The Comox Valley Growers and Seed Savers are excited to present:
- The Comox Valley Community Seed Bank is now in its second year. Join long-time seed savers
Vivien Adams
and 
Ellen Rainwalker to hear about out what the Seed Bank is doing, why it’s important for food security, and how you can get involved.. 10:30 @ Muir Gallery
Chanchal Cabrera: Grow Your Own First Aid Kit – With a small garden, or even a patio or sunny balcony you can grow a wide variety of herbal medicines. Join medical herbalist and master gardener Chanchal Cabrera in this illustrated to explore growing, making medicinal teas and using herbs for health and healing. 11:15 @ Muir Gallery
Jonathan Schut: Permaculture Design – Jonathan Schut has gardened from coast to coast, and studied Ecological Gardening and Permaculture at Linnaea Farm on Cortes Island. At his home and through his business Budding Landscapes, his dream is creating gardens that are integrated, edible, gorgeous and sustainable. He lives with his partner and two boys in Dove Creek. Together they find great pleasure in feeding hand-picked slugs to their ducks. 12:30 @ Muir Gallery
Peter Bickel Janes: Perennial Edibles – Peter Janes is an orchardist and plant propagator from Denman Island. His brief 20 minute presentation will highlight some of the best practices and biggest hurdles in the cultivation of fruit and nut trees. His personal experiences and images are applicable to home yards, traditional orchards, and permaculturally-oriented food forests. He will also review some of the most successful and least appropriate edible perennials he’s observed in our bioregion in hopes of increasing the successes of local growers. 12:30 @ Muir Gallery-
Royann Petrell: Growing and Saving Bean Seeds Successfully On Vancouver Island – Using ecological engineering gardening principles, Dr. Petrell has produced edible bean pods and dried seeds for nearly 20 years. How, and what surprising and exciting results have surfaced will be discussed. 12:30 @ Rotary Hall
Thierry Vrain: The Gene Revolution – Thierry discusses the current status of GMO crops and how they were created; demystifying the genetic engineering process. He then reviews the literature and debunks Industry assertions that GMOs increase yields, reduce pesticides, are neutral to the environment, and are perfectly safe to eat. Thierry Vrain had a career as a soil biologist and a genetic engineer for 30 years. After retiring 10 years ago he settled in the Comox Valley with his wife Chanchal Cabrera where they are developing a healing and educational centre called Innisfree Farm. 13:45 @ Muir Gallery
Carolyn Herriot: Zero-Mile Living – Living the Good Life – We live on an island on an earthquake fault and 95% of our food comes onto the island in trucks on ferries. How will we all get fed if there is a disruption to the current food distribution system? Carolyn Herriot shares an inspiring vision for The Islands Diet. By bringing our food back home we can increase food security, create employment (new ‘gastro- economy’), improve our diet and health, and cool down the planet deliciously! 13:45 @ Rotary Hall
