3 Boys Farm

Live greens equal lively taste: Eating is believing!

2012-02-01T14:06:00.005-05:00

Since we last posted, we've been crazy-busy here at 3 Boys Farm, what with test-plantings, crop harvests (almost a daily event now that production has reached a truly impressive level and continues to grow--so to speak!) and, of course, with taking area chefs on tour.

As people who truly love good food, we always enjoy showing off to the professionals whose life work involves creating delicious dishes. And when chefs visit the farm, we can just sit back and let our lettuces, tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, and herbs sell themselves. (Well, there might be a little olive oil and balsamic vinegar involved.)

Time and again, we've found that the best advertising is "taste of mouth"--in other words, we sit our visitors down, toss a lovely fresh salad, and show them how our product will work for them. Sometimes, chefs will just grab the utensils themselves and play for a while, which we're more than happy to let them do.

Produce and lettuce are harvested and prepared, and everyone enjoys a wonderful al fresco lunch. Visiting chefs, once they taste real, organic produce--and know they will be getting it directly from the farm--tend to say they'll never go back to using traditional distributor-supplied produce, given its inferior taste and nutritive values thanks to the long storage times (sometimes weeks) involved.

Chefs' tours can be arranged by contacting 3 Boys Farm via e-mail or phone (in the sidebar); you'll need to schedule your visit at least 3-4 weeks in advance during Florida's off-season. (During peak season, visits will necessarily be limited as we are a working farm.)

Here Comes the Sun: A photo essay

2011-07-03T18:03:00.010-04:00

The first phase of our solar array project: heavy concrete foundation piers ground the galvanized steel support structure. Weight, loading, and wind factors were considered throughout the design-build stage of this project. The array is designed for 48 panels and covering 1200 square feet @ 20' high. Model 702 windmill is in the background (water-pumper); there are 3,000 gallon water (rain) storage tanks nearby.

First phase complete: 6 strings of 8 panels, in place and hot. Solar energy is an important part of 3 Boys Farm energy program; it will run submersible pumps for back-up water when the main power grid is down.

These panels, and the pumps they'll supply power to, are also part of our overall USDA water recovery program. We will be recycling spent nutrients from hydroponics and using them--in addition to rainwater--in the organic outdoor bench section as well as the seasonal high-tunnel test programs. Our combined efforts with SWFWMD and USDA are to further reduce peak ground water withdrawal.

Water conservation's importance obviously cannot be overstated--life requires water.

We must conserve our remaining resources now: they are under pressure as never before.

We want to say a huge Thank You to James Tornello, builder and fabricator extraordinaire as well as uncle of the three boys. He took Robert's drawings and turned them into this impressive solar array. Even to the untrained eye, his months of efforts--from custom fabrication work to the mounting and wiring of the array--are obvious. We will be harvesting first power this week.

Toward growing a better world: 3 Boys Farm welcomes agronomists from Haiti

2011-07-03T15:39:00.004-04:00

The WINNER project is a five-year program designed to rebuild Haiti's agricultural infrastructure by providing "concentrated and transformative support". Brian Boman, Florida BMP (Best Management Practices) coordinator for UF/IFAS and WINNER project team member, wanted his team to see a strong example of resource management, energy efficiency, and most saliently, the level of sustainability afforded by cleverly-designed water catchment systems. Accompanied by UF's Jemy Hinton, the agronomists, shown above, toured the facilities at 3 Boys Farm; Robert thoroughly enjoyed discussing methods and practices that will help Haiti successfully grow and produce food for its people, and do so in the face of conditions that many traditional farmers Stateside would consider insurmountable.

