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Great Big Ideas & Takeaways:
- The top 7 ways you can garden—and get paid!
- How to strategically add multiple streams of income to your property.
- Investing in agriscaping: how it can pay off.
- Tips for aligning your planting with growing market demand.
- Building a thriving home-based business that strengthens the local food economy.
- How to make hundreds of dollars giving tours of your property.
- New advances in micro-climate growing.
- Adding “productive pets” to your backyard.
- Networking to tap into local sales channels.
- The 3 trends pushing up the value of backyard food production.
About The Speaker:
Justin Rohner, founder of Agriscaping Technologies, has been helping people around the world grow their own healthy, fresh foods at home for more than 25 years. He is a passionate educator, artist, and entrepreneur who recently created a way to start sharing his sustainable gardening secrets with the world.
His professional enthusiasm centers around improving self-reliance, sustainable food systems, and family. And he was recently named one of Arizona’s Top 35 Entrepreneurs under 35 for his work improving local food access and sustainability via Agriscaping.com.
Justin lives in an HOA community in Gilbert, Arizona with his wife Britney, 4 kids, 20 chickens, quail, rabbits, fish, and a beautiful landscape full of food.
QUESTION: Have you added any additional income streams to your property? Did you get any new ideas, watching Justin’s presentation?
Justin Rohner
I enjoyed your seminar very much because
I have often wondered how to make the most of
the areas I have for gardening.
I have a swimming pool that takes 1/3 of the property and two big pecan trees that shade the rest of it in the back yard. I do however have several flower beds I can use for vegetables and one 15’X ’20 area that is full sun where I would like to garden. It is problematic however since it is at the end of my driveway and I have two cars that are parked there most of the time. I think the gasoline fumes will effect plant edibles. So I hesitate to plant food crops there.
What can you tell me about the effect of toxic fumes?
Appreciate your response.
Rebecca Trevino
Thank you for your comment and question Rebecca.
Yes, toxic fumes can be a problem if you are growing tender greens. In my front yard, next two my driveway I plant only woody-stemmed edibles within 3 feet of my exhaust pipes (like rosemarry, natal plum, gogi berry, White Oak trees) These plants are actually great at sequestering the carbon-based toxins and putting them to positive, recycled use. Outside of that three-foot filtering buffer, I grow just about anything edible 🙂
as a landscaper we don’t have many designers but I have built a pond with a long waterfall and long stream this year I acquired a few plants not having time I stuck them in the stream. fall is a good time to harvest.
Very interesting presentation. I didn’t know there was a term for what I wanted to do with the landscaping in my yard. Would the mastery program help me do a design and give me resources for getting help with installation?
When is the next mastery program and does the discount mentioned in the presentation apply to us now?
Thank you
Yes Susan, the Mastery program includes a whole section on DIY design as well as both instruction on self installation and connection to local pros if you need them. Also, YES, the discount mentioned still applies! 🙂
I open this through the latest email notification. Then I click NOT on the arrow in the middle of the photo but the one at the BOTTOM of the photo. I hope this helps you.
Is there a program that can assist in Grant/Funding attainment to start a larger Green House/ Winter Thermal gardening enterprise that you are aware of?
There are a number of Grants out there that clients of ours have used to get funding for cool Agriscpaing projects. Their availability depends on many factors including your organization type, location, affiliations, and professional background, just to name a few. I would recommend connecting with an experienced grant writer like Greg Hebert, who I spoke with earlier this week. You can reach out to him here: greg.kelseythomasllc@gmail.com
Here is a solution I saw mentioned earlier from Jimmerson that helped me… I switched to Chrome for my browser:
“Are you able to try an alternate web browser, such as Chrome? Please email me at jimerson at thegrownetwork.org if you still are not able to view the video and I’ll help you get it worked out!”
I hope that helps!
I went thru a permaculture course but didn’t get certified, would that count?
