Study permaculture online through Cornell University’s distance learning program.
Create a design portfolio based on your own project and complete all three of the courses from home to earn a Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC). Continue reading
Study permaculture online through Cornell University’s distance learning program.
Create a design portfolio based on your own project and complete all three of the courses from home to earn a Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC). Continue reading
Cayuta Sun Farm is proud to be a sponsor of the Permaculture Tour Weekend’s activities and we’re looking forward to hosting visitors. Our site has promoted permaculture for over a decade through community education events, including the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute’s courses.
We would like to support this celebration of our permaculture community and welcome out-of-town visitors. Rustic camping sites are open for reservations. A simple low-pressure water supply, hot shower, and composting toilets will be available. You will need to supply your own tent.
Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute alumni may stay for free.
Permaculture Weekend travelers are also welcome to book a campsite through HipCamp.com. If HipCamp reservations are sold out, please contact directly via email <Michael@CayutaSunFarm.com>. There may still be more camping space for this special occasion.
Cayuta Sun Farm is proud of our pastured poultry and pork and would like you to taste why. Upon arriving for the Sunday tour, make an order for our pork sausage meal. Better yet: Preorder! Last year we sold out quickly. Use this online form to buy in advance and be sure to enjoy a woodland-raised, heritage breed, pork lunch.
Enjoy your freshly grilled sausage and salad at a picnic table in the cool shade of our shiitake mushroom yard. We begin grilling at 11 a.m. Cold non-alcoholic drinks will also be sold.
You can make a deposit to reserve packages from a menu of meats we offer online for pickup on August 25th, 2019. If you don’t find what you are looking for online, ask us when you visit. We’ll have frozen pork and chicken for sale at the farm. Bring a cooler. We accept credit cards.
Sunday’s guided tours will be conducted in a continuous loop from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Join in at anytime but please register with your likely arrival time at the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute’s site. Led by Michael Burns, the presentation will highlight the development of a permaculture-inspired farmstead that has in recent years become a small woodland farm. Highlights include the octagonal classroom built of black locust logs with a reciprocal rafter roof, chickens and pigs raised on grass and under the canopy of trees, plus off-grid energy systems.
Michael will offer a short “Introduction to Permaculture” presentation at 9 a.m. Please register in advance.
A decade’s worth of permaculture students, teachers, and practitioners have passed through Cayuta Sun Farm working, learning, and connecting with others. We feel lucky to be part of it all, are proud of our local permaculture scene, and look forward to sharing the promise of permaculture and ecological design with all our guests this weekend. Please remember that your donations this weekend support the work of the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute which has been a keystone organization building the local and regional permaculture movement.
Visitors to Cayuta Sun Farm during the 5th Annual Finger Lakes Permaculture Permaculture Weekend are offered a morning “Introduction to Permaculture“ presentation, a pork sausage BBQ Lunch and tours of the farm.
If the weather and mycelium cooperate, shiitake mushrooms will be fruiting on the logs in our mushroom yard. Tour participants will be able to purchase by the pound mushrooms they harvest on their own.
In addition, a collection of local farms and vendors will be open for business from 10 am to 4 pm in a mini-farmers market. The line-up includes:
Cayuta Sun Farm is proud to be a sponsor of the Permaculture Tour Weekend’s activities and we’re looking forward to hosting visitors. Our site has promoted permaculture for over a decade through community education events, including the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute’s courses.
We would like to support this celebration of our permaculture community by opening up our woods to campers visiting from out of town. A limited number of rustic camping sites will be available Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. A simple low-pressure water supply, hot shower, and composting toilets will be available. You will need to supply your own tent. Coffee and tea will be available in the morning.
The nightly fee will be $20 per person or $50 per carload of visitors. Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute alumni and those willing to volunteer at least four hours during weekend’s events may stay for free.
All campers are encouraged to register using this form as soon as possible to ensure a campsite.
Cayuta Sun Farm is proud of our pastured poultry and pork and would like you to taste why. Upon arriving for the Sunday tour, make an order for our pork sausage meal.
Last year we sold out quickly. Use this online form to buy in advance and be sure to enjoy a woodland-raised, heritage breed, pork lunch. Your online purchase reserves your meal until 2 p.m.
Enjoy your freshly grilled sausage and salad at a picnic table in the cool shade of our shiitake mushroom yard. We begin grilling at 11 a.m. Cold non-alcoholic drinks will also be sold.
You can preorder from the menu of products we offer at The Food Forest Shop online. If you don’t find what you are looking for online, ask us when you visit. We’ll have products for sale at the farm as well. Bring a cooler. We accept credit cards.
Guided tours will be conducted in a continuous loop from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Join in at anytime but please register with your likely arrival time at the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute’s site. Led by Michael Burns, the presentation will highlight the development of a permaculture-inspired farmstead that has in recent years become a small woodland farm. Highlights include the octagonal classroom built of black locust logs with a reciprocal rafter roof, shiitake mushroom production, chickens and pigs raised on grass and under the canopy of trees, plus off-grid energy systems.
Michael will offer a short “Introduction to Permaculture“ presentation at 9 a.m. that includes the first tour of the day.
Local vendors will be offering their products at a pop-up farmers market on site. Check back soon for the full list of vendors. At this moment we have an apiary, baker, cheese maker, plant nursery, grass-fed beef farm and meadery confirmed.
