rivers & roots
WELCOME! If you are here, you probably have an interest in plants, foraging, mushrooms, and feeling close to the Earth. Perhaps you love the idea of bypassing the grocery store and the pharmacy, and even the health food store, by harvesting your foods and medicines directly from the land. Perhaps you relish the companionship and community of learning with others
on this path. An ancient calling is beckoning; a birthright and birth-responsibility to joyfully engage with the Earth through food, medicine, and so much more!! We look forward to walking this path with you.
What We Do
Our primary focus is sharing our love of foraging the local environment for food, drinks, herbal and mushroom medicines, probiotic ferments, wild beers and wines, as well as traditional plant "resources" such as natural dyes, baskets, fibres, and other delights! Our approach to the land is gracious, playful, and filled with gratitude and awe, and often infused with tracking, bird watching, and opportunistic nature mysteries!
Where Do We Do It?
Most of our meetings will be at our homestead just north of Wakefield Qc, 30 minutes north of Ottawa, at 507 ch. Shouldice. Some of our foraging forays will be in wild and not so wild places in the Ottawa/Gatineau area.
We look forward to meeting you!
Pierre Blin, (BA Outdoor and Experiential Education, Queens University) Director and main instructor of Rivers and Roots.
Pierre was raised in the suburbs of Toronto by French and English parents. He represents the original French and English settlers who came but never quite learned how to live here gracefully. Figuring this all out has nurtured a life-long fascination with nature, ancestral skills and ways, and aboriginal culture and wisdom. He has studied with wildfood, foraging and herbalology with masters, such as Sam Thayer, Abrah Arneson, and Joe Pitawanakwat. He has studied wilderness and
nature mentoring skills with Jon Young, Mors Kochanski, RIcardo Sierra, and many others, as well as countless hours of self study.
Pierre has been teaching wilderness skills through camps and education centres for over 20 years. He has built three birchbark canoes, one of which is currently on display at Kawartha Outdoor Education Centre.