Anything you took within the permaculture universe will accelerate your progress through the Agriscaping coursework.
whwn i have trouble playing the videos, I restart them and they seem to play, also if you have other programs running at the same time this can cause the video to stop, I have had this problem to ,so I stopped other programs and they play ,hope this helps you
Thank you for your comment Trish. In part, I agree with you… it’s more “salesy” than I ever like to be but, I hope you see my deeper intention… to grow YOUR business as a Pro Gardener in whatever way I can and to help YOU get more clients and sales. The world needs more PRO gardeners.
Perfect! This is what I want to do when I grow up! Many brilliant insights, starting with “how fresh do YOU feel after travelling 1500 miles?”
Thanks,
Sam
Hi,
Loved your presentation! My question is are you using organic and/or bio-dynamic principles in your gardening? One of the reasons I have never been interested in a Master Gardening certification is their emphasis on knowing all about pesticides and herbicides and other “cides” which I strongly believe do not belong in a garden (actually, about anywhere!). Are you teaching environmentally and people safe methods? I also think that too many of the “green” technologies are maybe better for the environment but not better for people. Case in point-flourescent light bulbs).
Thanks, lots.
Yes, we like to call our approach “better than organic” and abide by a very bio-dynamic, naturally pesticide-free and sustainable form of elegantly high-intensity gardening.
And yes, we focus on on approaches that nourish both people and planet.
Hi im from mexico city, could i do the certification?, i already do money designin, instaling and teaching how to homegrow, alsow im starting my acuaponic sistem in my house so i could sell greens, i like very much your presentation and im very interested in your design software, i think it would take me to next level in my job
Absolutely Ralph! Once you learn, you are free to create wherever you live. Being in Mexico city, we already have been utilizing weather station data where you live to improve our garden planning and design software to align planting calendars for your region.
Great ideas Justin! What software do you use for your landscape designs?
Depending on the situation, I personally use a combination of Autodesk Sketchbook Pro, Revit, and Photoshop but allow our trainees to use whatever program they are most comfortable and professionally creative with.
Thank you for your presentation. I don’t mine one bit that “it’s more “salesy” than I ever like to be”! The fact that your business is trying to put together a viable infrastructure for local food is very exciting. Many of us can grow or design or teach but have no connections to market to those who are in need of what we have. If you can be successful the food insecurity of every city will decrease. Thank you!
Texas did not show on your map as having any activity in your network. Do you see that changing soon? I am off the I-35 corridor near Round Rock and Ceder Park and would love to see this used in the home owner associations of those areas and the local Sun City.
Thank you understanding our intention! You are absolutely right!
Yes, TEXAS actually has a good amount of activity now… Pros are now training from Dallas, Austin, and Houston with a number of students in San Antonio and El Paso as well.
For your immediate area.. It begins with you! 🙂
The presentation was obviously originally from an earlier time. Will new students have access to live training and feedback for the next three months or will that stop at the end of November as stated in the presentation?
Absolutely! Live feedback goes on for an entire year at least 🙂 Possibly forever.
How much time does the average homeowner need to spend to maintain one of your designed landscapes after it is established? Is it a doable option for the average family which now mows and waters once or so a week or is it only usable for people who are avid gardeners?
Great question Jean. The amount of time required to manage an Agriscape varies based on size of area and scope of edibles being grown. The key to the most time-efficient and profitable garden we found focuses on simple daily routines. For my kids (ages 5 to 13 who run our yard) they each spend between 15 and 30 minutes a day, 5 days a week in their respective zones. There is an additional 2 hours per week preparing harvest for market that leads to sales of roughly $3,000 per month.
If I were to be a weekend-warrior instead of daily, I would likely have to spend about a third more time each week to get the same result… cool part is, the more Certified pros their are out there, your Agriscape could easily afford to pay for regular help 🙂
$62.50/hour isn’t bad!
This is a good idea, and probably a profitable business (for Justin Rohner and his ‘agriscapers’). But I do not live in the USA … I can’t ask Justin to help me, and I think many of what he teaches doesn’t apply in this country (with different rules and regulations).
Where do you live Inge?
I used to live in Germany and understand there are vast differences in regulations from one country to the next. Here’s what I also know: If food can be purchased where you live and your local economy is vibrant enough where people pay for things like landscaping, design, education, maintenance, or harvesting services then at least one or more of the methods I shared CAN work where you live, especially if you are willing to help find the correct path for your area.
