Growing healthy veggies at home

PETALING JAYA: Jenny Koh was so determined to consume vegetables free from synthetic and chemical fertilisers that she flew to Hawaii to learn aquaponics.

Koh, 58, started researching aquaponics, which is a marriage between vegetable and fish farming, on the Internet several years ago.
Her interest grew so much that she flew to Hawaii to meet some growers there to learn their tricks for successful aquaponic farming.
Koh has converted the first floor front garden of her three-storey bungalow here into an aquaponic garden and plants chillies, tomatoes, a variety of beans, spinach and several other leafy vegetables.
She said the system involved fertilising the vegetables with fish excrement directly from the ponds.

Harvest time: Koh picking chillies in her garden.

“There are two methods which I use. One involves putting a raft with holes directly on the fish pond and placing pots with the vegetable seedlings into the holes,” said Koh, who has two children aged 40 and 38 and two grandchildren aged 16 and 17.
She added that fish excrement and other organic waste in the pond would fertilise the roots of the vegetables while the vegetables filtered the pond water and kept it healthy for the fish.
Koh rears a variety of fish except the Tilapia in her aquaculture pond and tank.
“I found that the Tilapia eats the vegetable roots and so I stopped rearing them,'' she said.
Besides her aquaponic vegetable garden, Koh has a regular vegetable garden in her backyard which is also located at the first floor of her home.
“I am from Penang and I must always have all the variety of herbs used in Malaysian cooking to add flavor to my food,'' she said.
Koh added that the yield from her aquaponic garden was enough for her own consumption as well as to give away to friends.-thestaronline