Spring Seed Academy

Join the Seed Academy with teacher Don Tipping (Siskiyou Seeds)

An in-depth, hands-on training for farmers, gardeners, educators, entrepreneurs, permaculturalists & anyone interested in becoming a part of the Seed Movement. Learn with the experts. Gain the essential skills you need to harvest & process seed. Learn the fundamentals of plant breeding & propagation. Receive the step-by step tools, strategies & inspired vision required to start or upgrade a seed business, or implement a seed system to you farm or homestead. Meet & network with your bioregional neighbors to optimize results. The Seed Academy’s mission is to increase network capacity, collaboration & synergy in the Seed Freedom Movement in the Rogue Bioregion & beyond. Course will include deep dives into whole systems, permaculture, regenerative agriculture, and solutions oriented action steps.

While this course focuses on Reproductive Biology in plants and the related seed saving science, we also delve into whole systems permaculture and pattern literacy to illuminate how central seeds are to human civilization. Many people leave this course transformed, inspired and energized!

WHEN: 3 day Event begins Friday, May 30 @ 9:00am and runs through Sunday, 6/1 at 4pm. The event is 9 am through 6pm with dinner to follow and a more open, salon type format after dinner. People traveling from out of town can arrive Thursday eve to set up camp.

WHAT: We invite you to join us for a 3 day intensive training in seed saving, basic botany, reproductive biology in plants, understanding selection, planting seeds, soil mixes, seed germination, isolation, crossing, seed libraries, seed storage, germination tests and much more. Don Tipping is the lead instructor who brings over 30 years experience in organic farming, seeds, permaculture and enthusiastic on-farm education. The Seed Academy is much more than a simple "seed saving" course, but rather a deep dive into whole systems theory and management and an immersive experience in a mature Permaculture Farm site.

WHO: Gardeners, farmers, permaculturalists, homesteaders, those interested in starting a neighborhood seed library or seed bank, those interested in stewarding and preserving heirloom varieties, and all who see growing and saving seed as a wonderful way to grow a positive future. No prior experience is necessary, however, some gardening familiarity will be helpful.

HOW: includes delicious organic meals from the farm, camping, showers, instruction, handouts, field trips and a deeply nourishing dive into co-creating regenerative culture.Breakfast ingredients are provided but done self serve (or group coordinated) in our Seed Barn, whereas lunch and dinner will be spectacular farm based catered meals. In order to support local growers who envision themselves becoming part of a local seed production network. If you are traveling from out of the area and would like to camp on Thursday (5/29) night please email don@siskiyouseeds.com to pre-arrange that. Or if you'd prefer to do an Air BnB there are some in Williams HERE.

Course Fees: Full Price - $650 (if able to pay the full price you enable us to welcome more people through scholarships.) Includes instruction, tours, excellent organic meals and camping. No refunds.

Early Bird Discount (until 5/10/25) - $550

Farm Tour only: Friday, 5/30/25, 9am - 12pm. - $40 (tour is included in full course registration)

*please note that we do not offer refunds.

SCHOLARSHIPS: No one turned away for lack of funds. We offer a limited amount of scholarship opportunities. We welcome help with course logistics. The hope is to eliminate any barrier for folks who want to participate. Please send an email sharing a bit about why attending this course will benefit your journey to become a seed steward to don@siskiyouseeds.com to apply.

VISION: The journey with connecting more deeply with seeds as a source point of life begins with seed saving, then progresses to seed growing on a farm or garden preservation scale. The master level is seed stewardship, cultivating a deep relationship with the species and all of its potential for bioregional adaptation to climate, pests, disease and agronomic & culinary preferences.

We visualize interconnected Community Seed Hubs that are capable of doing breeding, selection, stewardship and improvement that work with bioregional centers that can do finish cleaning, climate controlled storage, marketing and distribution of high quality, open-pollinated organic seeds. In this way we can co-create a sustainable seed system that will support organic food production for local markets and resilient local food systems. Siskiyou Seeds is striving towards providing a Community Seed Hub for the Rogue Valley. We are partnering with the following non-profits Our Family Farms, Southern Oregon Seed Growers Association and other seed freedom organizations.

Reccomended Reading before or after:

Seed To Seed, by Susan Ashworth

The Organic Seed Grower, by John Navazio

The Seed Garden, Jared Zystro & Miceala Colley

Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond

Where Our Food Comes From, Gary Nabham

Garden Seed Inventory, Seed Savers Exchange

Return to Resistance, by Roaul Robinson

Bred Your Own Vegetable Varieties, Carol Deppe

Shattering, Cary Fowler

Plants & People, & Seed to Civilization, Charles Heiser

Here is a he syllabus from a previous course and this years will be similar:

Thursday

5:00-6:30 pm Arrival for out of town folks (camp set up)

7:00 pm Potluck

Friday

7:30-9:00 am Breakfast in the Barn

9:00am – 1:00 pm Farm Tour (meet in front of farm house)

1:00 – 2:00 pm LUNCH

2:00 – 2:30 pm Participant Intros & Goals

2:30 – 3:15 pm Botany ID in Flowers exercise

3:15 – 3:30 pm BREAK

3:30 – 4:15 pm Evolution of Reproductive Biology in Plants

4:15 – 6:00 pm Hands on observation in field of pollinators

& Identifying phenotypes in Butter lettuce trial

6:00 – 6:30 pm Considerations in growing plants to seed, planning, spacing, life cycle

6:30- 7:30 pm DINNER

7:30 - 9:00 pm Jessica Plancich Facilitates seed coaching session

Saturday,

7:30 - 9:00 am Breakfast in the Barn

9:00 – 9:15 am Meetup and ‘Ah Ha’ circle

9:15- 10:00 am Activity – Greenhouse Propagation & Perennial plant propagation / seed

10:00 – 10:45 am Seed industry history

10:45-11:00 am Break

11:00 – 12:00 pm Designing and planting variety trials & field walk

12:00 – 1:00 pm Heirloom biodiversity preservation & ongoing process of domestication

1:00 – 2:00 pm LUNCH

2:00 – 3:00 pm Hands on Corn Selection & Shelling (outside Barn)

3:00 – 3:45 pm Seed Cleaning & Storage

3:45 – 4:00 pm BREAK

4:00 – 4:45 pm Isolations & cross pollination (slide show in barn)

4:45 – 6:00 pm Field Exercise – making selections / roguing

6:00 – 6:45 pm Varietal maintenance, grexes

7:00 - 9:00 pm DINNER – Cob Oven Pizza Party

9:00 pm Optional Seed Luminaries videos – Luther Burbank, Winnona laDuke,

Dr. Alan “Mushroom” Kapuler

Sunday

7:30 - 9:00 am Breakfast in the Barn

9:00 -9:15 am Meetup and ‘Ah Ha’ circle

9:15 – 10:00 am Slide Show of Vegetable Families and Species

10:00 – 10:45am Seed production integrated into enterprise, staking functions

10:45 – 11:00am Break

11:00 am – noon Basic plant breeding Backcrossing, populations, selection, Introduction to genetics, Genes, traits, inheritance, inbreeding, hybrids

Noon – 1:00 pm Seed Cleaning hands on

1:00 – 2:00 pm LUNCH

2:00 – 2:45 pm Seed enterprise, wholesale, retail, cooperatives, libraries & more

2:45 pm – 3:30 pm World Café style: Activity: Designing regenerative seed systems

3:30 – 4:00 pm Wrap up and feedback

4:00 pm Break down camp and depart