Where there are rules and regulations there are also paths to legality. Let the good ideas and inspiration begin to open doors to your own success!
I hope that helps 🙂
Thank you for your answer Justin. Today (Nov. 7) I happened to have a meeting with the coordination group of our community permaculture garden. An idea came up leading in a direction of a project somewhat like the ‘agriscapes’. Yes, we think also here (in the Netherlands, the country at the west side of Germany) something like that can be possible. So we want to start locally, first contacting the Town council, the housing corporations, the social workers, etc.
Probably the time is ripe …
Thank you for the inspiration.
Great presentation – very exciting! I live in south Florida. Are there local resources you can connect us to here? The plants we can grow and the growing season are very different than what they are in most of the country, but the principles would still apply.
Also, do the dates you stated in the presentation apply? In other words, it is already a week into November and it seemed like you were saying the program ends at Thanksgiving. Does that mean access is only good through then, or just the live training aspects?
Thanks!
Yes Mary! We have a growing support system in Florida and the next class cycle actually BEGINS after Thanksgiving, sorry for the confusion. Live aspects will continue through 2017. Apply now to join now, or later. 🙂
I don’t discount the 1500 notation about food, just it is only marginally relevant as far as cities go. What makes cities die resource wise is water. Rome of the classic period went from 1m to 10,000 once the aquaducts were destroyed.
I enjoyed the presentation regardless.
Thanks Johnmc, living in Phoenix, I certainly understand the need for the efficient, ecological, and sustainable management of water.
Brad Lancaster’s presentation addresses the water problem beautifully. Isn’t it great how the presentations complement each other?
If each city in the US adopted these two men’s ideas, there would be much less hunger and food insecurity in our nation. Add a few chickens in each household and there would be a revolution of change.
Hey Justin and Everyone!
…just thought I’d pop in here and say how fun it is to see such a great conversation happening 🙂
Justin’s Agriscape program is excellent – I highly recommend it!
Do you have any connections in Michigan?
We have students, but no Pros yet in Michigan. Lots going on in Normal Illinois though… we are just getting started!
We leased an acre of our land to a young farmer who planted vegetables and raised chickens for eggs. He was so enthusiastic until he encountered an insurance liability problem. Selling food to the public requires a huge liability coverage. It was so expensive he couldn’t afford it so had to abandon his plans to be a farmer. It was so sad to see his plans crushed all because of insurance. How do young start up farmers overcome this problem?
Great Question Suz! The problem you sitre is exactly why we created the Harvester Certification which aligns with the Utopian Harvest network which helps new growers/producers decrease the amount of liability they need to cover by sharing it with other local growers under one distribution family (www.UtopianHarvest.com) Ultimately, cost of insurance coverage varies widely by what you sell, where, and to whom. Best starting point? Sell THROUGH an organization like Utopian Harvest. 🙂
This seminar was just incredible! Justin covered so much in regards to populous city living and the need for more produce. I have given some thoughts to how I could create an income using my garden, so this seminar was right up my alley. I am glad there are businesses out there like Agriscaping that can help others make an income for themselves. Thanks Justin.
I would like to know more about the grey water tech. Can you recommend a website I could look at?
WOW!!!!! THANKS!!!!! HOW INSPIRING…..
Good information .. why did I not try these 20 years ago …
worse day to day. Get your “ducks” in a row instead of asking to change web browsers. What a bunch of quacks. Agree
Justin, this is truly a God-send to me. Agriscaping is the answer I have been looking for for over a year. I live in an Active Adult +55 community and I have been laboring over how to teach people how to grow food here and I would love to know how to use all the “landscaped” area in growing food and making our community more beautiful at the same time. I would like to do this Agriscaping project as a prototype for all communities of this type, not to mention there is a new elementary school going in one block away and I would dearly love to be able to get the “powers that be” to let me incorporate Agriscaping into their final design before paying thousands of tax-payer funds to “professional landscapers”. Thank you for the lead for a grant writer (Greg Hebert)and his contact info. I am in Houston, TX and look forward to meeting your agriscapers here. Bless you for putting out this information and I look forward to meeting you someday soon.