Some more information about WINNER from Florida Grower:

The earthquake that devastated Haiti last year brought more troubles for a land that has long suffered from issues related to systemic poor governance, regular upheavals, and coup d’états. Farming, for example, has faced major problems long before the quake hit, making successful commercial agriculture in the country virtually non-existent.
With its location and various climates at different elevations, Haiti has the potential to grow many different crops and become a more self-sustaining country. USAID is funding the Watershed Initiative For National Natural Environmental Resources (WINNER) project, which is focused on sustainable agricultural development in Haiti. Chemonics International is managing the project and has subcontracted UF/IFAS to help resurrect agriculture there.

Unintended Results

Years ago there was a commercial agricultural sector in Haiti. But, when the U.S. and other countries began shipping in humanitarian food aid beginning in the 1960s, it killed the ag economy.

“When the free food aid started coming in, it destroyed agriculture,” says Brian Boman, Florida BMP coordinator for UF/IFAS and WINNER project team member. “Local farmers couldn’t compete with free. All of those farmers had no jobs, so they moved to the cities like Port-au-Prince and a whole other set of urban problems rose out of that migration.

“Haiti has lost a couple of generations of farmers and the knowledge of how to grow. We are here to reintroduce modern ag practices, so people can learn how to produce their own food in a sustainable way and have viable commercial agriculture.”

3 Boys Farm, the video

2011-06-23T15:43:00.005-04:00

We've just uploaded Rick Lurding's gorgeous video about 3 Boys Farm--the one that debuted at the Florida Agriculture Commissioner's Environmental Leadership Awards--to our brand-new YouTube channel.

Hooray for technology!

Please enjoy, and of course, feel free to like, comment, and share.

3 Boys Farm and Robert Tornello featured in Oceanfront Magazine

2011-06-02T14:53:00.002-04:00

Robert Tornello recently met with Tampa-area writer Mary Jo Melone and showed her around the growing (and ever-growing!) facilities at 3 Boys Farm. The result was a terrific article in this month's issue of Oceanfront Magazine, shown above. You'll save your eyesight if you head over to the magazine's website to read it, though (click the link, then enter page 9 at the bottom): Oceanfront Magazine.

On the cover of Florida Grower!

2011-01-08T10:01:00.000-05:00

Robert Tornello's 3 Boys Farm was the cover story of the December 2010 issue of Florida Grower magazine (a popular trade periodical serving the produce industry). From the accompanying article:

When arable land is scarce and climate is a challenge, growing food becomes threatened — if not impossible. That’s why countries like Israel and Japan have become pioneers growing crops under protected structures like greenhouses.

In Florida, during the summer months, fresh produce production pretty much shuts down. But, in the greenhouses of 3 Boys Farm in Ruskin, winter greens flourish while the heat of summer sizzles outside. Robert Tornello, 3 Boys owner, has channeled his passion, ingenuity, and knowledge gained by studying other greenhouse pioneers into establishing an operation that could be a model future farm.

The project, which started two years ago, combines old and new to produce hydroponic crops with an eye toward conservation and energy efficiency. So much so that this year, 3 Boys was among those awarded the 2010 Agricultural Environmental Leadership Award from the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

Time Tested

While in some ways a visit to 3 Boys might feel like a scene out of “The Jetsons,” one of its most important tools used to conserve water dates back to ancient times. Cisterns have been used for millennia to collect rainwater, and Tornello has installed them to supplement water requirements.

The cisterns have 150,000 gallons of storage capacity, which are fed by industrial gutters that collect rainwater from the greenhouse buildings. This water, along with groundwater, is used for the greenhouse cooling pads and as the base for the nutrient-rich solution that feeds the plants. If the main well goes offline due to a weather event, the stored water alone could keep the greenhouses in operation for a minimum of three weeks.

Pristine Waters

A reverse osmosis plant is being installed at 3 Boys Farm to ensure pure waters are used as the base for carrying the nutrients of the hydroponic solution. The plant will be capable of treating 15,000 gallons per day.

“If you start with 100% pure drinking water for the crops, you are less likely to ever have water borne contamination,” says Tornello. “So we want to start out with purified neutral pH water and the plant allows us to do that. In certain crops, this also will help us lower the costs of nutrients.”

