shortage

January 22, 2015

​Most Americans take food for granted. Even the poorest fifth of households in the United States spend only 16 percent of their budget on food. In many other countries, it is less of a given. Nigerian families spend 73 percent of their budgets to eat, Vietnamese 65 percent, Indonesians half. They are in trouble.Last year, the food import bill of developing countries rose by 25 percent as food prices rose to levels not seen in a generation. Corn doubled in price over the last two years. Wheat reached its highest price in 28 years. The increases are already sparking unrest from Haiti to Egypt. Many countries have imposed price controls on food or taxes on agricultural exports.Last week, the president of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, warned that 33 nations are at risk of social unrest because of the rising prices of food. “For countries where food comprises from half to three-quarters of consumption, there is no margin for survival,” he said.By the year 2050, nearly 80% of...

How the right soil makes your vegetables tastier

December 1, 2014

People ask me all the time what is the difference between hydroponics and organic growing. This article sums up why organically grown food tastes better and is better for you - some things that Mother nature causes cannot be duplicated by humans.______________________________________________________________Soil can make a significant difference to the flavor of produce. Just ask David Cohlmeyer.The farmer turned sustainable food consultant noticed in the 1990s that the taste of the vegetables he grew near Thornton, Ont., depended on how he treated the earth. When he was gentler on the soil – if he set aside his Rototiller and grew a cover crop, such as rye and hairy vetch, over the winter – he found that the next year’s carrots and beets tasted sweeter and more complex.“Pretty well across the board, just about everything” tasted better, Mr. Cohlmeyer says. “Kind of like with a good wine. You know, it’s not just one taste, you get an assortment of tastes.”It wasn’t...