Justin & Marjory, I was at a presentation at Justin’s house about 5 years ago. He is living a permaculture advanced style. I recently retired and have a few years gardening, inspired by your tour and a few malabar spinach and other plants I purchased. Now I have a great permaculture style garden and want to teach others about what I have done. I just signed up with Agriscaping to become an educator. I have watched a lot of videos from this summit and a few others as well as many free ones on YouTube. I am always learning more about gardening, soil building, vermiculture, chickens, herbs, and all the great info available. Thanks for what you and the others are doing to help with the preparedness movements going on around the world. Selfreliance is important but so is working together as this summit showing. I bought into Agriscaping earlier and a few other peoples info and products because of this summit. It is all good.
Great presentation Justin!
I have a permaculture design certificate and have an edible landscaping business. Am I understanding you correctly that if I take the mastery course and get certified as a designer i can take advantage of the Agriscaping network to find clients? Better yet, the network will send clients my way?
Yes to both! Once once you are part of our Certification Training, we will connect you with our network in your area and even start directing marketing and education classes for your area to bring you more clients. With your experience, you can apply here: http://agriscaping.com/designer/
And will likely pass out of a few classes toward your design certification as you are already a pro!
Thanks for being available for personal questions, it really adds to the community side of things!
A question about the Utopian Harvest, how do you rate quality for different producers and does that quality rating tie into the sales of products? In other words does better quality product pay more than low quality?
I found this to be a big disappointment. I live in very rural Western Maine. All your suggestions applicable to a rural setting won’t work here or are not needed. Yes I see your deeper intention. You want us to pay you money in exchange for your training. For some of us, your talk is common knowledge and old school. There is a reason the pyramid principle is illegal and I feel this is exactly what you are proposing.
Wow John, Maine is a tough place to grow and I commend you for your courage to keep growing up there. I love that this is “old school” for you and encourage you to get out and share your expertise a little more! If we are to feed the world we need a lot more people doing this as a pro-level!
I’m also sorry for any misunderstanding this presentation might have sparked for you on how we work. No pyramid here.
I had a choice a few years ago to either franchise to keep up with demand, or go “open hand” for anyone who has the talent and passion to serve others and help improve local food economies. I chose to sacrifice potential profits for the benefit of empowering people and communities to bring their own creativity to the table to solve the challenges of local food and then support their businesses wherever I could.
We provide research-based training, certification, and support tools to improve their service to clients. When leads come to us for design, installation, maintenance on urban farms, we send them to our certified pros. We teach through the USGBC, the Landscape Architects Association and many other professional development groups to help people improve their own companies and teach them skills that improve their revenues and offerings the way they want. We don’t require our students to use our referral services and in every case, the end client is someone in
Justin, I love your goal here! While I was watching early on in the program I was thinking about my husband’s desire to start his own business and work outside, but how I wouldn’t want that to be traditional landscaping because I would want it to line up with our values and be something we’re truly passionate about. That was before you started talking about the agriscaping! Once you transitioned to that, I was blown away. I think it’s incredible that you are giving others the opportunity to partner with you in this valuable effort, and I’m looking forward to finding out more.
Is there an opportunity for student loans for these programs?
There have been a number of Grants offered out through EWING and HUNTER landscaping earlier this year and we do offer payment programs for those who need it. We’ve also had a number of organisations sponsor their employees to go through our programs including nurseries, landscaping companies, municipalities, heath centers, homeless shelters, and more through the Perpetual Education Programs they have.
We are a debt-free organization and we encourage all our students to do the same. Our tuition is very low for the upside potential available and there is always a way to get tuition paid for without debt. When you apply, just ask! 🙂
Yes, he has a course, but no where does it say you cannot do the same as he does, w/o the course! The course just kick starts your own business. If you have ever started a business, you would know that ALL the professional info comes in very handy.
This was a great presentation for us that do not consider this “common knowledge and old school”. This is just another way to think outside of the box. Thank you Justin.
