Our 2026 Instructors
Check back for updates as we add
confirmed instructors
Tim Swanson
Event Co-Director
Kid's Trade Blanket
Trade Blanket
Archery Competition
TBA
Tim Swanson is the founder and lead instructor of Owl Eyes Wilderness
Survival. He holds a double Bachelor’s Degree in Adventure Education
Leadership and Adventure Therapy. He is a Level 2 Certified Animal Tracker, Wilderness First Responder, a Leave No Trace Master Educator, and a published author. Tim teaches wilderness survival and bushcraft from a connective and realistic approach. Classes with Owl Eyes Wilderness Survival are held in Massachusetts and throughout New England for all ages.
Emma Markowitz
Event Co-Director
Small Animal Hide Tanning
Intro to Survival for Teens
Emma Markowitz is an instructor at Owl Eyes Wilderness Survival and the Assistant Director of TimberNook Middlesex County. Emma is a lifelong adventurer and naturalist. Growing up in the prairies outside of Chicago, her boundless energy often led to climbing trees, splashing through mud, and turning the washing machine into a rock tumbler. Embracing her spirited nature, she channeled her love for exploration into a purposeful career, earning a Bachelor's degree in Art and Visual Culture Education from the University of Arizona.
With over 15 years of experience in outdoor and progressive education, Em believes that by empowering people to take healthy risks and explore the natural world, she can help them develop the confidence and skills they need to thrive. Her teaching is infused with curiosity, patience, and a generous dose of humor.
Laura Wolfer
Event Co-Director
Women's Circle
Knowing Where Everything Is, and What's Going On
Laura is the founder of Moose Ridge Wilderness School, and the one who said in 2018, "I think I'm going to start a gathering", without actually understanding that said gathering would take up a good portion of her life from that day forward (in a good way, of course). She went to graduate school for molecular biology, worked as a DNA scientist for a while, then a medical writer, then went to graduate school a second time to become an archaeologist (a true passion), and somewhere in between raised three kids who are now all in college. She is also a lifelong gardener, has raised just about every kind of farm animal, just started a seed company, and does a little of everything else, especially pottery, art, basketry, foraging, wood working, and herbalism. Obviously she can't settle on any one thing, but that's what keeps life interesting.
Since archaeologists can only dig in the warmer months, she has plenty of downtime to make all of the sausage patties for the gathering, and figure out how to fit four days' worth of meals for 200 people into a few freezers in the basement.
Cheeny Plante
Useful Knots
I am from Sanford Maine. I was a SERE (survival, evasion, resistance, escape) Specialist in the Air Force for eight years. I trained thousands of aircrew members how to survive in every environment in the world. I currently work in the trades (painting, general labor) and I am a registered Maine guide. When I'm not working, I'm backpacking, fishing and canoeing.
Mike Dube
Tracking
Native Story Telling
Come learn the Ancient Art of Tracking with Mike Dube. Mike teaches Traditional Native Skills through his School, "Taconic Challenges". This will be his 6th year at Moose Ridge Gathering, teaching Tracking Classes and telling traditional Native stories around the fire.
You'll learn side-tracking, aging with Wisdom Keepers, 10 step drill, Stalking Circle, patterns, Cutting Sign, and track casting. Your connection to Mother Earth will expand.
Marie Somers
Soap Making
Marie resides in Chester, New Hampshire with her husband and a large amount of farm animals, including sheep, cows, chickens, pigs, and silver fox rabbits. Living in a world of many passions, she is a Naturopathic Doctor who has specialized in homeopathy, herbology, and holistic medicine for 48 years. She will be teaching a class on making your own soap at home!
Aileen Peterson
TBA
Aileen Peterson (she/they) is a Queer mother, traditional midwife, naturopathic practitioner and community herbalist, permaculture farmsteader + consultant, bodyworker, rewilder and traditional skills practitioner + educator. Their business is Bear Woman Wisdom: Birth, Healing & Folk Ways and she and her wife operate Two Bears Farmstead & Apothecary together. A military brat born along the Rogue River in the Southern Oregon Siskiyous, growing up and raising a family mostly in Southeast North Carolina, and a recent transplant to Midcoast Maine—Aileen and her family have been building a life and community around ancestral land-based living and parenting, rewilding, traditional skills, regenerative and relational land stewardship, holistic healing, and food + body sovereignty for the last 15 years. She has taught on various homesteading, ancestral skills, and reproductive sovereignty topics in-person and online since 2016, at Earthskills Gatherings around the U.S. since 2017, and is excited to join the Moose Ridge family in 2025. In their free time Aileen can be found learning to tan hides, crafting something, reading, writing short stories and zines, and doing graphic design or photography.
