Mountain Run Permaculture

It’s lineup launch day! Visit www.mountainrunjam.com and get your tickets now!

Thank you to Doug Reid for the graphic design!

Sign up for Great Day Gardens CSA (and for our eggs)!

We’ve got a great lineup of educational events planned this year. Visit www.mountainrunpermaculture.com/events to learn more, and follow Mountain Run Jam to stay in the know about our annual celebration of agriculture and the arts!

Events from October 4 – March 30 – Regenerative Agriculture, Farm & Homestead, Permaculture Designer in Virginia 30 March Grafting 101Grafting 101Date March 30, 2024Time 12:00 pm - 5:00 pmLearn how to propagate your own fruit treesMore Info

A friend came for a visit earlier this week and captured our family doing chicken chores. Check out our Cyber Coop highlights on Instagram if you’re interested in the build of our hen house, and head on over to , or to buy our non-GMO, pastured eggs! We are also excited to be working with again this year to provide eggs for their CSA. So many ways to shop local and support small farmers around here!

Shout out to for the pictures and for packing many of this week’s eggs!

Self-seeded Asian cabbage 🥬🤙🏼

is right around the corner! We have a limited supply of weekend passes still available. Be sure to browse through our website to see all that will be offered this year. There will be over 50 opportunities to learn something new, over a dozen bands throughout the weekend, an artisan market featuring our local craftspeople, and four local food options! Oh, AND it’s a full moon weekend. The best Jams have been under a full moon 🌕 hope to see you there!

Really learning to love summer apples like this Duchess of Oldenberg. I took the last few and made a tangy applesauce to put on our weekly sourdough waffles. Such a treat to pick apples in June/July. Definitely gonna be propagating more of this.

Join us next weekend for a deep dive on composting, soil biology and health. This class will be more than a simple demonstration of how to make high quality compost with ease as we tackle a range of subjects regarding soil health, plant health and nutrient-density. We'll have a mix of class time and hands-on activities, including how to measure compost or soil biological health, how to use a microscope to observe the life in soil, and of course, how to make the compost.

We hope you'll join us!

Composting, Uncomplicated - Mountain Run Permaculture | Virginia Regenerative Agriculture, Permaculture Design and Edible Landscaping The topic of composting is one that many people struggle with. With all of the expensive gizmos that can be purchased, all of the information on “hot” composting, “cold” composting, anaerobic versus aerobic, fungal vs. bacterial, it can be confusing to know which method will deliver the grea...

Our grafting class was a success! Cheers to 11 new enthusiastic apple propagators now released into the wild. Even more exciting, our beloved C-Town Red red fleshed apple will now live on across Virginia.

Catch you all again for 2024's grafting class.

Such a great CSA!! Sign on up!

2023 CSA Sign ups are live!

Our CSA* program allows you to enjoy locally grown, no-spray produce each week from May through October. Through our program you can support a family-owned, local business while maintaining a highly nutritious diet. Our CSA includes our own bread, vegetables and flowers while also supporting two other local farms who supply pastured meats and eggs.

*CSA: Community Supported Agriculture, CSA is a farm membership system that allows consumers to sign up to receive a season’s worth of a farm’s products over a number of weeks. Along with getting to enjoy fresh, delicious, and local food, being a CSA member is an excellent way to support and get to know your local farmers.
To sign up visit the link in our bio and click on CSA FARM SHARE!

Join us next month to learn the grayifying art of grafting. Learn how to use the grafting knife, select from a wide range of unique apples from our collection, take home your own grafting knife and 4 of your very own apple trees that you've grafted yourself.

For details and to register, hit the link in our bio.

First time headed out to do chores with Dad! For those who don’t know, we sell our pastured eggs through 🍳 Visit their website and head to to pick some up along with their pastured meats in Lynchburg or Forest!

Last Thursday we welcomed a son - Herb Alfred Angelini 🌿

On the docket for us: rest and recovery as we settle in as a family of four, preparation for a Holiday Market here on the farm on December 10th (hope to see you there!), and Mark is working in our new office space finishing up his current client projects, and tending our gardens and egg laying flocks in the mornings and evenings.

