The Blue Forest is Europe’s first, largest and most offshore demonstrator site for aquaculture-as-a-service for nature.
Based in North Devon, at our Algapelago Marine site, we’re recruiting partners to help us scale the research and deliver lasting outcomes for farmers at land and sea.
More more information, simply get in touch below.
More fish per year
Gallons of water filtered each day
Nitrogen removed each year
CO2 absorbed each year
Our oceans are in crisis. Our solution is to grow undersea rainforests, which accelerate marine regeneration.
Blue forests are a scalable solution for regenerating our seas, but we need your help to deliver the first demonstrator site.
Your support is crucial. Will you help us create richer seas?
Seaweed extracts have been adopted in soft fruit, field veg, and horticultural production for their perceived and quantified wide-ranging benefits (stress resistance, yield benefit, promoting root development, crop quality (e.g. sugar content, field holding capacity, colour, texture).
We are disrupting the market with a high-quality cultivated biostimulant. Data collected during the Farming Futures R&D demonstrates that we’re on the right track.
First, that cultivated kelps offer higher quality and consistency than wild-harvested seaweeds.
Second, our processing methodology, unlocked via Innovate UK funding, transforms this higher-quality biomass into a more complete bioactive profile than leading market incumbents. As a result, we are seeing this stronger bioactive profile drive superior yield response as a biostimulant than the leading market alternatives.
Our product differs in two key ways: the original biomass and the processing.
In terms of biomass, our growing systems are fully sustainable and do not rely on the cutting of wild seaweed forests. In the autumn, our lines are ‘seeded’ with native kelps, which continue to establish and grow through the cold winter months. As day length increases in the spring, they grow exponentially and mature for harvest by late April and May. By “cultivating” or “farming” the kelps, we are able to overcome issues with inconsistency in nutrient quality and also optimise harvest windows for the maximum yield, cleanliness and quality of product, just as terrestrial farmers can.
When processing, traditional seaweed products rely on drying seaweeds at high temperatures or fermentation, which denatures the biomass and limits the availability of bioactives.
Instead, we use low-energy processes at ambient temperatures to transform fresh kelp into a homogeneous liquid within hours of harvest. It is then further macerated before it passes through equipment at ambient temperature but under very high pressure, which breaks the cell membrane and releases the bioactive components into the surrounding solution. By using the whole plant, we do not need to add water to the process, and we do not end up with any waste material requiring disposal.
Our products are compatible with the majority of insecticides, herbicides, fungicides and fertilisers. Note that the core pH of the product is 3.25 to 4.25. If the interaction of chemicals is unknown, a “jar” compatibility test is recommended.
The product is highly soluble, and any residues are temporary and will wash off easily with normal crop quality and processing control measures. If concerned, speak to your customer about their minimum requirements for residue and harvest quality.
Our products should not be used as a complete fertiliser replacement. Instead, they should be used as a tool to support plant development and help them overcome abiotic stress. Early research suggests that our product can support potential reduction of applied nitrogen through enhanced nutrient-use-efficiency (NUE), but more research is needed to confirm. Contact us directly for the latest on our NUE research.
An initial greening effect may be visible in the days after application. However, we recommend applications up-to-five days before an anticipated stress event, and this can also be dependent on your precise soil and climate conditions on the farm. Contact us, and involve your agronomist, for more information.
Yes – TerraMara Liquid Seaweed is certified Organic by the Organic Farmers & Growers (OF&G) under registration UKE2174
No. At this stage, our products only include cultivated seaweed and an organically approved additive as a stabiliser. As our R&D develops, we may explore additional nutrients where this is relevant for specific crops.
Store in the original sealed container, away from direct sunlight, between 5°C and 30°C. Protect from frost and keep out of reach of children and animals. Under recommended storage conditions, in its original unopened packaging the product will have a shelf life of 2 years.
No. Our product is pursuing registration for CE marking, and we anticipate successful completion by Autumn 2026.
Establishing a seaweed farm involves securing consents from several regulatory bodies, including the Marine Management Organisation, The Crown Estate, and Natural England. This process includes environmental assessments to ensure our activities are compatible with the surrounding marine environment — including the UNESCO North Devon Biosphere Reserve, within which our site sits, and building a social licence where members of the community are consulted and engaged to ensure their support. We’re proud that our seaweed farms are the largest fully licensed sites in the UK, allowing us to responsibly operate a cultivation site, and the rigour of that process is reflected in every bottle of TerraMara that we produce.
Our research suggests that the risk is very low. Our ropes are installed under high tension, so it would be like trying to get entangled within scaffolding. Instead, large cetaceans are more likely to “bounce” off these tensioned lines, and actually benefit from feeding on the fish that aggregate around the farm.
We work with independent researchers at the University of Portsmouth, Exeter, Plymouth and others to rigorously monitor what’s happening ecologically at our cultivation sites, going well beyond what our licence requires.
The site was previously a featureless, heavily trawled stretch of seabed supporting very little marine life. By introducing the physical complexity of kelp longlines, mussel infrastructure, and benthic reef structures, we’re creating the 3D habitat that juvenile fish, invertebrates and other species need to thrive. Scientists are tracking this biodiversity uplift across multiple levels of the food web — from epifauna on the kelp and mussel biomass right through to fish recruitment and survival rates – building a rigorous evidence base for the ecological value of IMTA systems. Because the farm cannot be trawled, it also functions as a de facto marine protected area, with benefits expected to spill outward into the surrounding fishery over time.
Our goal isn’t just to do no harm, it’s to demonstrate that a commercial aquaculture operation can actively restore what decades of coastal habitat loss have taken away.