Ryan Johns
TBA
Men's Triangle
Ryan Johns lives in Roxbury VT with his family of 5 and their many pets. He works as a k-8 wilderness, primitive skills, science and math educator in local independent schools. Hunting for animals, raising and processing animals for the family homestead and both growing and foraging for mushrooms with his kids are what he spends most of his free time both doing and thinking about. Ryan moved to Vermont from Colorado and brings with him knowledge of southwest primitive skills and practices and enjoys exploring and working in the northern woods. Ryan has many years of experience teaching children and adults to feel comfortable in their outdoor environment and finding out what drives their unique passions both at gatherings, in nature and in the classroom.
See you at the gathering!
Hannah Mitchell
Broom Making
Coming from the mountains of southern Appalachia, Hannah has been immersed in the natural world since a young child. An abiding love for the wild is the foundation for her creative process. Hannah has been teaching broom making for 12 years. She lives with her partner and two children in central Vermont.
Jes Steele
Small Pack Baskets
Woven Quivers
Kid's Camp: Gathering Basket
Jes has a deep passion for the wilderness and for teaching. She has been working in the field of Adventure and Environmental Education for more than 30 years. This leg of her journey is about connecting more deeply with herself, others, and the wilderness.
Credentials:
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B.A. Ecopsychology and Outdoor Education from Prescott College, AZ
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M.Ed. Adventure Education Plymouth State University, NH
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Registered Maine Recreational Guide
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National Registered EMT
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SOLO Wilderness First Aid and Wilderness First Responder Instructor
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Leave No Trace Master Educator
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Mindfulness Instructor
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ServSafe Manager
Krystle Bouck
Work Trade Manager
Arrival/Registration Desk
Krystle is a leader in the healthcare software industry and is passionate about making a difference in people's health outcomes. So much of modern medicine focuses on treating symptoms rather than addressing the root cause. Through diving into the world of herbalism and whole food, Krystle has restored her health and now has a homestead where she and her family raises and hunts their own meat. She is currently acting scribe for the Ancient Ones of Maine where she enjoys competing with black powder firearms and believes in the importance of bringing people back to our roots, when times were more simple. She also directs the children's ministries at her church and has 20 years of experience teaching children ages 5-12.
Kevin Bouck
Campfire Cooking
Black Powder Rifle
A Soldier's Rations
Kid's Archery Competition
Kevin Bouck lives in Litchfield, Maine, with his wife Krystle and twin boys Hunter and Zachary. They enjoy their 1850’s farmhouse and have a small, but ever growing, family farm. They enjoy the simple life and strive to keep things as period correct as possible. Kevin grew up in Michigan, and spent 20 years serving in the United States Marine Corps. After retiring in 2001, he settled in New England where he met his wife, Krystle. They moved to Maine in 2017 and have been involved with the Moose Ridge Gathering since 2020. Kevin enjoys all things Maine and the outdoors, although still can’t wrap his head around ice fishing. Kevin can be found hunting turkeys in the spring, deer in the fall, teaching as an Appleseed instructor, serving in leadership roles in his local church, teaching Hunter safety for the IFW, supervising rifle ranges as a CMP Master Instructor, and restoring vintage firearms, or living an 1700's life style with the Accent Ones of Maine. He is looking forward to having you visit him in his classes.
Barry Keegan
Birch Bark Baskets
Advanced Fire Making Workshop
Miniature Bows (kids and adults)
Barry has taught many Earth skills since 1991: such as flint knapping, basketry, bark canoe making, fire by friction, bows and arrows, primitive fishing, survival food/water/shelter, and much more, has made or repaired 70 wigwams and longhouses of bark and thatch, and 15 dugout canoes, (one of which has been part of numerous films featuring bark and dugout canoes), fluting a point, and History Channel’s Stonehenge Archer (Mystery Quest). He also performs a rare demonstration of 9 ways to make fire by friction-back-to-back, which may be unique. He has taught at many survival schools, primitive gatherings, colleges and public schools, day camps, museum and nature centers. Barry makes replica crafts for many museums and teaching institutions, has written over 20 articles for periodicals, and assisted in writing and illustrating numerous books on primitive technology related matters.
