Two-Day Short Course:Woody Agriculture: Theory and Hazelnut Practices

Thinking about attending? See what previous attendees have to say about it!"Your course is an excellent educational opportunity and well worth the time and money."

Eagle Bluff Environmental Learning Center, Lanesboro, MN
March 31-April 1, 2012

For a quick rundown, and for something to post for others who might be interested, please see the 2012 Short Course flyer.

Please note: while the classes themselves are only on Saturday and Sunday, it is strongly recommended that you show up on Friday evening to get acquainted with your instructors and classmates, and the on-farm class/tour on Monday is a valuable experience.

While much of the content and format will be similar to the 2011 short course, there will be some changes, and the newest research results are of course new every year! A tentative syllabus is posted below and will be updated as it is developed. This year, we may shedule concurrent classes for the first time; another good reason to bring a friend!

The order form and pricing at the bottom of the page are correct- you can lock in your early-bird rate now!

We highly recommend getting there on Friday night— there is no extra fee for it this year. The two days we have available are none too long; we're going to be cramming at least a semester's worth of information into this course. Our first meal is breakfast on Saturday (or possibly supper on Friday, TBA), and our first class will start on Saturday at 9 AM. At the moment, it's not clear whether we will be having classes after the evening meal on Saturday or not; if we really need the time, we'll try. Last class should end at 4 PM Sunday. There will be additional in-field instruction at Badgersett Farm on Monday for the morning at least(weather permitting), the focus of which will depend on those who can attend.

The accommodations at Eagle Bluff were primarily designed as school "dormitories", with each room having 2 bunk beds. Photos can be found here. You can find more general information about the facility at the Eagle Bluff Environmental Learning Center home page.

Since most of their clientele arrive in school buses, Eagle Bluff does not have a regular commercial bus service. Please email us if you need help getting there. We are also limited, but we'll do our best to help out here. In past years we've had a number of people flying into or coming down from Minneapolis/St. Paul; we'll try to put you in touch with each other, at the least.

You can refer to Eagle Bluff's directions for maps and instructions for how to get there. Alternatively, detailed directions can be found at these two places: MapQuest or Google Maps.

Basically, Eagle Bluff is on the road (County 8) between Lanesboro and Fountain. Signs directing to Eagle Bluff are good and fairly hard to miss. If you've never been there before, however, it would be good to allow a little extra time to find it.

If this were a formal university class, these would be "required reading". Please do make an effort to read what you can, as it will speed the classes considerably.

On the Badgersett Website:

• Reducing Greenhouse CO2 Through Shifting Staples Production To Woody Plants
• Woody Agriculture: Increased Carbon Fixation and Co-Production of Food and Fuel
• Badgersett Plantings, Projects, and Goals
• Philip Rutter's C.V. and publications: for those of you who are not familiar with me
• Brandon Rutter's C.V. and Why.

Highly Recommended:

• Smith, J. Russell. 1987. Tree Crops: A Permanent Agriculture. Washington, DC: Island Press. This should be available in most university libraries.
• Rosenzweig, Michael, 2003. Win-Win Ecology: How the Earth's Species Can Survive in the Midst of Human Enterprise. New York: Oxford University Press. Go to the Win-Win Ecology website.

State-of-the-art material is presented in each section with updates every year; sections entirely new to the course are marked as NEW! The whole schedule is tentative at this point, but particularly tentative sections are also marked- let us know which ones you'd most like to hear.

Day 1: Classes will start with Woody Agriculture theory and progress to details of establishment and planning, primarily focussing on hazels:

• Woody Agriculture Introduction: Theory and Energetics: Why; and How
• Basic Hazel Biology—plant morphology, physiology, genetics, species ecology
• Chestnuts, Hickories, and Others
• The Badgersett Hazel Breeding Program - Specifics on Cycles 1 through 4, with the math.
• Establishment— site selection, planting, and weed control
• Life Cycle Hazel Spacing— with effects on yield and long-term management

Day 2: The detail continues, with fertilization, pest management, marketing and sales:

• Fertilizing— how to assess and optimize hazel fertility
• Harvest and Post Harvest—NEW!now including machine harvest results ripeness assessment, state of the art hand harvest techniques and machine development
• Pest Management in Detail—mammals, birds, insects, plants and fungi
• NEW! Propagation Update; Dr. Sue Weigrefe. High and low tech—involving examination of actual plants in class, and including our proprietary on-farm cloning method.
• TENTATIVE Coppice— important details of this field renovation practice
• TENTATIVE Nut Quality faults, sorting, grading for sales
• Marketing Including specifics on creating markets for new products.

It is not recommended to attend only one day.

Weather permitting, those who can stay for the Monday following the course will be invited to tour the plantings at Badgersett Farm for informal observation and discussions. In the last couple of years this has included some formal propagation training, even in the rain!

Philip A. Rutter, MS

Founder, Badgersett Research Corporation
Founding President, The American Chestnut Foundation
Past President, Northern Nut Growers Association

Mr. Rutter created the concept and coined the phrase "Woody Agriculture", and he is the originator of the Accelerated Guided Evolution (AGE) breeding technique.

Research Associate, Badgersett Research Corp.

Chief Operating Officer, Badgersett Research Corp.

STILL at 2008 Prices!: $279 early bird registration received thru March 15; $309 after March 15

Includes 2 nights lodging (Friday and Saturday nights) and 6 meals, starting with supper on Friday. Sunday night lodging available for an additional $15.

Attendees will be required to fill out Eagle Bluff's Medical/Liability Release Form, available linked from their trip planning page.

For certain parts of the presentations, you will also need to sign our confidentiality agreement, which we will post here shortly.

To register by e-mail:
Copy this text order form into an e-mail to orders@badgersett.com (PayPal Verified), fill it out and send it. Once we have begun processing your registration, you will get an e-mail invoice from PayPal with instructions on how to pay.

Please note: Some businesses block PayPal e-mail. To avoid such problems, you may wish to use a personal e-mail address. Payment processing both at Badgersett and at PayPal can take a variable amount of time, but in most cases you should receive an invoice from our PayPal account within 2-7 days.

To order by mail:
Send fees and participant information (address/phone/email) to:

Badgersett Farm
Woody Agriculture Short Course
18606 Deer Road
Canton, MN 55922