A growing system is described where living organisms are grown within containers in stacks. Above the stacks run load handling devices. The load handling devices take containers from the stacks and deposit them at service area stations where goods may be picked out. The containers may be provided with one or more of the following services: power, power control, heating, lighting, cooling, sensing, and data logging. The provision of these services within individual containers rather than across the system as a whole, allows for flexibility in storage whilst reducing cost and inefficiency.

Embodiments disclosed herein describe systems and methods associated with light mounting systems. Embodiments may include lighting shelves that are configured to be mounted to a fixed structure, such as to a wall or supports within a room via a cantilever design that is mounted to strut channels. The lighting shelves may be anchored at only a single end to the strut channels, and the lighting shelves may protrude away from the strut channels. The lighting shelves may have a sufficient width and length to cover an entire region of interest below the lighting shelves, which may enable to lighting shelves to uniformly distribute light to plants.

A system for growing a plurality of plants, including a support apparatus having a plurality of upright frames and a plurality of substantially parallel wires extending longitudinally between the upright frames above a base surface. The wires are placed in tension to support laterally therebetween a multiplicity of individual, separable bags containing plants. Cultivation of the plants is facilitated by the apparatus with the supported bags positioned in a minimally spaced arrangement relative to each other at an ergonomic height above the base surface.

A cultivar growing system is disclosed that may comprise a plurality of chambers. Each chamber comprises a floor, walls and a ceiling. The chambers also support a plurality of cultivars. The chambers also include sensors that monitor light, temperature, humidity, leaf temperature, vapor pressure deficit, carbon dioxide, plus grow medium temperature, oxygen, pH level, total dissolved solids, and electrical conductivity, and nutrients in the chamber and lighting elements that supply light from the direction of the ceiling of the chamber. The chamber also includes an air supply that supplies air from the direction of the floor of the chamber and a nutrient supply that provides nutrients and water to the cultivars. The chamber may also include one or more control systems for controlling the lighting elements, air supply and nutrient supply, wherein the one or more control systems incorporates information from the sensors and a predetermined growth recipe.

A tank housing a vertical farm, having inside a plurality of structures at different heights that are supported on the tank wall such that they create ring-shaped projections on which to place the trays for the crops and the remaining installations and channels, wherein, since the structures are arranged as rings, a hollow space is created in the central shaft of the tank that is used to install a liftable platform so that an operator or robot may access the different trays holding the vegetables, and wherein on the lower portion of the tank are located closed and sealed compartments intended for the hydraulic, electric and electronic systems for controlling the parameters necessary for crop optimisation.

In accordance with embodiments of the invention, there are provided automated plant training systems and related methods. An automated plant training system is designed to train medium to tall plants to grow in a height restricted space by adjusting the plant's direction of growth through the use of phototropism. The device can physically control the plant's main stem, branches and foliage from excessive vertical growth.

A system bypasses harvesting in an assembly line grow pod when it is determined that a plant in a cart is not ready to harvest. The system includes a track, a cart configured to move on the track, one or more sensors and a controller. The cart includes an upper plate that supports a plant. The controller receives information about the plant from the one or more sensors, determines whether the plant in the cart is ready to harvest based on the information; and transmits an instruction for bypassing harvesting the plant in the cart in response to determination that the plant in the cart is not ready to harvest.

A system for removing seeds includes a track, one or more carts moveably disposed on the track, one or more sensors, a removing device, and a controller. The controller includes one or more processors, one or more memory modules, and machine readable instructions stored in the one or more memory modules that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the controller to determine a location of one or more of one or more contaminated seeds and one or more contaminated plants on the one or more carts based on information received from the one or more sensors and instruct the removing device to remove one or more of the one or more contaminated seeds and the one or more contaminated plants based on the location.

A greenhouse arrangement that includes a block storage system in which at least one stack of multiple block storage elements can be accommodated.

A system for testing for contaminants in an assembly line grow pod includes a tray moving along a track arranged in an assembly line grow pod, a plurality of cells arranged on the tray and a contaminant sensor. Each cell supports seeds, plants, or both, and a selected cell includes side walls and a base that define a cavity. The contaminant sensor is arranged in the cavity of the selected cell. The contaminant sensor includes a sensing device and a control device. The sensing device directly senses a characteristic of a content present in association with the selected cell. The control device is coupled to the sensing device and operable to receive a signal from the sensing device. The control device may determine a likelihood of contamination based on the received signal.