Robin Blankenship
Fire Making for Beginners Demo
Sewing with a Bone Awl and Sinew
Rawhide Container Making
8-Ply Buckskin Round Braiding
ROBIN BLANKENSHIP owns and operates Earth Knack and has been working in the outdoor field since 1978 when she began leading horse packing trips into the Collegiate Peaks Wilderness for Adventure Unlimited Ranches, eventually directing their mountaineering program. She began teaching for Larry Olsen’s School of Urban and Wilderness Survival in 1984, the National Outdoor Leadership School and Outward Bound. She holds a B.A. in English Literature, a minor in Spanish from the University of Colorado, Boulder, as well as a B.S. in Education with a Colorado elementary teaching certification. Currently she also “moonlights” as the 4th and 5th grade teacher at the Crestone Charter school, which she helped to establish in 1995. She is the author (and illustrator) of How To Play In The Woods, published in 2016 by Gibbs Smith, Publishers, and co-authored and illustrated Earth Knack Stone Age Skills for the 21st Century, also published by Gibbs Smith in 1996. Robin made a friction fire for Katie Couric on The Today Show, has been featured in publications including Outside Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, The New York Times, The Denver Post, and appeared on Channel 4 news programs in Denver featuring self-sufficient and sustainable lifestyles. All her Air b-n-b listings on the Earth Knack property are self designed and architected, hand built, homemade, alternative and eco-friendly buildings; methods that she also teaches through her Earth Knack programs.
Kitty Michelotti
Jute Jar Holders
TBA
Kid's Camp: Rag Dolls
Kitty raises chickens, rabbits, turkeys, and pigs on a 2 acre homestead in Derry, NH with her husband Nate and their 3 boys. Since moving to NH 10 years ago (from Colorado by way of Massachusetts) Kitty and her family have striven to raise and harvest as much of their food as they can while homeschooling and living in suburbia. Kitty prides herself on having least four species of animal in her chest freezer at all times. :)
Nathan Glaser
Ham Radio (Meshtastic) & Short Wave Radio
Evening Ham Radio Demo
Could you communicate with family and friends if cell service went down? Ham radio is a great way to increase self-reliance and be able to speak to people over long distances without cell towers or the internet in an emergency, or just for fun!
In this class General license holder Nate Glaser, call sign KC0MYM, will cover short wave radio, reception, repeater operation, digital modes versus analog modes, ham license differences, antennas, and disaster communications. Nate will bring his base station radio (Icom 9100) and various handhelds. Feel free to bring your own radio and any questions you may have.
Grace Krupkowski
TBA
Trilogy Herbalism is founded by Grace Krupkowski, herbalist and educator. Trilogy Herbalism is located in Keene, New Hampshire and serves all of Northern New England and beyond. Trilogy Herbalism seeks to weave the power of personal agency, health justice, and medicinal plants together into cohesion. These three links bring forth an awareness not only of how you can better take care of yourself, but also of the natural world, its forces, and the medicine it provides. Through herbalism, we establish resilience and an awareness of interconnectedness between all aspects of the self. Grace's innate and learned knowledge fosters a connection across many herbal traditions. In 2015, she began an exploration into the world of herbalism and plant connection which has since blossomed into a lifelong passion. Since 2020, Grace has served as an educator teaching courses in person and online while managing an herbal product line. Grace also offers one on one herbal wellness consultations that encompass the whole individual, their ailments, and goals for healing and balancing the body.
Bob Berg
The Bob Berg Experience IYKYK
Classes TBA
Bob Berg of Thunderbird Atlatl (the world's foremost atlatl designer and producer!) has been interested in all things primitive for the greater part of his adult life. He is skilled in many of the primitive arts and enjoys passing his knowledge on. Bob enjoys a few hobbies both in and outside the atlatl business, among them spear fishing, atlatl hunting, oil painting, and inventing mechanical devices designed to save the world.
George LoCascio
Foundations of Blacksmithing
George has been blacksmithing off and on for over 20 years. He has helped start a heathen artist collective that focuses on Celtic and Norse artwork thru metal, bone, wood, painting and printmaking.
Students will learn basic forging practices emphasizing safety. During our class students will learn the basic techniques that are needed for future smithing. Also, students will take home a piece of their art at the end of the class.
