We’re partnering with Sierra Club, High Country Audubon, and High Country Wild to care for our public land. In this workday, we’ll focus on removing nonnative Autumn Olive, Multiflora Rose, and Bittersweet at the upper loop of Brookshire Park.

This time of year, Autumn Olive and Multiflora Rose are fruiting, both of which have beneficial and medicinal fruit uses. Autumn Olive fruits can be eaten or made into fruit leather. The berries are rich in many vitamins and minerals and have 17x more lycopene than tomatoes. When eating the fruits, do not spit out the seeds as we want to prevent spread from the fruit.

Multiflora Rose has fruits called reships. These can be harvested and eaten or made into tea or dried and soaked in oil for skin nourishment. Again do not spit seeds on the ground as we want to prevent this plant from spreading.

Because these plants are nonnative, they can be harvested without any worry of overharvesting.

We encourage harvesting the fruit as we cut and remove the plant from the landscape.

It’s clear our current economic structure in the US is built upon fossil fuels and environmental destruction while hardly meeting the needs of the public. We envision an economy that is regenerative and just, meeting the needs of the people while taking care of the planet.

This series will cover topics such as circular economy, employee-owned trusts, the gift economy and Earth’s abundance, housing trusts, and community agriculture.

The location is at the Agriculture Extension Community Meeting Room. There is free parking at the building.

This event consists of two parts. You do not have to participate in both parts. However if you sign up for basketweaving in the second half of the day, we recommend you join the work day in the first half of the day.

Bittersweet removal/harvest co-hosted with Mountain True. We will work at the Rivers House to remove Bittersweet and learn from our weaving instructor, Angela Eastman, how to harvest the vine for using later. 9 am - 12 pm. Registration is through Mountain True’s website.

Bittersweet basketweave workshop hosted in partnership with Blue Ridge Women in Agriculture. Angela Eastman will show us how to use the vines harvested from the morning to each weave our own basket. Thanks to a grant earned by Transition Blue Ridge, registration is by-donation and will be hosted on the BRWIA website.

All donations from this event will be used directly in purchasing native plants to plant at Rivers House.

We’re so grateful for the many hands that have helped in tending our public lands together this year. We’ve removed nonnative species, planted native species, improved trails, and made medicine from the harvest/removal of nonnative plants together.

If you’ve volunteered with us this year, we invite you to gather with us at Strawberry Hill on November 8th at 4 - 6 pm for local food & drinks and a performance of live hammered dulcimer by Connie Woolard under the big old Oak tree for sunset. 

Please let us know you're coming by filling out the form. Plus one's and well-behaved pets are welcome. 

A rain plan will be emailed if needed. 

It’s clear our current economic structure in the US is built upon fossil fuels and environmental destruction while hardly meeting the needs of the public. We envision an economy that is regenerative and just, meeting the needs of the people while taking care of the planet.

This series will cover topics such as circular economy, employee-owned trusts, the gift economy and Earth’s abundance, housing trusts, and community agriculture.

The location is at the Agriculture Extension Community Meeting Room. There is free parking at the building.

It’s clear our current economic structure in the US is built upon fossil fuels and environmental destruction while hardly meeting the needs of the public. We envision an economy that is regenerative and just, meeting the needs of the people while taking care of the planet.

This series will cover topics such as circular economy, employee-owned trusts, the gift economy and Earth’s abundance, housing trusts, and community agriculture.

The location is at the Agriculture Extension Community Meeting Room. There is free parking at the building.

It’s clear our current economic structure in the US is built upon fossil fuels and environmental destruction while hardly meeting the needs of the public. We envision an economy that is regenerative and just, meeting the needs of the people while taking care of the planet.

This series will cover topics such as circular economy, employee-owned trusts, the gift economy and Earth’s abundance, housing trusts, and community agriculture.

The location is at the Agriculture Extension Community Meeting Room. There is free parking at the building.

It’s clear our current economic structure in the US is built upon fossil fuels and environmental destruction while hardly meeting the needs of the public. We envision an economy that is regenerative and just, meeting the needs of the people while taking care of the planet.

This series will cover topics such as circular economy, employee-owned trusts, the gift economy and Earth’s abundance, housing trusts, and community agriculture.

The location is at the Agriculture Extension Community Meeting Room. There is free parking at the building.

It’s clear our current economic structure in the US is built upon fossil fuels and environmental destruction while hardly meeting the needs of the public. We envision an economy that is regenerative and just, meeting the needs of the people while taking care of the planet.

This series will cover topics such as circular economy, employee-owned trusts, the gift economy and Earth’s abundance, housing trusts, and community agriculture.

The location is at the Agriculture Extension Community Meeting Room. There is free parking at the building.