Microgreens - small plants with a big impact

Microgreens are edible young vegetables that are harvested shortly after the “cotyledon” phase. Cotyledon is a phase in the early embryological development of a plant in which the first leaves develop in the seed germ. A short time later, the germ opens and the first leaves emerge from the soil. The precursor to microgreens are sprouts.

This is the time when you can harvest the young green leaves. It is full of high-quality nutrients and contains more proteins than older plants. In short - microgreens are a true superfood. However, a distinction should be made between microgreens and sprouts. Sprouts grow without daylight and without soil, but microgreens require soil as a growing medium and always sunlight. Furthermore, microgreens contain far more chlorophyll than sprouts because they have already formed leaves.

Microgreens have originally been cultivated and grown in Southern California since the 1990s. The career continued to East America via San Francisco, so the little plants have come a long way and are now an integral part of modern cuisine and conscious nutrition. In the beginning, arugula, beetroot, cress, basil and cilantro were grown in America. Today there are hardly any limits to microgreens, but seeds from the nightshade family, such as tomatoes or potatoes, should not be used because their young leafy greens contain toxins.

The favorites among the microgreens can vary depending on taste, one leaf green is a little spicier, the other tastes mildly sour, but they all have one thing in common - they are packed with vitamins, trace elements and proteins right down to the tips of the leaves. Commonly grown microgreens include red cabbage, coriander, amaranth, radish, beetroot or cress. So how can aquaponics / hydroponics be combined with microgreens?

Aquaponics is excellent for growing microgreens. Optimal conditions can be created in greenhouses that enable weekly harvesting. Microgreens can cope with regular daylight, so it is possible to use fish that can withstand medium and high temperatures if the fish are kept in the greenhouse with the plants. If the fish farm is housed in a separate and cool building, the types of fish can be adapted to the conditions. You can find a selection of fish species for aquaponics here . In addition to choosing the right fish, it also depends on what characteristics the greenhouse should have.

There are a multitude of possibilities, the limits of which are only set by the imagination. Since the water used comes from the closed cycle of aquaponics/hydroponics, it is free of pesticides and fertilizers and the system can be operated all year round, resulting in a regulated yield of microgreens and fish.