Permaculture Weekend Workshop #2
Developing a Small or Large Scale Permaculture Site

Instructor: Mark Shepard

Lecture Topics:
•  Conversion of 100 Acre Farm into Long-term Profitability
       •  Agroforestry
              •  Permaculture Explored

Conversion of 100 Acres into Long-term Profitable Permaculture
Mark Shepard 's New Forest Farm in southwestern Wisconsin is one of the very first and finest examples of Permaculture farming in the United States. For 10 years he and his wife Jen have been working to convert a typical row-crop farm into a permaculture based perennial agricultural ecosystem using oak savannah, successional brushland and eastern woodlands as the ecological models. He is demonstrating that a permaculture based farming operation increases in value because the amount of work slowly recedes while the output or benefits continue to increase over decades. The farm is always improving in fertility while never polluting or eroding.

Mark is a repeat guest to Stelle, having presented at our full-length Permaculture Design Certification Course last summer. He was certified as a permaculture designer in 1993 and has since become a certified instructor for aspiring permaculture students. Mark's hand's on experience permeates his thought provoking, intellectually challenging, and imminently practical presentations. He offers real solutions for the real world and elicits positive action from workshop participants.  

Agroforestry and Permaculture
In this three day event, Mark will explore how trees, shrubs, vines, canes, perennial plants and fungi are planted in association with one another to produce food (for humans and animals), fuel, medicines, visual delight and long-term profitability. Much of Mark's expertise lies in raising Badgersett Hazelnuts, chestnuts, walnuts, and various fruits and he will expound on the benefits of his “sheer, utter & total neglect” method of productive design. Mark loves the big picture, and will touch on how agriculture relates to the development of humankind.  

Guest Speaker
Candice Chaffee is a Certified Natural Health Practitioner and a Master Herbalist with years of experience performing Live Blood Analysis. By looking at a person's blood with the aid of a high powered microscope, Candice provides an intriguing inside view of what our nation's food supply does to our bodies and overall heath.

Off Site Tour
Also scheduled for this weekend will be a half day trip to Spence Farm. Marty and Kris Travis are restoring the oldest farm in Livingston County to a more sustainable system where income is being derived from many different but interrelated enterprises. They are harvesting crops from their woodlot, their restored prairie land, their gardens, and pasture, as well as earning income through their educational offerings.  This tour will present income generating opportunity you may not before have considered.

More on Mark Shepard
Mark spent 4 years at Unity College located in Maine, majoring in Ecology but shortly afterwards headed for Alaska where he and Jen immersed themselves in a self-reliant, ecological lifestyle for eight years. A pact with fellow permaculture students brought them to Wisconsin to begin what has become their life's work. Mark is the co-inventor of a hazelnut husker and the “Hypobaric Food and Crop dehydrator.” He is currently entering into an extensive Hazelnut breeding program with the University of Minnesota.  

While working on the long term conversion from traditional to permaculture based farming he has also used his background and permaculture skills in his own landscape design work and in his Permaculture & Agroforestry consulting business.