Permaculture Weekend Workshop #3
The Integration of Animals into a Permaculture System

Date: August 4th -7th      Price: $275 ($325 After July 25th)
Register Here

 Instructors: Bruce & Jesse Rickard

Lecture Topics:
•  Livestock in a Permaculture System
       •  Intensive, Rotational Grazing
              •  The Importance of Grassland in Agriculture

Bruce and Jesse

Bruce & Jesse Rickard
Bruce Rickard and his son Jesse will share the knowledge they have gained over the past 18 years raising livestock using rotational grazing methods. Bruce along with his wife Lisa, Jesse, and daughter Hannah created the 280-acre Fox Hollow Farm in Fredericktown, Ohio, where they now specialize in commercial, grass-fed lamb and beef. The Rickards' started farming in 1987 after Bruce left the corporate world to live a more authentic and meaningful life in the central Ohio countryside. They started small with only eight sheep, learning as they went, by attending workshops and seminars, collecting a library worth of books, and through much trial and error.  "We see new ways of doing things because we didn't grow up in the farm mindset,” said Bruce. This outside perspective allowed them to comfortably adopt permaculture principles and practices into their increasingly successful operation.

Fox Hollow Farm
Fox Hollow Farm on average handles 2000 sheep annually along with a herd of beef, hundreds of chickens, some ducks, hogs and more. Their animals are grass fed to enhance the overall health and well-being of the animals, the humans who eat the meat, and the land they all share. The Rickard family's success as farmers stems in part from the fact that they reduce the amount of time spent feeding the animals, as they let the animals harvest the grass themselves using a rotational method of grazing (while maintaining the ever improving health of the meadows with their hooves and manure).
For more information about Fox Hollow Farm: www.foxhollowfarmnaturally.com

Guest Speaker - Laura Paine
Laura Paine is an agronomist and an Agriculture Agent with the University of Wisconsin Extension Service, based in Columbia County, Wisconsin. She has a broad plant science background with education and training in botany, horticulture, and agronomy. For the last 12 years, she has been involved with research and education in the area of grazing management including resource conservation issues such as water quality, wildlife habitat, and using native prairie plants in pasture systems.

Three Fascinating Tours

• Mint Creek Farm is a 225 acre sheep farm directly next to Stelle.  Harry Carr and his family are in the midst of transitioning this farm into organic certification. 
• Myles Harston will tour us through his new, state of the art aquaponics operation where he has integrate the raising of tilapia fish with some of the finest gourmet herbs found in Illinois.
• We will also be visiting the Moore's multifaceted family farm where they are raising over a dozen different types and breeds of animals while complimenting their 125 member CSA (Consumer Supported Agriculture) vegetable business.

Here is a quick look at the workshop outline:
I. The Problem is the Solution - Grass as the enemy
    A.  Animal agriculture and environmental damage from the Sahel to Chairman Mao
    B.  Grass as a weed in orchards and annual crops
II. The Potential
    A. Grass as grain
    B. Grass as band-aid
    C. Grass plants- biology
III. The Place of Animals
    A. The intermediate harvest
        1. Simpler carbohydrates-grain
        2. Cellulose
    B. Labor/nutrient production balance
    C. Sustainability
IV. Animals - Keeping it Simple
    A. Nature's model
    B. Animals to fit the job
    C. Animals as eco-management tools
V.  Non-ruminants
    A. Chickens/ducks
    B. Pigs
VI. Ruminants
    A. Cattle
    B. Sheep