FarmTek Provides Custom Buildings In Any Configuration

FarmTek Provides Custom Buildings In Any Configuration BUILDINGS Miscellaneous No one sells more “engineered” farm buildings than FarmTek a big mail order company headquartered in Dyersville Iowa Buildings offered include greenhouses of every size hoop buildings for livestock and machinery high tunnels for crop production and many more “We make more than 500 designs of fabric-covered structures and at least 75 different greenhouse designs for everything from hobby gardens to commercial flower and vegetable production ” says Barry Goldshire FarmTek Representative “We’ve expanded quite a bit into the grower market and hydroponics is creating quite a buzz with the drought The same is true with growing fodder Now that hay is so expensive fodder systems are booming “Our larger structures are almost all one-of-a-kind ” says Goldshire “We custom-build to almost any size while a lot of our competitors are limited to specific lengths For example we recently put up a 250-ft wide clear span structure for composting wood chips and a 15 000 sq ft clear span building for lions for an animal sanctuary in Colorado “They had 30 days to get a building up to receive circus lions from Bolivia or the animals would have been euthanized ” recalls Goldshire “We designed a Hercules model for them It was paid for by Bob Barker of TV fame and put up by volunteers ” The clear span fabric-covered structure provides habitat with grass plants and natural light An overhead walkway allows visitors to observe the lions The company isn’t the only one to get creative with structures Linda and Randy Naeve of Ames Iowa modified their Pro Solar Style High Tunnel with rain gutters on either side Harvested rainwater is used to irrigate plants inside and out David Lucius Atoka Tenn houses more than 100 banana trees plus tropical flowers in his 12 by 24-ft Backyard Pro Greenhouse II The greenhouse-style building has 2-ft wide panels of tough polycarbonate Goldshire cites a customer in Texas that raises giant flytraps and others that raise orchids koi and more He says the locally produced food movement is driving interest in greenhouses Even FarmTek is involved Its retail manufacturing and distribution are headquartered in Dyersville Iowa The company’s demonstration high tunnel greenhouses supply Dyersville grocery stores restaurants and food banks with fresh vegetables “People are wanting to grow their own or buy it local ” says Goldshire “We have a lot of ‘urban farm’ customers Perhaps 50 percent of our web sales are to urban customers ” Contact: FARM SHOW Followup FarmTek 1440 Field of Dreams Way Dyersville Iowa 52040 ph 800 327-6385; www farmtek com

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