workshop

How might we initiate a dialogue with the soul in nature? How might we listen for ways in which we might nourish this soul? How might this dialogue inform our dreams for the earth and aid us in earthing our dreams? In this workshop we will listen, individually and collectively, to the ways in which the soul of nature speaks to us through movement, drawing, listening, speaking, singing, and creating an offering that arises out of our exploration of this relationship. This workshop is for all ages and will include both adults and children.

Four biodynamic farmers at different stages of working with animal power (some for decades, some brand new) will share their experiences on how they have integrated draft animals into their farm individualities. They will explore their approach to the work, using tried and true equipment as well as new on-farm inventions that make their systems work for them. Conversions from a primarily tractor-powered farm to a primarily horse-powered farm will be discussed, as well as starting from scratch with draft animals.

Within this session, farmers and gardeners will have an opportunity to draft an action plan for their own farm or garden with the guidance of veteran biodynamic practioners. This session will offer a space to take the information you are learning at the conference and apply it to your own land at a reasonable, doable scale with a little guidance. Prepare to return home with concrete next steps on how to integrate and transform your own space.

School farms and gardens provide a place for students to experience how science, philosophy, economics, art, and literature are all interconnected. They also offer a place to develop the system thinking skills necessary to address the wicked problems of our time, such as climate change, food security, biodiversity collapse, and the growing disconnect between man and nature. Plus, school gardens provide the space and time for contemplation, reflection, and connection with nature, each other and their inner soul.

Using a unique blend of biodynamic agriculture, Holistic Management, and regenerative permaculture design, PEG farm project in Barbados is working to create a biodiverse working and living space on a landscape that was farmed in a monoculture of sugar cane for over 400 years. The farm incorporates holistically managed cattle with local blackbelly sheep, poultry, biodynamic preparations, compost, a host of indigenous pollinating plants and cover crops, gardens, and food forests to create a unique and thriving environment.

Heirloom Food and Story is a project of Tano Farm that rekindles sharing our cultural legacies around sacred food and deepening our connection to land, story, heritage, and each other. In this storytelling session, Larry and Deborah Littlebird will share their work with Tano Farm at Hamaatsa, which is rooted in place, story and ancestry—bringing back the sacred in the way we eat, grow, and share our food. Through regenerative farming practices, permaculture, and indigenous land wisdom, Tano Farm is committed to creating a healthy, genetically diverse ecosystem.

Jeff Poppen, the "Barefoot Farmer," has been growing vegetables for 35 years and has helped hundreds of others to learn and start their own farms and gardens. In this workshop, he will cover all aspects of the biodynamic approach to growing vegetables, including planning, soil preparation, sowing, transplanting, companion planting, crop rotations, weeding, and harvest. Bring your vegetable questions to get them answered by this living legend.

In this workshop Beth and Nathan Corymb will share their 30 years of experience, with suggestions about how to begin seed growing on your farm or to further your expertise. We will discuss the role of seed in the farm organism, the cultural and artistic benefits of growing seed, integrating seed growing into market and CSA production, growing seed for your farm, and growing seed to sell. Practical considerations such as plant families, populations, pollination, and isolation will be addressed, as well as finding markets and how to become a sought-after grower for seed companies.

Continuing our co-working between agriculture and medicine from the 2014 Biodynamic Conference, in this workshop we will endeavor to deepen our common understanding of salutogenic (healing) forces hidden within the human being and our surrounding geography. Taking as a basis Rudolf Steiner's lectures titled “Geographic Medicine” (GA 178), we will explore this unique basis of illness as well as how geography and our environment influence the potential for social activity and community.

In this interactive session, we will explore emerging trends in the intersections of farms, finance, and food systems. With the increase in the number of innovative food hubs, cooperative approaches to production, aggregation, and distribution, the issue of financing remains a challenge. What is needed? What has worked successfully? Is the conventional marketplace being transformed to a more associative condition? We will explore these and further questions.

* Photo credit: Roxbury Farm