Part I: Germination and Growth (Spring)

Agricultural practices like cultivation, sowing and transplanting disturb the soil and fix into it elemental qualities that mirror the passage of the moon through the zodiac. These elemental qualities then unfold in the growth patterns of a plant during the growing season. The rising tide of life forces in Spring is linked in a unique way to lunar rhythms around the time of the equinox. This first of two workshops will address these critical patterns of early spring, highlighting optimum times for working with plants.

Part II: Flowering and Fruiting (Fall)

Working with fundamental lunar rhythms while cultivating, spraying and harvesting enables the practitioner to enter more directly into the flowering and fruiting processes of the plant. This can greatly enhance the keeping qualities of produce and the potency of herbs, and prove highly effective in post harvest operations such as fermentation and seed gathering. This workshop completes the work with the planting calendar through studying the elemental patterns of the moon during harvest season.

• Lecture 1 – Spring
  Equilibrium field, symmetry, syzygy, synergy, wave properties, solstice, equinox, growth cycles, ash cycle, spirit germ, annual plants, Christian and pagan year
• Lecture 2 – Spring
  Moon runs high and low, analog year, star moon, sun rhythm, moon phase, trine moon, pruning rhythms, mildew spray, fruiting strategy, solar plant gesture, bed prep, pricking out, root crops
• Lecture 3 – Spring
  Plant as earth/water/air/fire, repeating rhythms, ferments and life gestures, sowing roots, spraying for mildew, moon phases, rhythm and substance
• Lecture 4 – Fall
  elemental beings, importance of rhythm, solar declination, equinox and solstice influences, sun rhythms in plants
• Lecture 5 – Fall
  lunar declination, powdery mildew strategies, plant evolution, equisetum morphology, sowing roots, three moon rhythms, cultivation practices
• Lecture 6 – Fall
  sidereal moon, bed preparation with sidereal moon, growing roots, growing squash, pricking out and transplanting, harvest herbs, fall bed prep strategies, harvest fruits, overwinter