workshop

Mac Mead has been farming and working with biodynamics for over 40 years and has helped hundreds of others to learn and start their own farms and gardens through his work at the Pfeiffer Center. In this workshop, he will cover all aspects of the biodynamic approach to growing vegetables, including planning, soil preparation, sowing, transplanting, weeding and pest management, and harvest. Other topics covered include: using raised beds, horn preparations, and the planting calendar.

Biodynamic preparations, along with application of the principles underlying their use, are an artist's palette of colors to create landscapes that give rise to vibrant life as well as food, fiber, and raw materials of amazing quality and abundance. Though often biodynamics is referred to as a practice, its more skilled practitioners may think of it as an art form that produces the nuttiest winter spinach; the most inspiring tarragon, basil, or ginger; the most delicious apples or cherries; and the subtlest fine wines.

Stone Barns Center is anchored by the need for communities, artisans, and producers to be inspired by complex collaborative food system models. Since 2004, we have worked to create a more open and responsible food economy by connecting farmers, chefs, academics, and makers with a common goal.

Awareness of the benefits and impacts of farm-based education has been growing. More and more farms are offering educational programs for children and many more traditional learning institutions have been adding gardening and animals to their offerings. This workshop will highlight two different approaches to developing farm-based educational programs for children.

The Queen Mothers of Manya Krobo Ghana asked me during a visit, “Is it true that in the United States, the farmer will put a seed in the ground and say no prayer, offer no song or dance, make no libation, and not even say thank you to the ground and expect the seed to grow? Well, that is why you are all sick.” Let us come together to learn how the Black agrarian tradition informs a relationship of consent, reciprocity, and deep listening with the sacred earth.

Modern biology and modern medicine claim alike that at the center of living organisms (plants, animals, and microbes, including humans) is to be found a "master molecule." This view of life, in which DNA is a "code" having executive functions, relegates the organism to the status of a puppet and a machine. It is a paradigm of life that is, at once, strikingly authoritarian and, on careful examination, unlife-like. In this workshop I will show that this genetically deterministic and reductionistic orthodoxy in biological science has no basis at all in evidence.

"The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility.” — Wendell Berry Each one of us has our own unique experiences with the natural world. As farmers, gardeners, and land stewards, we have made commitments to particular pieces of this good earth that nourishes us. Through the lens of our direct experiences with land (our biographies), we will explore the nature of our kinship and commitments to the part of the earth that we live with.

At Woven Stars Farm in Ghent, NY, we graze all our ruminants in the same pasture using a regenerative rotational grazing system. The various species play a pivotal role in managing soil and a diversity of plants. The sheep, cows, and goats are followed by the chickens to disperse the manure and manage persists. Rudolf Steiner mentioned the importance of diversity in the farm organism, which we believe helps to build farm resilience. This workshop will highlight the ways to observe the land and plants in a rotational grazing operation.

As a pioneering Biodynamic® farm and the third CSA in the US, Brookfield Farm had many ideas, but not many models, for how to move forward with creating a more sustainable agriculture. Now, after decades of work on the same patch of ground, it's clear that one of the most successful strategies that has been followed has been a long-running apprentice program. Training over 40 participants who have gone on to create farms far and wide has been both beneficial to the operation of Brookfield Farm, as well as developing a more sustainable agriculture in the wider region.

This lively exploration of soil biology and healthy plant metabolism will rouse every gardener and fruit grower to think deeper. How mycorrhizal fungi enhance plant health is absolutely stunning. Nutrients are delivered by means of fungus-root synergy. A boost to green immune function helps keep disease at bay. Expansive fungal networks bring resiliency to ecosystems. Soil aggregate formation addresses carbon flow. Yet for the longest time, we have ignored basic soil biology and instead disturbed ecosystems at our own peril. Time to change all that, and fast!