I loved this presentation. It’s the only one where I have commented and only one I have listened to all the way through. Very interesting concept. Would love to find a way to be involved with getting this off the ground in Seatlle, WA!
Awesome! I was just in Spokane with Joel Salatin as a speaker for the Food and Farm Expo and there is DEFINITELY a lot of people starting to come together up there and where you live in Seattle. Gonsaga is on-board and happy to help get things going as well as a growing number of Pros signing on as well. How would you like to get involved?
if the master program started Sept 23, this must have been recorded in ??
Yes, it is all recorded now for those who want to go at their own pace PLUS the next live sessions begin again November 30th.
I’ve been watching these through my Firefox browser and my Kindle Fire has no problems playing these presentations. I hope everyone who couldn’t watch these can find a solution to their problem. I hope that everyone has updated their browsers just in case that is the problem. Or it could be an internet service provider problem (I have AT&T as a service provider and a DSL). I hope that there is a replay of this summit for those that have missed most of it (I wouldn’t mind seeing some presenters twice myself)!
I think you ave a great idea there … very close to permaculture. I’m trying to think if it would be good for me. I’m in my late 60s… pretty active for sure.. but I rent my place.. I might stay here for years more and i did see where it can be profitable quiclky I have an acre and a half but only a small part would be put into you program… as it is I am always expanding into the wild areas of my place and i’ve found some great peach trees.. along with locust and mimosa Ihave a pretty large area of raised beds more like swales in place whdere i grow most of my veggies…I like the idea of shrinking the intensive growing area.I am rambling but I get inspired easlily when I encouter a vision like you have. I hope to see your program work very sucessfully and may gardens flourish everywhere Sam
Thank you Sam! Sounds like you have a great opportunity in your yard. Yes, people have said we are the “Elegant, Economically Integrated Offspring of Permaculture” and I can certainly agree with that. 🙂
Do you have anyone in northwest Georgia or any printed resource to help with microclimates in my yard? I rent & don’t want to get too involved or much money invested. I’m also older and basically a non-gardener, just would like to grow some stuff to eat. Thanks!
We have an intern in Georgia working on the free micro-climate map for all the areas in Georgia, North Carolina and Florida this semester… hope to have it done before the new year.
The Garden Planner already has all the info for full sun for your area (B Micro-Climate)
Hi Justin,
Both my husband and I are interested in the program. Are we able to go through the mastery program together, or would we need to pay two separate fees? Thank you!
Do it together! No need to buy two accounts, by all means, we encourage having a buddy and getting the whole family involved! ONE ACCOUNT PER GARDEN? We’ve actually been talking about having a FAMILY Certification for Mastery to help bring more collaboration to every garden.
NOTE: If you want to Go Pro with additional certifications, you would each need a separate account but your Mastery Tuition would have already been covered 🙂
I really enjoyed your presentatoin and do not mind one…single….bit about the business promotion. I have listened to presentations every day of the summit – some I enjoyed and found useful, others not so much, but those ones, I just turned off or moved on to another…. no need for people to get so nasty about not getting anything from some of them, after all, all of the presentations have been FREE!
To the point. I retired from the military several years ago and have been home gardening on my own and searching relentlessly for a way to incorporate all the things I love about it into something meaningful – for myself (and others who may be interested).
I think I found it.
Pittsburgh is a great place to live and I have just the property to start working. Your program will give me the education and tools I need to make sense of what I would like to be able to do here. So looking forward to start learning!
how about alaska
YES! We have students in Alaska and, I believe people still buy food up there, right 😉
Dear Justin and Marjory,
Hey from Germany! I very much enjoyed the format and the communication here in the comments. The approach is educational and inspirational. The headline is straight forward and offers great insight. Eventhough I am not in the US, it is great to find out more what is happening for the people in such thought-through and organized way to make things easier to get people outdoors and growing healthy food by respecting Mother Nature. Redd all the answers Justin provided and it deepened my appreciation even more. Loving Mother Nature and growing your own food respectfully is one thing, having the guts and follow-through to get it organized in such a way is so inspiring. The questions suggest, that a level of security and safety and networking in this field (pun intended) is highly needed and appreciated. SiebenLinden in Saxony-Anhalt is an ecovillage in an area with quite poor soil in Germany that combines education, living and production in an interesting way as well. It has had an impact over all those years in how farming is now handled in a wider area around it. I took part in an reforestration project with my then small daughter. It it is an experience we´ll remember well. It has something very fundamental and reassuring. Later she took a dance class at the same community. Your presentation inspires me to reconnect there again. It also offers valuable information into the business side and shows how you can be truly sustainable in all aspects in our modern society. Thank you!
