This fieldtrip and symposium is for students, practitioners and teachers of the herbal arts. Our experienced guest specialists know, conserve and use plants.
Field Trip & Symposium Ticket Facts: You may select tickets for either the Friday Field Trip and Saturday Symposium or Saturday Symposium and Sunday Field Trip. One Field Trip is offered only to those who attend the Symposium. The same Field Trip is offered on two days this year to minimize our impact in the forest and to improve teacher-to-student ratio. Bus transportation to field trip destinations, picnic lunch and water will be provided. The woodland trails range from easy to moderately difficult. There is a short climb up a narrow trail over slippery rocks to get to the base of the water fall. The two mile hike back to the bus is uphill. Participation is limited to physically fit people who can walk independently for three miles on sloped, uneven terrain. Wear hiking shoes or boots. Walking stick and weather-appropriate apparel are recommended. The symposium will take place on Saturday. Bring a wrap to be comfortable in the air conditioning of the White Oak Theater.
Wild Herbal Field Trip & Medicinal Plant Symposium Schedule and Teacher Bios
Friday, May 13 (or Sunday, May 15), Wild Herbal Field Trip
8:00-8:45 Breakfast available at the Skillet Restaurant
8:45 White Oak Theater in the Visitor Center: Orientation
9:00-5:00 Wild Herbal Field Trip Destinations: City Rock Bluff, Rand City Park and Steele Falls Trail. Picnic Lunch Included
Saturday, May 14, Medicinal Plant Symposium (Required for Field Trip Participation)
8:00 Breakfast available at the Skillet Restaurant
Meet in the White Oak Theater inside the Visitor Center
9:00-9:15 Welcome Announcements
9:15-11:00 Native Medicinal Plants: Uses, Cultivation, Conservation, Connections and Ecology--Helen Lowe Metzman
11-11:30 Break
11:30-12:30 Using and Preserving Wild Foraged Foods--Bo Brown
12:30-1:30 Herbal Wild Luncheon (included in workshop fee)
1:30-2:00 Visit Plant Arbor with Heritage Herb Gardeners & Craft Village Perusing
2:00-3:00 The Medicinal Virtues of Violas—Herb of the Year 2022
Susan Belsinger
3:00-3:15 Break
3:15-4:15 North American Viola Species & Their Traditional Uses by Indigenous People
Kathleen Connole
4:15-5:00 Make a Viola Infusion for Your Own Apothecary
About Our Teachers
Helen Lowe Metzman: The nexus of natural history, ethnobotany, and environmental conservation has been a passion of mine since young adulthood. I have worked as a naturalist, artist, and an herbalist - specializing in medicinal plant gardening. As an educator and a prior Director of Jim Duke’s Green Farmacy Garden, I have taught humans’ long and evolving history with plant medicine ~ the traditional uses, current scientific research, gardening with the plants, and the urgency of plant conservation. While growing up, I was not exposed to the wisdom of herbal medicine but studied and deeply honored various cultures’ uses of native plants. As an elder now, I am committed to seeing that current and future generations learn to respect and to use all plant medicine with reverence ~ not only for themselves but also for the survival of the species and the biodiversity of ecosystems.
My bachelor's degree from The University of Vermont, Master's degree from Maryland University of Integrative Medicine, studying with prominent herbalists, and life in general have all been instrumental in my own experiential education on the use of plants as medicine. I am on the Board of Directors of United Plant Savers - a conservation organization devoted to the education and conservation of native medicinal plants, and on the board of the Friends of Patuxent - whose mission is to support the Patuxent Research Refuge in Laurel, MD.