A decade’s worth of permaculture students, teachers, and practitioners have passed through Cayuta Sun Farm working, learning, and connecting with others. We feel lucky to be part of it all, are proud of our local permaculture scene, and look forward to sharing the promise of permaculture and ecological design with all our guests this weekend. Please remember that your donations this weekend support the work of the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute which has been a keystone organization building the local and regional permaculture movement.
Michael Burns & Kelly Dietz created Cayuta Sun Farm to produce healthy food in an ecologicaly regenerative system. Permaculture is the central organizing framework of the farm. Learn permaculture with Michael and earn a Permaculture Design Certificate.
January 2020
Cultivate your ecological literacy by looking at complex symbiotic relationships in both natural and constructed systems. Explore and apply systems thinking to your own garden, farm, or backyard.
Learn permaculture while designing your own site.
This course is one of three in a series offered by Cornell University’s College of Life Sciences Extension and Outreach Program leading to a Permaculture Design Certificate issued by the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute. (Read more about Permaculture Design: Fundamentals of Ecological Design and Permaculture Design: Design Practicum.)
This course is designed by Steve Gabriel of “Farming the Woods” and Wellspring Forest Farm with Michael Burns of Cayuta Sun Farm. Both are cofounders of the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute. Michael Burns will be the course instructor.
Steve Gabriel and Michael Burns
Cayuta Sun Farm is proud to be a sponsor of the Permaculture Tour Weekend’s activities and we’re looking forward to hosting visitors. Our site has promoted permaculture for over a decade through community education events, including the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute’s courses.
Spend the weekend on a small forest farm.
We would like to support this celebration of our permaculture community by opening up our woods to campers visiting from out of town. A limited number of rustic camping sites will be available Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. A simple low-pressure water supply, hot shower, and composting toilets will be available. You will need to supply your own tent. Coffee and tea will be available in the morning.
The nightly fee will be $20 per person or $50 per carload of visitors. Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute alumni and those willing to volunteer at least four hours during weekend’s events may stay for free. All campers are encouraged to register using the form at the bottom of this post as soon as possible to ensure a campsite.
Enjoy a homegrown lunch.
Cayuta Sun Farm is proud of our pastured poultry and pork and would like you to taste why. Upon arriving for the Saturday tour, make an order for our pork sausage sandwich. Enjoy your freshly grilled Italian style sausage at a picnic table in the cool shade of our shiitake mushroom yard. We begin grilling at 11 a.m. Cold non-alcoholic drinks will also be sold.
Meet the farmer.
A guided tour will be conducted in a continuous loop from 9 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 3:30 p.m. Join in at anytime. Led by Michael Burns, the presentation will highlight the development of a permaculture-inspired farmstead that has in recent years become a small woodland farm. Highlights include the octagonal classroom built of black locust logs with a reciprocal rafter roof, shiitake mushroom production, chickens and pigs raised on grass and under the canopy of trees, plus off-grid energy systems.
A decade’s worth of permaculture students, teachers, and practitioners have passed through Cayuta Sun Farm working, learning, and connecting with others. We feel lucky to be part of it all, are proud of our local permaculture scene, and look forward to sharing the promise of permaculture and ecological design with all our guests this August 26th through the 28th.
Register to camp:
During nine afternoons and evenings this summer, teacher and farmer Michael Burns instructs farm apprentices and others in the basics of permaculture design. Presentations, activities and design work focus on specific goals and challenges of this 14-year old, off-grid farmstead as it transitions to a working forest farm.
Michael Burns has been teaching permaculture for over a decade and is a cofounder of the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute. He teaches permaculture at the high school and college level and with community-based organizations.
Hands-on: 2 – 4:30 p.m.
Students are welcome to come early to give labor in exchange for tuition. Our activities will demonstrate the implementation of permaculture design on the farm’s landscape. Hands-on students are not required to pay the evening class fee.
Potluck Dinner: 5 – 6 p.m.
All are welcome to bring food to share. A grill is available. Enjoy pork sausage from our farm!
Instruction: 6:30 – 8:30 p.m.
Learn a basic introduction to permaculture ethics, principles, design process and strategies. Mapping and activities will engage students in practical design for Cayuta Sun Farm, learning skills applicable to a wide variety of projects. Class fee: $20
CLASS TOPICS:
June 13: What is permaculture?
June 27: The Design Process & Scale of Permanence
July 18: Reading the Landscape: Mapping
July 25: Reading the Landscape: Vegetation
August 1: Water & Landform
August 15: Reading the Landscape: Access & Circulation
August 22: Reading the Landscape: Zones & Sectors
September 5: Creative Design
September 19: Regenerative Design
Registration
Send an RSVP by filling out the form below with your name, phone, email address and which dates you plan to attend. You are welcomed and encouraged to sign on and share our Facebook Event for these classes. However, use this form to ensure your registration.
At our farm we invite visitors to learn how we are using ecological design methods to build a small sustainable woodland farm. Be our guest and take part in any of the following activities:
If you are coming from out-of-town, and need a place to camp, feel free to contact us. We may be able to share our land for a few nights. There is a very rustic hot shower and composting toilets for visitors.
The weekend’s events start on Friday evening with a showing at 6 p.m. of the new permaculture film “Inhabit” that features local permaculture teacher Steve Gabriel of Wellspring Forest Farm. After the tours, all are invited to the Good Life Farm’s Cider house for a reception with food and live music. Learn about all these events at: http://fingerlakespermaculture.org/. You can also connect via Facebook for the tour and the movie.