FALL 2023 PDC SCHEDULE & Curriculum overview
Week 1 , September 30 (Saturday) – Ethics & Principles and the Local Ecosystem
Earth care ~ people care ~ fair share! By staying grounded in our core values and principles, we can design solutions to any of our collective challenges. Learn the 3 core ethics and 12 principles that guide and inform permaculture design and practice, and why they’re so needed in the world. Also explore the local ecosystem, and Lost Valley as an 87-acre living permaculture site.
Week 2, October 7 (Saturday) – Patterns, Reading the Landscape and Natural Building
Learn the art of observation and awaken to the patterns all around you. In permaculture, pattern language informs our design process at all levels. Weather systems, ecological successions, zones & sectors, keyhole gardens, watercourses, seashell spirals, leaf veins, and more.
This lesson will also explore the art of natural building. Modern construction practices create a massive amount of toxic landfill waste. In natural building, the key ingredients come from – and return to – the Earth. Learn how to use local, renewable materials to design smart and simple shelters. Then, get your hands dirty with a natural building project.
Week 2, October 8 (Sunday) - Natural Building
Work alongside leading PNW Natural Builder Bryan Burnoski on building a roof for basic cob building.
Week 3, October 14 (Saturday) – Permaculture Design Process, Keyline Design, Biogeography and Microclimates
Learn the fundamental elements of permaculture’s innovative design process, including manual and digital tools for surveying and mapping your landscape. Understand the elements of a complete design, how to present it, and sample professional and student designs. Learn about the keyline scale of permanence, recognizing what attributes of a site are easy to change and which are to be adapted to. Also learn about climates, microclimates, and biogeography.
Week 3, October 15 (Sunday) - Cider Pressing with Brian Byers
Learn about the different ways to use and preserve the many varieties of apples abundant at Lost Valley
Week 4, October 21 (Saturday) – Water: Cycle, Harvesting, Retention and Aquaculture
Water the is the lifeblood of our world. In permaculture, we respond by working with its natural flows: catching it from the sky, cleaning it for reuse with plants, and storing it in the landscape. Carry out hands-on water planning projects and see on-site earthworks in place. Also learn about aquaculture as an alternative closed-loop food production system.
Week 4, October 22 (Sunday) - Honorable Harvest & Friction Fire with Nathaniel Nordin-Tuininga
Practice the ethics of Wildcrafting and learn a core Ancestral skill of calling fire forth with your own bow drill kit, harvested directly from the forest.
Week 5, October 28 (Saturday) – Trees, Forest Ecology, Fire and Regenerative Forestry
Forests are among the most diverse and resilient ecosystems on Earth. With conscious ecological management, they can support our long-term social needs while storing carbon, cycling nutrients, regulating climate and the water cycle, and providing habitat for the more-than-human world. Explore how forest ecosystems function, and how to design productive and regenerative food forests & woodlots. Also learn about fire ecology and biochar production for increasing carbon storage and soil fertility.
Week 5, October 29 (Sunday) – Fire Ecology/ bio char production with Brian
Learn about small scale carbon sequestration, wildfire mitigation and the maximization of land and garden fertility through the intelligent ecological relationships with this essential elemental force of nature.
Week 6, November 4 (Saturday) – Plants, Cultivated Ecologies, Earthworks, Soils and Microbiology
Soil is the foundation of all terrestrial life. Learn from the ground up about soil care, basic botany, plant families and uses, and sample plant guilds. Touch, taste, and see a variety of cultivated ecologies at Lost Valley. Also learn about earthworks, like swales, ponds and dams, and see how they have been implemented at Lost Valley to sink, slow and spread water throughout the landscape and support critical ecosystems.
Week 6, November 5 (Sunday) – Social forestry with Nathaniel
Come deepen your kinship with the more-than-human world and those who are remembering how to live and tend this land as a keystone species, with reverence for the sovereign rights our older relatives.
Week 7, November 11 (Saturday) – Social Permaculture, Animal Integration and Closed Loop Systems
This week will include a field trip to Heart-Culture Farm to explore animal integration in permaculture and closed-loop systems. Learn the characteristics of wild and domesticated animals and how to design productive and harmonious ecosystems. Also explore techniques for dealing with troublesome little critters, via integrated pest management (IPM).
Week 7, November 12 (Sunday) – Garden animal integration with Brian.
Grow in your understanding of closed loop systems and animal integration for greater farm and garden fertility.
Week 8, November 18 (Saturday) – Decolonizing Permaculture and Access to Land
This week, students will learn from Anishinabe Elder, Dan Wahpepah, about his approach to decolonization, particularly within permaculture, land access and designing for invisible structures.
Week 8, November 19 (Sunday) – Aidless Orientation/Navigation with Nathaniel
Learn how to more fully engage your senses to deeper your connection to your environment in order navigate with greater confidence through unfamiliar terrain without the assistance of exterior devices.
Week 9, November 25 (Saturday) – Designing for Catastrophe and “Waste”
Learn how permaculture design can mitigate the effects of climate change, natural disasters, and other emergencies. Explore bioremediation and ways that permaculture addresses “waste”. Learn how to treat and reuse greywater, considered “dirty” but still of value. Also discover human nutrient recycling and the responsible use of composting.
Week 9, November 26 (Sunday) – Lost Valley Ecoforestry Project with Brian
This week we will focus on tending and clearing some of the more robust introduced plant species within our riparian zones.
Week 10, December 2 (Saturday) – Permaculture Economics and Suburban Permaculture
Learn about permaculture economics and take a field trip to local suburban permaculture sites. This week, students will visit Dharmalaya, Maitreya Ecovillage, and some residential suburban permaculture sites in Eugene, to see examples of permaculture implemented in a variety of settings.
Week 10, December 3 (Sunday) – Tracking basics
Once again tapping into the well of ancient cellular memory to reawaken ways of perceiving and interpreting the signs and signals of the world around us. Special attention will be given to the tracks left by non-human relatives whose presence can nourish both our bodies and our souls.
Week 11, December 9 (Saturday) – Designing for other Biomes, Settings and Building Client Relationships
Permaculture design can be implemented anywhere to improve resiliency. Learn practical strategies for other biomes, like the tropics and deserts, and even urban settings. Finally, get tips about working with design clients and building client relationships.
Week 11, December 10 (Sunday) – Lost Valley Garden project (TBD)
Week 12, December 16 (Saturday) – Project Presentations
Present your polished group projects to the class, the Lost Valley community and mentors. This is the culmination of the course experience, putting all the elements together in a creative project proposal. Also learn more about the permaculture “scene” and what’s next now that you have your PDC.
Finally, participate in an evening of community fun and celebration. Congratulations!
“An enjoyable, whole-hearted, holistic immersion into the word of permaculture. Beautiful location; a diversity of knowledgeable instructors; and good people to share in the journey. Hands-on and hearts-on education with a conscience.” – Jesse Hickman, PDC student