“Hydroponics is a water-intensive practice,” says Tornello. “When I bought the property here, the water permit was for 98,000 gallons per day. But, as pressures have come on, our permit is now for 42,000 gallons per day. That is when we went totally to Netafim microjet and cycle irrigation. With that change, we found we were nowhere near our permit threshold just by proper water management.”

Those adjustments and the use of cisterns have allowed Tornello to cut his draws from the aquifer by 10 million gallons annually.

3 Boys Farm welcomes Hawai'ian Fusion Cuisine innovator Roy Yamaguchi

2010-10-27T14:35:00.012-04:00

L-R: Roy's Restaurants Corporate Chef Kiel Lombardo;
Robert Tornello;
Roy Yamaguchi

It has been an exciting and busy October at 3 Boys Farm. Last week, we had the honor of welcoming Roy Yamaguchi (of Roy's Restaurants fame) to the hydroponic facilities in Ruskin.

Yamaguchi, along with Corporate Chef Kiel Lombardo, Robert Tornello, and 3 Boys' Greenhouse Manager Michael Lenas, toured the wildly productive shadehouses, where our guests were able to see the kind of quantity--and, most importantly, quality--that 3 Boys Farm can produce, consistently and year-round, without needing to use dangerous pesticides or genetically-modified seeds; without draining Florida's threatened aquifer; and without the large carbon footprint traditionally associated with the vast majority of commercial food-growing operations.

Chef Kiel Lombardo;
3 Boys Farm Greenhouse Manager Michael Lenas;
Roy Yamaguchi

One of the many nice things about growing hydroponically and organically is that visitors can sample a crispy, sweet pepper, a juicy cucumber, or a firey arugula leaf right where they're standing--there are no worries about soil or pesticides needing to be rinsed off.

Yamaguchi was especially impressed with the current eggplant crop:

Still, it's hard to not be in the mood for a lovely fresh salad after walking through rows of tables like these:

Congratulations Robert! 3 Boys Farm receives Environmental Leadership Award (with VIDEO link)

2010-10-22T14:02:00.008-04:00

Last week, Robert and Deborah Tornello traveled to sunny Daytona Beach, and at a breakfast ceremony on Friday, October 15, Florida Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson recognized 3 Boys Farm, Saturiwa Conservation Area, and Arapaho Citrus Management with his 2010 Environmental Leadership Awards.

Be sure to see the fantastic video that Rick Lurding--Radio & TV Producer/Director for the Florida Department of Agriculture--made of 3 Boys Farm, which premiered at the breakfast (in Flash). You'll be so impressed, with both the farm itself and the lovely filmography and well-written narrative.

Of course, we're terribly proud of Robert, who's been tirelessly working toward this very green dream for many moons. And in addition to thanking Commissioner Bronson, we'd also like to thank Rick Lurding, as well as Gemy Hinton, and our intrepid crew at the farm, especially Greenhouse Manager Michael Lenas and his assistant, Giancarlo Tornello (Son One of the 3 Boys!)

A couple of snapshots of the breakfast:

Robert speaks about the importance of growing locally and
sustainably--not just in terms of Florida's farms,
but for the agriculture industry writ large

Commissioner Bronson and Robert Tornello

October skies and 3 Boys Farm

2010-10-21T13:27:00.004-04:00

This is a shot of our new (yet old) windmill, photographed at sunset. Gorgeous fall skies are a not-too-well-kept secret here on the Gulf Coast--we've traveled around quite a bit, and have yet to see a sunset that compares to the ones we enjoy here in western Florida.

(Well, sunsets in the Big Island of Hawai'i and Tucson, Arizona *might* have come close--we're admittedly a bit biased toward our home state. Still...)

