Becoming A Bioregional Herbalist - Tucson
Spring in the Sonoran Desert
with bioregional herbalist, John Slattery
Catalina State Park, AZ
March 14-16, 2025
*Camping available at Catalina State Park
Workshop fee - $495
*Limited Space Available
Early Bird Price - $444
What to Expect
Learn to Identify Wild Plants for Healing
Learn to appreciate that sacred relationship of People, Place, & Plant
Learn key features of these plants so you can confirm ID
Learn how to gather plants and make your own remedies
Learn how to connect more deeply with wild plants so you can learn FROM plants
Learn to observe the landscape and the seasons to bring in more context
Receive experienced guidance to cut through doubt and confusion while learning to follow your own senses
Deeper your personal relationship with the landscape and the plants
Where should one go to learn about plants for healing, but to the plants themselves!
Learning about desert plants as food or medicine is part of an ancient pathway. Like many other ancient practices, it has become new again. Fortunately, this practice is a way back to our true selves, one which promotes insights, knowledge and care of self, and enlivens within us integrity and compassion.
I call it bioregional herbalism. It’s not just about learning the facts of the natural world around you - it’s about relationship. Taking time to observe, listen, and contemplate, learning grows from a natural fountain of inspiration. Learning to embrace this practice is a way of coming home.
If you are called to develop relationship with the plants around you for healing, but unsure how to begin, then this workshop is just for you.
If you are attracted to the idea of Vitalism and would like to learn more, then this workshop is for you.
Also, if you have been gathering knowledge about the plants around you, but would like to go deeper, this workshop is also for you.
In this 3-day field study we will explore the fundamental aspects of becoming a bioregional herbalist: developing relationship with place and the plants within it. This endeavor leads us to explore many subjects including, the study of field botany, respectful wildcrafting and participation with our environment, plant energetics, landscape observation, developing and exercising the senses (particularly the feeling sense), discussion of making herbal remedies, and applying these remedies for well-being and healing utilizing our knowledge acquired from the land and the elements.
We’ll touch on several key areas of bioregional herbalism in this workshop as we learn to follow the lessons set before us. I, as your guide and facilitator, seek to embark on a path of integrity that is challenging, enlightening, and revitalizing for all who participate.
In times of uncertainty, the embrace of Mother Nature can remind us of who we truly are and who we are meant to be. The deeper healing potential of plants can be realized through direct relationship and interaction with these vital beings. To feel ourselves resonate with the living energy of the plants is where healing truly flourishes.
Deep connection through continued observation is the foundation for a bioregional herbalist. Knowledge is derived from experience, and wisdom through continued practice and observation of Nature (people, place, and plants). Learning about the plants found naturally occurring around us, in their natural habitat, begins to deepen our relationship to place. Little by little, patterns begin to emerge which inform us as to how we can utilize plants for medicine.
What you’ll Experience in this Workshop
In this workshop we’ll also explore the core concepts of plant energetics while experiencing them directly through the plants we study. Experiencing the plants in their natural setting, while rooted in these fundamental concepts, and consuming small amounts of herbal tinctures and teas, in context, allows one to acquire this knowledge readily.
We will walk through the desert stopping to look closely and engage with plants, sometimes sitting for an hour or more with one plant. Although we will be hiking this is not vigorous hiking and our aim is not to cover long distances. We are showing up to be present with the plants and with ourselves.
The exercises in this workshop will introduce the participant to a method of learning which is empowering, distinctly individualized, unusually contextual, and highly experiential.
Participants come away from these experiences appreciating plants in a whole new way, even when they already had a deep appreciation for plants.
Following are select comments from a previous participant:
John is breathing new life into an ancient way of engaging with plants. What seemingly begins as an outward exploration of the local bioregion, quickly becomes a profound study of the internal landscape, of one’s own capacity to be in dialogue with the intelligent, living medicines of the green world. John reawakens in each of us, our own ability to receive wisdom directly from the source- from the plants themselves- through his invitation into stillness, an open heart, the body’s felt sense, and other subtle impressions.
Join me for this intensive workshop to begin to transform your approach to working with plants. Starting in your own backyard you can become a master of the wild plants that grow within arm’s reach. Then begin to branch out with the basic principles and practices learned in this workshop to continually learn more about your local environment including unique ways to apply the herbal remedies you learn about in this workshop. Becoming equipped with a hands-on approach to learning about plants in the field can open up many opportunities for gaining unique knowledge about the plants growing around you.
Overnight camping is optional. Please indicate upon receipt of meeting details by replying to the email. Additional fees due for camping.
A list of what to bring will be sent upon registration.
John J Slattery LLC
Bioregional Herbalist
Tucson, AZ
© 2016-2025
www.johnjslattery.com