Vielen Dank Sandra!
Es freut mich!I have always loved Germany… you grant me even more reason to return and learn some more. Thank you again for showing up for this class. 🙂
Interesting idea. I went on the site to try to find out how much all these certifications cost and was quite disappointed that I couldn’t just get prices,even just ball-park figures.I had to first give all my personal information. I am always VERY leery of such practices. I decided not to pursue it any further once I saw that.
Thank you for your comment: The range in Certification is $350 up to $6,000 for tuition it all depends on what certification you want and what your background is. You have to apply first because we want to avoid disappointment down the road and help be sure people get the best price and get credit for what they already know! For instance: if you are a Master Gardener you get you can pass out of a number of classes toward certification, If you have taken permaculture design classes you can pass out of a few classes… Your view helps us reconsider our approach. Thank you again for sharing.
I am surprised that this is one of the presentations chosen for encore. I could have sworn it had originally said those with the highest rating would be re-shown, and this one at 3.78 surprises me. I am pretty sure some of the others that are not in this group were higher than that. I was hoping to see Joel Salatin as I missed it first time around, I guess his presentation must have gotten less than 3.78 stars then?
Nothing personal directed at this presentation, just was surprised is all, about the ratings and choice of encore.
I love Joel Salatin! He and I shared a chauffeur this weekend in Spokane Washington for the Farm and Food Expo as speakers. I spent a solid hour with him, one on one, after dinner yesterday just talk’n shop and I can understand why you would want to hear that man speak. Perhaps I can connect you 😉
When will your next program begin?
Next class cycle begins November 30th
Am I understanding correctly that we don’t need to wait until Nov 30th to start the course now? Is there an advantage of waiting until the next live course?
No Need to wait. You can work at your own pace. November 30th is just the point where the live sessions start back up again and more Pro-specific training starts up.
Hi Justin, I also went to ASU for the BSLA and love what you’re doing! I went the typical path of commercial and municipal landscape design, but now, after 10+ years I’m delving into permaculture principles and homesteading in Queen Creek/STV area. If you’re on FB would love to have you in our Homesteading Arizona group. 🙂 Thanks for the great ideas and inspiration!
Yes! I live in Power Ranch… real close to you! And, I’m on FB… look me up!
Great vision, I really enjoyed the presentation. Is there any support available for the Los Angeles, CA area?
Yes! There is a little, but as you know there is a TON of people there so we need more. 🙂
I would like to sign up but this is not a good week. Can the payment be made in installments? I am both a master gardener and have my PDC certificate. This would fit in perfectly with what I want to do
Yes, You can work out a payment plan with your counselor after you apply for a specific Pro Certification.
How does it look for me in California…I don’t know that Utopian Harvest exists..any pros here….water is so scarce and expensive.
Yes, parts of California can be tricky! We have pros either training or operating (or both) in Orange County, LA County, San Diego, and San Francisco… a Utopian Harvest market stand usually lags about 6 months in a new area until enough production is verifiable in an area. Until then, items can be sold though a number of other channels with the help of the Harvester training and team.
I realllyyyy want to watch this but my husband is complaining about “time for bed” over here on the East Coast. Please allow me to watch this tomorrow
This was great. I am so excited. I have been watching all sorts of videos about you to try to find out more. Where can I get info on your trampoline garden?
Thanks Jennifer! Right now, besides Jake Mace’s tour on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohVW00NSmFA
We go into more details on the build in our next Mastery Class! (we’ve improved on the design and simplified the install in the last two months…)