3 Boys Farm to receive Florida Agriculture Commissioner's Environmental Leadership Award

2010-10-12T17:34:00.004-04:00

Executive Chef Jason Cline of Tampa's Bin 27, center,

selecting lettuces with Head Grower Michael Lenas (left)
and Robert Tornello (right)

The Florida Agriculture Commissioner's Environmental Leadership Awards will be presented this week at a state breakfast held in Daytona Beach. This honor is in recognition of 3 Boys Farm's innovative approaches to conserving rainwater and energy, and we're one of only three such honorees statewide.

Bravo, Robert!

From the Florida Agriculture website:

A model of conservation, the 10-acre 3 Boys Farm in Ruskin has integrated alternative energy sources with high- and low-tech systems to produce a hyper-efficient, sustainable 21st century farm.

While collecting rainwater in cisterns isn't a new idea, the way in which the farm uses the water is. Owner Robert Tornello harvests it from the roofs of his greenhouses to use as a base for the hydroponic growing solution and in the greenhouse cooling systems. Using rainwater reduces his annual draw from the aquifer by over 10 million gallons.

The hydroponic growing technique and greenhouse climate control system allows 3 Boys Farm to organically grow any vegetable or herb year round, a rare feat for a Florida farm. Customers -- including upscale, ethnic and fusion restaurants -- rave about the quality and variety of the produce and the ability to cook with vegetables and herbs, grown to their exact specifications, picked just hours before.

As others were leaving traditional agriculture, Tornello felt it was time to return with a new vision. Combining old techniques with advanced technology he wanted to grow a wholesome crop with little impact on the environment. At 3 Boys Farm he has succeeded.

If you build them, they will turn...

2010-09-16T06:29:00.005-04:00

"Thou hast seen nothing yet!"
-- Miguel de Cervantes, author of Don Quixote

The windmill is up!

Iconic and nostalgia-evoking, the windmill has been the energy workhorse of traditional farms for many generations, and it remains so today. 3 Boys Farm will soon be installing state-of-the-art solar panels, but when it comes to harvesting the wind, why re-invent the wheel, so to speak?

(By the way, the earliest eggplants--a test crop--were outrageously delicious: we sliced and grilled them, then dressed them with a simple balsamic vinaigrette. Soon, tomatoes. Grown without pesticides, of course, and sure to be as intensely flavorful as our first crops of basil, lettuce, eggplant, and cucumbers.)

Another Cervantes quote, then:

"In order to attain the impossible, one must attempt the absurd."

Hope grows sustainably and irrepressibly in New Orleans

2010-08-29T11:25:00.003-04:00

Five years after Hurricane Katrina devastated one of America's greatest cities, a hardworking and talented group of urban farmers are bringing vegetables and vigor to a part of town where fresh produce had long been unavailable:

When the levee along the Industrial Canal failed back in 2005 and the wall of water drowned much of New Orleans' Lower Nine, the area north of Claiborne Avenue - the poorest section of the neighborhood - was hardest hit. Not surprisingly, the stretch has been slowest to recover. Five years after the devastating hurricane, the area still does not have a supermarket or store that sells fresh produce. Today, where houses once stood, jungle-like growths have consumed the lands. Other homes, still abandoned, are slanted and Burtonesque.

But just as strange is another thing in the neighborhood, right on Benton Street between North Roman and North Debigny. "We call it 'The Volcano'," says Brennan Dougherty. "We just started the compost pile back in April, and it's already almost 15 feet tall and 40 feet long." Then like a proud parent she adds, "It produces the most beautiful soil you've ever seen." Dougherty is the manager of a farm in the Lower Nine where organic vegetables are grown and goats raised where drug deals used to take place.

What's more, Dougherty is inspiring young people in other urban areas to plant and grow. Do read the whole thing--it will brighten your day!

Camera-ready and plate-perfect: New crops thrill documentary-makers and local chef

2010-08-10T19:46:00.010-04:00

It was partly cloudy this morning, and the cucumbers were going wild (actually, better than wild)

Filmmakers from the Florida Department of Agriculture arrived early and will be here all week, preparing a documentary for the Commissioner's Environmental Leadership Award (to be presented this fall to a select group of businesspersons, including Robert Tornello)

And today, as always, we were greeted by pretty lettuces all in a row...

