Douglass Oster, Post-Gazette Dan Yarnick looks over hydroponic tomatoes in his greenhouse in Indiana, Pa. Click photo for larger image. Related article: Hydroponics take root in a South Side shop

Dan Yarnick starts his winter days on the right note: "I have a tomato sandwich for breakfast pretty near every morning," he said.

But it's not one of those greenish, flavorless winter fruits masquerading as a tomato. This one is deep red, thin-skinned, juicy and tastes, well, like a tomato should. It was picked fresh the night before.

Dan and his wife Lynnette grow three quarters of an acre of hydroponic vegetables at Yarnick's Farm and Greenhouse in Indiana. Their tomatoes are a far cry from most grocery-store fruit, which are often picked green, forced into ripening with ethylene gas, refrigerated and shipped from some temperate farm far away.

This year, nature's cruel power created a bonanza for hydroponic tomatoes. In California, floods and insects devastated the crop and Mexico was hit hard by pests. Florida probably took the hardest knock, with a succession of hurricanes that sent the market price soaring after Ivan swept through.

That was all good news for hydroponic tomatoes, which are grown indoors, without soil. Unaffected by the weather, local growers were able to capitalize on the soaring prices in the rest of the market. Like many producers, Yarnick's tried to extend their crop to produce as much as possible to take advantage of the shortage. A little luck helped out as their greenhouses had been planted a little later than normal and the tomatoes were still producing.

One reason hydroponic tomatoes are so popular is the work that's been done over the years in improving flavor.

Douglass Oster, Post-Gazette Lynnette and Dan Yarnick spend as much time with each other as with the hydroponic vegetables they grow in their greenhouse. Click photo for larger image.

"Hydroponics are bred for taste," Dan Yarnick said. "The good old heirloom tomatoes are hard to beat but these are pretty close."

Along those lines, the couple had an interesting mistake happen this season. Dan grows out different seeds for customers, and one of his regulars wanted seedlings for an old Italian heirloom tomato. An employee accidentally planted those tomatoes alongside the disease-resistant hydroponic crop.

"Actually, it was a really good thing 'cause when we started picking, there were these big beautiful pink heirloom tomatoes," Dan said, adding that they'll do it again next year -- on purpose.

The greenhouses are full of hundreds of seedlings. The aroma of the vines is intoxicating. Close your eyes and it's midsummer. Even though the light level is low this time of year, the smaller plants tolerate it and flourish as the days grow longer.

The hydroponic system that Yarnick's uses is similar to what most growers use. Seedlings are planted in rock wool, a sterile medium made from melted igneous rock. A computer-controlled system provides water and a changing formula of nutrients to the plants through thin plastic tubes.

Each plant is pruned to a single leader that is trained up and down a string, sometimes reaching 30 to 40 feet in length.

One of the largest local hydroponic operations is Village Farms, with 9.5 acres in Ringgold, Clarion County.

"Anybody who was growing tomatoes to the middle of the summer until now has been very profitable," said Mike Bledsoe, vice president of technologies. "We grow first for flavor, then for size," he adds.

Closer to home, a pilot program at Bidwell Training Center on the North Side focuses on teaching adult students how to grow tomatoes hydroponically. Nearly 100 plants are under cultivation and the crop is already spoken for, by local restaurants. The school hopes one day to reclaim a former industrial site for a larger hydroponic operation.

At Fair Winds Farm in Jackson Center, Mercer County, owner Cindy Latchaw has been growing hydroponically in 11u20442 acres of greenhouse space since 2002. She and her husband stumbled on a closed hydroponics operation when they were looking for a place to set up a machine shop.

"We saw the greenhouse and fell in love. It's got everything," she said, including a spring-fed pond whose water has just the right pH and minerals for plants.

Their tomato crop was coming to an end when prices spiked. Probably their most popular item is their Boston lettuce, sold under the name of WaterBlossom . It's sold with the rock wool and roots still attached so it is really still alive. Most of what they grow is harvested one day and delivered the next. Fair Wind Farm supplies grocery stores and restaurants in Pittsburgh.

To make their fruit as natural as possible, many hydroponic farms use an organic technique called integrated pest management. Basically, it means releasing "good bugs" instead of chemicals to control insect pests.

The Yarnicks also make use of good bugs in their greenhouses, but working long hours side by side doesn't seem to bug them. When Dan talks, Lynnette looks at him like a newlywed. When she talks, Dan listens attentively with a smile.

The two met 20 years ago at the farm. Lynnette had always been fascinated by farming since she was a little girl. When she rented a place across from Yarnick's, she would watch Dan plow the field for hours. One hot day, she decided to walk down the road with a couple of cold drinks. Little did she know, he was just as interested in meeting her.

"Let me tell you something," Dan said. "That field was powder when I was done with it. I drove round and around till finally something happened."

From March until November, the couple spend nearly every waking minute together.

"Lynnette, do you remember the hydroponic lettuce head that flew at you?" Dan said, laughing. "I actually wasn't aiming to hit her. It's pretty soft, too. What was that you threw at me, an apple? It's not because we don't love each other. It's just the stress sometimes."

"If we didn't work together, I don't think we would ever see each other," Lynnette said.

"We have our days -- everyone does -- but they're few and far between. I don't think I could ever be away from him working. We truly love what we do."

For more information on Yarnick's Farm and Greenhouse, call 724-349-3904. For Fair Winds Farm, call 724-699-9116 .