Our foraging classes and herbal medicine courses give you the knowledge and skills to gather wild plants safely and sustainably. When you’re out on a hike, you’ll be able to gather tasty treats for your supper. Additionally, you’ll know how to harvest herbs to support vibrant health. You can unravel your dependence on grocery stores and pharmaceutical companies. Learning to forage for food and medicine will empower you to care for your own body, in deep connection with the natural world.
Foraging classes reveal the richness of the wilds.
Herbal medicine courses teach you the ancient healing wisdom of the plants.
In-person Classes
Women's Basic Carpentry
This class is intended to get ladies up-to-speed on basic building skills, working with wood, and using hand tools as well as power tools. Focus is placed on ... creating a safe, comfortable, relaxed and fun learning environment in which students with beginning to intermediate skill levels can thrive. Trans welcome.
Choose a 2025 session:
- Apr 3-6,
- Apr 24-27,
- May 15-18,
- Jun 2-5 or
- Jul 24-27
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Tiny House Building Workshop
Gain the skills you need to build your own tiny house from local, natural, or conventional materials. Tour beautifully crafted tiny houses and natural buildings, ... learn about each stage of building from expert lectures, experience hands-on learning as we build a tiny house from scratch, plus get lifetime access to extensive online video library
Choose a 2025 session:
- Apr 28 to May 7,
- May 22-31 or
- Jun 19-28
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Foraging and Medicinal Herbs Course
Identify and wild forage medicinal plants in the Appalachian mountains. Learn to make medicine and cultivate herbs in your garden. Make ... and take home herbal salves, tinctures, flower essences, decoctions, cough syrups, herbal liqueurs, oxymels and vinegars.
- May 8-11
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Timber Framing Class
Learn how to lay out, measure, cut, fit, assemble, and raise a 16' by 20' timber-framed building through demos and hands-on practice. This class is appropriate ... whether you are an experienced carpenter, backyard deck builder, or excited beginner who just has a knack for craft.
- Jun 14-21
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Women’s Rewilding Retreat
Gather with other women for a long weekend of connection, learning, and rewilding. Basketry, medicine making, cheese and soap ... making, wild foods cookery, friction fire, and more In the mountains near Asheville, NC.
- May 28 to Jun 1
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4-Month Carpentry Program
Get confident building for yourself and others. Our hands-on carpentry program is non-residential and takes place at Wild Abundance, located near Asheville, NC. It’s ... appropriate for beginning to intermediate level builders; no experience is necessary, just enthusiasm and a willingness to learn by doing. If you do have experience, there will be plenty of depth and advanced skills to dive into.
Choose a 2025 session:
- Mar 11 to Jul 2 or
- Jul 22 to Nov 20
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Adult Beginner Woodworking Class
Get deep satisfaction from learning carpentry In a culture that’s zooming toward virtual reality and digitizing the day-to-day, not everyone grows up learning ... how to use tools and work with their hands. Our woodworking class for beginners and folks who have used tools, but don’t feel totally comfortable with them is here to change that. No matter your lifestyle, you surely interact with physical objects like shelves, chairs, tables. Learning carpentry can be rewarding and satisfying whether you want to build for yourself, feel confident fixing things around the house, or interacting with folks you hire in a confident way
- Sep 26-29, 2024
- Monthly or one time payment options available
- Secure checkout
- Flexible refund policy
- Sliding scale pricing based on income
Gardening and Permaculture Apprenticeship
Learn to grow vegetables and tend food forests in this one-day-per-week program that spans an entire growing ... season. Non-residential permaculture apprenticeship.
- Mar 19 to Nov 19
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Permaculture Design Certificate Course
This permaculture class empowers students to become effective ecological designers and planners. You will ... come out of this class with deep knowledge about creating forest gardens, ecology, permaculture principles, plant species and variety choices, holistic forestry, and more.
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Online Classes
Foraging classes help you discover delicacies growing right outside your door!
Plants are fascinating and full of richness. That’s why we love sharing our wisdom about them while exploring wild places together. As soon as springtime warms up, you’ll find us gathering and nibbling tasty plants every moment that we’re outdoors. You see, foraging for wild foods is super satisfying, not to mention delicious.
It’s taken us many years to get to know the wide array of edible plants in North Carolina that grow here in Southern Appalachia. We’re delighted to share that experience with you. As a result, you, too, can enjoy the flavors of the wild.
Throughout the growing season, we weave wild foods harvesting and cookery into our Immersive Permaculture Design Certificate Course. During this eight-month program (one weekend per month), we share our knowledge of wild plants with students through the seasons. In addition, we teach about the roles of the wild edges of our homesteads and gardens. That’s because when we know how to identify and work with edible weeds, they transform from a bother to a boon! In essence, observing the nature of wild plants can help us plan our gardens in harmony with nature. Our foraging classes let us see the patterns in nature that build the foundation of permaculture.
Herbal medicine courses empower you to heal yourself and your community.
The healthcare system in this country is failing, but we can take our health into our own hands. Participating in an herbal medicine course gives you the power to make and use your own natural medicine.
Herbs are fantastic for both preventative health and for treating disease and imbalances. Our wildcrafting class teaches how to make lots of common herbal preparations, so you can fill your medicine chest. It also covers cultivation and harvesting of many common medicinal herbs that are accessible to everyone.
Carrying the healing wisdom of plants has traditionally been a role held by women. As we explore rewilding for women, we incorporate medicine making and herbal healing. This is an herbal medicine course that goes beyond the how and what of using herbs. It connects with the deeper aspects of the human relationship with plants.
What better place to learn about plants than the lush, temperate rainforest near Asheville, NC?
There are lots of reasons people come to visit Asheville. Our home is one of the most naturally beautiful and biodiverse regions in the temperate world. If you’re looking for foraging classes, hardly anywhere could be better. You’ll find tasty treats in the wilds here nearly year-round, including choice edible mushrooms like morels. If you’re interested in herbal medicine courses, this area is not only a hotbed of medicinal plants (some rare or endemic), but also a gathering place for herbalists. Our instructors truly love plants and share their knowledge freely in a clear, inspiring, funny and engaging manner.
We look forward to exploring the green world with you!