...which Chef Jason Cline of Tampa restaurant Bin 27 couldn't resist. He and Robert were talking salad ideas as he gathered the evening's offerings (our first customer!)

Mama loves looking at the flowers, like this delicate lavender eggplant blossom; the boys want to know when Nana can make some Melanzane alla parmigiana.

Ready for its closeup: just one of the scores of luscious butterhead lettuces we're harvesting today.

Red and green leaf-lettuces flourish in their nutrient channels.

3 Boys Farm makes the nightly news!

2010-08-10T11:56:00.004-04:00

Sheena Parveen of Tampa Bay Fox interviews Robert Tornello at 3 Boys Farm:

RUSKIN - Robert Tornello is a laid-back environmentalist who's passionate about all things organic. He's a farmer at heart.

"This farm, to me, is kind of an expression of myself -- ha…not to get philosophical," he said.

3 Boys Farm is named after his three sons. Everything on his 10-acre farm was picked to lessen the impact on the environment. Insect nets line the greenhouses, eliminating the need for pesticides. The large fans save energy.

"So this way we cool the buildings and on the exhaust side we then capture that energy again and turn it back to power," Robert explained.

He captures, purifies, and stores 60,000 gallons of rainwater.

"We already know that we're going to withdrawal 10 million gallons less per year just from this one site," he said.

Solar and wind power will soon pump the stored water through the farm. Robert says the heat makes it hard for growing, but with cool, filtered water, it's a different story.

"This is changing that," he said. "I mean, it's basically like growing in an air-conditioned space."

Certainly something you feel the second you walk in.

Robert believes the results could be overwhelming -- growing in a smaller space with renewable energy, recycled water, and no pesticides.

"Where you would have 10 acres of tomatoes growing, as a quick example, you could do that in one acre of hydroponic greenhouses," Robert explained.

In the end, Robert hopes to feed the Bay Area healthy, affordable food, grown just as nature intended.

These are our living rooms

2010-07-19T23:21:00.001-04:00

Welcome to farming reimagined.

From the skies, 3 Boys Farm appears so futuristic and spotless--immaculate, even. And that's exactly what our farm is all about: growing vegetables and herbs in a contained, pest-free environment without needing to apply dangerous chemicals to them. Using modern hydroponic and organic technologies and carefully controlled climate zones to maximize outputs of flawless, highly nutritious produce year-round. And doing it all in the greenest way imaginable, using sophisticated rainwater cachement systems and harvesting much of our power from alternative, green-energy sources such as wind and solar.

Let's show you around our sparkling, laboratory-like facilities.

Step this way, into the living rooms of 3 Boys Farm.

Greenhouses redefined: climate-controlled, with filtered rainwater stored alongside.

Support structures for the photovoltaic solar panels we'll be installing.

Inside one of the houses, cucumber vines are already flowering; soon they'll be climbing, too.

Seedlings burst toward the light in special above-ground trays; next they'll be transferred to custom-built hydroponic nutrient channels.

Our first crop: an explosion of fragrant basil. Success!

A closer view of a cucumber plant; they're growing in Dutch bato boxes.

Baby red-leaf lettuce are ready to be transferred to nutrient channels, too.

Tomato plants are just getting started, and so are we. Onward!

Welcome to 3 Boys Farm

2010-07-19T11:18:00.000-04:00

This is our first post at the brand-new blog of 3 Boys Farm, a year-round organic and hydroponic farm growing vegetables and herbs in the Tampa Bay area.

We hope you'll bookmark this blog, as we'll soon be sharing lots of updates about our latest harvests, stories of interest, photographs, videos, and even some terrific recipes.

Welcome...and buon appetito!