The morning Berkshire Botanical Garden program with orchard health expert Michael Phillips will have participants embracing a whole new way of thinking about growing fruit holistically, as well as understanding the principles and practices for growing healthy fruit. The afternoon session will be an offsite field study in a home orchard, where the instructor will conduct an orchard evaluation and discuss how major insect challenges can be resolved safely and organically. He will discuss how to deal with disease from a holistic perspective, so that challenges faced at your locale will become far more manageable, as you build a system that keeps trees healthy from the get-go. Pruning for fruit production will be demonstrated.
Michael Phillips is known across the country for helping people grow healthy apples and understand the healing virtues of plant medicines. He helped found a “community orchard movement†that provides a full immersion into the holistic approach to orcharding (www.GrowOrganicApples.com). His Lost Nation Orchard has two acres of trees and supplies local families with many varieties of organic apples. The program takes place Friday, March 8, from 9 – 4, and is $150. You may register on line at www.berkshirebotanical.org.