Susan Belsinger teaches, lectures, and writes about gardening and cooking, and is a food writer, editor and photographer who has authored and edited over 25 books and hundreds of articles. Referred to as a “flavor artist”, Susan delights in kitchen alchemy—the blending of harmonious foods, herbs, and spices—to create real, delicious food, as well as libations, that nourish our bodies and spirits and titillate our senses. Susan is a member of the International Herb Association, the Herb Society of America and was Honorary President of the HSA for the 2018 to 2020 term. Check out her new video series Gathering and Preserving the Herbal Bounty for HSA’s online education: https://www.herbsociety.org/portal-log-in-page/on-line-education.html. Susan delights in each new herb of the year: doing research, growing the specimens, taking photos, creating recipes, sharing her findings and celebrating the plants. Look for the release of her upcoming book about flavor, The Perfect Bite, due out in 2022. Find Susan online at: www.susanbelsinger.com, https://www.instagram.com/cookinwithherbs/, https://www.facebook.com/susan.belsinger, and https://www.facebook.com/CreativeHerbalHome.
Bo Brown is a self-taught naturalist that has been teaching foraging and outdoor skills for over thirty years. He has worked as an avian field biologist since 1985, and is the founder and director of First Earth Wilderness School on the Niangua River in the Missouri Ozarks. Bo regularly leads courses on foraging, stone-age wilderness survival, and nature education throughout the Ozarks region, including weekly foraging walks and primitive skills demonstrations at Johnny Morris’ Dogwood Canyon Nature Park near Blue Eye, Missouri. His book Foraging the Ozarks was released by Falcon Guides in 2020, his second book Foraging Central Grasslands will be released in 2023. Follow his various outdoor activities at www.firstearth.org.
Kathleen Connole joined the Ozark Folk Center’s Heritage Herb Garden team in 2006. Before moving to Arkansas’ Buffalo River Country in 2005, Kathleen earned a degree in Plant Science from the University of Missouri-Columbia and worked at Powell Gardens and Farrand Farms in Kansas City, Missouri. As the Folk Center’s Horticulturist, Kathleen’s passion is to research the natural history of the Heritage Herb Garden’s diverse collection of plants. While on hiatus during Covid she has continued to contribute time as a volunteer, by composing interpretive signs for the Garden and working on Heritage Herb Garden programming. Kathleen served as chair of the Herb Society of America Ozark Unit, headquartered at the Ozark Folk Center State Park, and currently is secretary for the International Herb Association Board and is editor of Viola—Herb of the Year 2022.
Eric Fuselier is an Environmental Scientist in northwest Arkansas. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Environmental, Soil, and Water Science from the University of Arkansas, and a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from Louisiana Tech University. Eric has extensive knowledge of wetland science, soil science, and botany. From a young age, Eric Fuselier has enjoyed foraging edible plants from the wild with his parents. As an adult, Eric continued to study wild edible plants while spending extended lengths of time in the Ozark wilderness as an avid hiker and backpacker. In 2015, Eric founded Ozark Primitive Skills in order to help others reconnect with the natural world. For Eric, teaching people how to harvest their food directly from the wild is just one way to facilitate this reconnection. Eric serves as the president of the board of directors for the Ozark Natural Science Center where he also teaches foraging classes for the public. Eric also leads edible plant walks for the Arkansas Native Plant Society and for the City of Eureka Springs’ Parks & Recreation Department, and enjoys foraging food from the wild with his wife and two daughters.
Deb Voigt Jolly is a self-taught naturalist, herbalist, and photographer who finds joy in each new discovery. She has hiked many miles in the Ozarks over the past 16 years since returning to Arkansas from coastal South Carolina. She is the Greenhouse Specialist at the Ozark Folk Center State Park and a member of the Heritage Herb Garden team. Deb serves as vice chair of the Herb Society of America, Ozark Unit. Her photographs have appeared in the Stone County Leader and in two of the International Herb Association’s Herb of the Year™ Books. You can see some of her photos in Bo Brown's field guide, Foraging the Ozarks on Saturday.
Tina Marie Wilcox has been the head gardener and herbalist at the Ozark Folk Center State Park’s Heritage Herb Garden in Mountain View, Arkansas since 1984. She cultivates the gardens, coordinates annual herb events and facilitates the production of herb seeds and plants for the park. She co-authored the reference book, the creative herbal home with Susan Belsinger. She is known, nationwide, as an entertaining and enlightening herbal educator.
Tina's philosophy is based upon experiencing the joy of the process, perpetrating no harm and understanding life through play with plants and people.
