Summer Solstice, Ceremonial Gathering and Forest Project Day

Come welcome the expansive season of summer in the Gemmo Forest. Discover the only Gemmo Forest in America, learn how we cultivate and care for our 12.5 acres, and take home ideas to integrate into your own landscape.  

SCHEDULE:

9:00 – 9:15 am : Arrival and Gathering
9:15 – 9:30 am : Welcome Summer Solstice Ceremony
9:30 am – Noon : Experience the Experiment

Join one or more of the five planned activities for varied abilities. Engage with the land and learn how we practice permaculture.

1. Create chop and drop mulch
2. Prepare a Hugelkultur bed for the Tea Garden
3. Tend a guild
4. Assist with barn repairs
5. Build a Bugg Hugg

Noon – 1 pm Lunch Break : Sandwich Bar, GF and Vegan options

1 – 2 pm : Tuning into Summer: A sound healing workshop with Janet Kessenich M.M.  | Janet Kessenich, M.M. is a workshop/retreat leader, holistic practitioner, and author who specializes in connecting participants and clients with their Essence Self – that which brings meaning, purpose, and grace into their lives. Janet leads rituals honoring the changing of the seasons through sound healing, intention setting, and divination.

Here are just a few of the current experiments underway in the Gemmo Forest.

• Cultivation and sharing of heritage seeds from the Abenaki Wabinaki tradition
• Use of minimimally invasive techniques of transitioning land for production:  Silage tarp to Cover Crop, Light till to Cover Crop, Sheet Mulching.
• Use of an electric brush mower to reduce diesel tractor use
• Harmonizing the balance of deemed invasive species ( oriental bittersweet, autumn olive, alder buckthorn) 
• Testing the medicinal qualities of Native v. European species to create Gemmotherapy extracts in collaboration with Western Romania University
• Cultivation historically used herbs for tea
• The creation of the use of a feathered edge as a wildlife corridor and habitat with production trees and shrubs and production  as a transition zone to productive fields