I have spent most of my life outdoors in nature and have been fortunate enough to both work at jobs that included the outdoors and own companies that deal directly with nature. I own Inspired By Nature, which is a company that teaches people with ponds and lake how to care for them properly without using chemicals. I also own Schooner Farms, which is a non certified organic farm that focuses on agricultural education for aspiring gardeners and other small farmers. We have a total of 32 acres. My wife, Rebecca, is a practicing herbalist that studied under Rosemary Gladstar and some of her apprentices.

I became interested in permaculture many years ago when we began Schooner Farms. I am currently (2014) enrolled in Geoff Lawtons PDC Online Course. I have been fortunate in spending time in Wisconsin with the Aldo Leopold Foundation and Leopold's family members for 10 out of the last 12 years. It was there that my focus on agricultural education became clear to me. Those visits literally changed my life and focus!

On 10 acres of our farm I plan to establish a food forest over the next several years. I have already created over 500' of hugelkultur and plan to expand that to over 2000' over the next 2 years. We have 3 half acre ponds that are managed naturally on our farm. We already have expanded into honeybees, a 40 member CSA program, aquaculture, U pick raspberries, blackberries and strawberries, and raise an enormous variety of culinary and medical herbs. We plan to build a building devoted to the educational side of what we do within the next 2 years that will include a fully functional commercial kitchen for teaching cooking and preservation classes among other things.