We’re imagining the year ahead and looking forward to winter by the wood stove, where dreams can take seed and clarity prevail.

A quick update since we’ve been quiet here lately!

Our teaching garden at the Bedford Area Family YMCA is really coming into its own. The medicinals in the food forest are thriving, and we’ve harvested gallons of blueberries with the kids over the past couple weeks. They have a great time competing to see who can fill their quart container first. 🫐

Two winner ice cream experiments.

Goumi reduction and vanilla

Sour cherry chocolate chip

Made with raw milk, cream, tons of egg yolks and nails syrup. Absolutely delicious and nutrient dense.

We got to visit the farm at Camp Trapezium this evening. Mark laid this site out a few years ago and the farm managers have done a great job implementing and maintaining the design. It’s so exciting to see the perennials coming into their own, to know elderberry beer is being made in the brewery, and to see the produce grown there on the menu. If you haven’t been to Camp Trapezium I’m Amherst, check it out! Delicious food, great people and a beautiful atmosphere. We highly recommend!

Only a month till the equinox and our hens are already rejoicing in the longer days.

This kid loves taking care of chickens, and she loves her pastured eggs!

Just had a great time - always fun to come here, see old friends and make some new ones!

Bringing in kale for dinner.

Our first pomegranate! We planted it in honor of Allison’s Granny Smith (her great grandmother who lived until 104 years old and had a garden and homestead in Newport News, VA).

Harvesting autumn olives and running up and down the landscape fabric.

Finalizing some details in this plan we've been working on over the past few months. Working with orchard crops, windbreaks, coppiced pole and fuel wood, small fruit production, savanna-style silvopasture and livestock integration. All organized using ideas from keyline design, permaculture and ecological design. Layered with principals of soil health, soil food web and the myriad of regenerative agriculture practices. This is the evolution of our work as consultants and designers, helping coach our clients into a novel way of stewarding their land and growing a livelihood.

Another goumi revelation...

We processed many gallons of frozen goumi fruit last week. Once it was strained into around 3 gallons of juice, I got the idea to reduce a portion if it down, the inspiration being pomegranate molasses. After several hours of boiling the roughly 1.5 gallons reduced to a quart of a luscious flavor packed light syrup, and once strained, this amazing umame rich pulp. It also seems the antioxidants have concentrated as well, as the color deepened. Overall it was an exciting discovery and something I'll be sure to do with future goumi harvests.

For my first use of this reduction I made some insanely delicious Japanese style pook belly. The tangy sweet flavor pairs perfectly with the rich pork belly.

Just spent an amazing week on the beach soaking in the sun, catching waves and wiggling our toes in the sand. We’re feeling rejuvenated and ready to get back to the farm for fall garden planting, orchard maintenance, that chicken egg grind, etc! Grateful to Allison’s parents for the vacation!

This evening we celebrated 15 months with Ila Mae by stopping by the farm kids lemongrass tea stand, taking this photo, and dipping in Reed Creek. Time is flying, as they always said it would. Life goes fast when you’re measuring it by the growth of a child. 🌻

Really excited for this workshop coming up next month. Get your ticket now through the link in our bio.

Reposted from Tickets are now on sale for our first ReSkill workshop intensive: 'Successful Self-Reliance' (Aug. 21 and 28) with of . Sponsored by the .ymca .

Learn lifelong practices and principles for producing nutrient-dense foods and a more resilient garden, homestead, or farm.

Become a practical problem-solver during this 2-day (Aug. 21 & 28) hands-on intensive where we’ll explore the principles and practices within 8 key topic areas—helping you to grow a more resilient garden, homestead, or farm. We’ll meld hands-on practical skills with core concepts and principals within the context of the Bedford Area Family YMCA teaching garden. Whether you’re a novice or seasoned gardener, we’ll present novel thought processes and techniques to help you overcome challenges and achieve success on your journey of self-reliance.

The workshop includes 2 days of information-packed and hands-on learning as well as a curated hand-out packet with resources for each topic area. Spots are limited so don't wait to register.

We are so excited to launch information for this years Mountain Run Jam! Get your early bird weekend passes now! Looking forward to having you on the farm this fall!