Events at Wheaton Labs

Most PDCs are crafted for beginners - and a lot of professionals get bored. Our PDC assumes that the student is desiring a course with a bit more substance and grit. This PDC is designed for scientists, engineers, educators or people with a lot of current knowledge of permaculture.

This is the course to take to give you a firm, in-depth understanding of the science of permaculture. Even if you have a lot of practical experience in various aspects of homesteading already, this PDC will move you past simply thinking in terms of isolated systems and into designing integrated, whole landscapes.

The Permaculture Technology Jamboree (PTJ) is an event full of:

• collaboration, experimentation and innovation to move permaculture technology forward
• experiences for people new to permaculture technology
• building homesteading skills

There are 10 separate tracks happening simultaneously, and you can switch between tracks at any time. One dy you might work on building a rocket mass heated sauna, the next day make a cob kitchen sink, another day build a earth sheltered greenhouse, and the next day learn natural medicine. The choice is yours!

SKIP is a hands-on curriculum of experiences you can complete to prove you can do permaculture.  While a PDC  teaches you how to do permaculture design and analysis, SKIP is about learning the practical skills.  You are making things.

When you complete several things, you earn a badge.  Sixteen badges will make you PEP1 certified.  After several years of progress, you can be PEP3 or PEP4 certified.  At that point you are basically self-sufficient and can prove it.  Many older homesteaders don't want their property to turn into a strip mall or subdivision.  This program will connect qualified candidates with those landowners so you can skip the rat race and skip the debt.

Most Master Garden courses offered by state universities include large sections about pesticide use and safety and non-organic approaches to gardening. Not so with this course!

With the Certified Garden Master course, you will learn organic, veganic, no-till, and permaculture gardening knowledge and skills. This course will focus on soil and habitat-building for beneficial organisms and systems thinking for gardeners and farmers: how to manage relationships rather than just crops.

Our goal is to understand ecological functions and interactions within plant, soil, microorganism, and insect communities. You will learn how to identify and manage all the relationships that make up a healthy farm-garden-ecosystem--one that does not require pesticides or large off-farm fertilizer inputs.

Whether you are an experienced builder, or new to wood-powered rocket technology, there is something for you at the Rocket Mass Heater Innovators Event! Rocket stoves and rocket mass heaters (RMHs) are a low-emission, efficient way to harness the power of sustainable wood for fuel. The term "rocket" comes from the sound that the wood makes as it burns--there are no actual rockets involved!

At the RMH Jamboree, the basics of rocket technology will be taught, while multiple innovations will be made, such as a tiny house rocket mass heaters, a rock kiln, rocket forge, solar food dehydrator with rocket booster, rocket oven, rocket sauna, and a whole lot more!