Mental Health Center of Denver – Dahlia Campus

Take a 5 minute tour of the Dahlia Campus Aquaponic Greenhouse with Tawnya Sawyer

The Dahlia Campus Greenhouse is a 5,400 sq ft facility that we designed from the ground up. There was a great deal of community input regarding the types of fish and plants they wanted to grow. The farm features two state-of-the-art raceway fish tanks at 2,800 gallons each. The fish tanks have their own integrated filtration system with automatic filter backwashing. The tanks also circulate water via air pumps which simultaneously provide oxygen, thus reducing the overall energy and equipment footprint.

The plant system is all deep water culture comprised of three 8 x 76’ long troughs totaling 1,824 sq ft of plant production.

The farm at Dahlia Campus is growing several varieties of kale, salad and leaf lettuces, cooking greens, collards, basil and chard, culinary herbs and microgreens. The Annual output for greens is expected to be about 25,000lbs. They are currently raising catfish and tilapia with an expected output of 5,000 lbs annually.

The aquaponics farm is run by The Mental Health Center of Denver. The aquaponic facility was recently featured in a story on PBS Newshour as an innovative community based model for healthy food, wellness and support programs working in the heart of a historic Denver neighborhood.