Sarah White
Sourdough
Morning Meditation
Sarah, founder of Holistic Roots Coaching is a lifelong adventurer, wife, and loving mother of two. She is passionate about empowering others to live authentic, sustainable, and healthy lifestyles. After seeing too many limited, generic programs, she started Holistic Roots Coaching in order to deliver a balanced healing journey supported by multiple pillars of wellness and fine-tuned for each and every client.
Sarah has a Master's Degree in Social Work from Simmons College and Holistic Health Coach certification from Institute of Integrative Nutrition. She has been teaching yoga and meditation for 14 years and has completed her 200hr training. She has completed various meditation and mindfulness training, including Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy at Harvard Teaching Hospital, The Center for Mindfulness and Self Compassion. Sarah has been a guest lecturer several times at MIT's Sloan Business School.
Thabani Ndlovu
Fish Skin Tanning
I have spent 7 years learning and practicing tanning leather. 4 of those years were specifically learning to tan yellow fin tuna hides. I have worked with everything from roadkill to butcher scraps. Every animal and species is a little different and wonderful in there own way. I have a bachelor's degree in Fine Art and am currently wrestling with the arbitrary line between Fine Art and craft. I love creative experimentation and the slow process of making.
Carrie McMillen
Kid's Camp: TBA
Carrie believes nature is the best place for kids to practice resilience and experience wonder. She spent 10 years leading family hiking and camping trips throughout New England for the Appalachian Mountain Club and is a graduate of National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS). She has had jobs in design, kid's outdoor education and more recently, cartography. She not only loves to pore over maps, but believes that mapping and orienteering can increase environmental awareness and spatial perception for kids. Massachusetts has been Carrie's home with her family for the past 25 years, but you may find her hiking, backpacking and orienteering most anywhere.
Jillian Erice
TBA
Jillian Erice is a holistic and integrative physician associate, certified wound specialist, and a family herbalist. As a member of the Wilderness Medical Society, she is trained in Advanced Wilderness Life Support and offers a wealth of knowledge on health and well-being in both everyday and wilderness settings.
Jillian finds joy in foraging, crafting, and fostering a deep connection to nature. She thrives in the forest, whether gathering wild herbs or creating with her hands, and is dedicated to inspiring her children and others to embrace the beauty and wisdom of the natural world and old ways of being. Her and her husband are currently raising their three children and an ever growing number of animals on an 1800s homestead in Midcoast Maine.
Her most recent endeavor is hosting a podcast called Original Being all about holistic health, homesteading, herbalism, primitive and survival skills and remembering old ways of being to bring into our lives today.
Gaianne Dube
Kid's Camp: Bracelets
Gay is the wife of Mike Dube', and she originally comes from Jamica Plain, Massachusetts, one of the many diverse sections of the city of Boston. She is of Puerto Rican, Native and Black American descent, all of which have rich cultural heritages and a deep connection with the earth. You will find she has a quiet spirit, and a very welcoming smile.
Since moving to Livermore, Maine with Mike she has embraced the life of living from her environment and learning from nature. She has taken to gardening, harvesting and canning. She also wants to learn herbal medicines and how to use them. She loves watching the animals move and play on the homestead. There is so much learn from their behaviors and habitats. She is learning to hunt respectfully, and how to process and use every part of her kill.
Her favorite time of the day is in the evening when the sun is setting and the trees are whispering, and everything is beginning to quiet, and the silence descends. The peace that just blankets her home is wonderful. There is nothing like it in the world and she and Mike want to share it with everyone through their school: Taconic Challenges.
Gay feels that her skills are better suited for children, and enjoys sharing Native crafts on a scale and level that will allow everyone to bring something special home. She also loves to crochet and make things with her hands. At the gathering, you will often find her by her tent working on something. Come by and sit and bring your projects. All are welcome.
Tom Turck
Primitive Sauna
After studying primitive sauna craft at the Boulder Outdoor Survival School, he began tending fire and stone as a way to reconnect with the land. Over time, the sauna became both teacher and medicine—helping ease arthritis, restore circulation, and bring the body back into balance.
He now shares this practice as a simple, ancient technology for warmth, community, and renewal. His workshops invite participants to slow down, work with natural materials, and experience the quiet healing power of heat, steam, and forest air.
Robert Newmyer
Power Boxes & Solar Systems
This class will cover the construction of a lithium battery power box with inverter and solar charging system. I will also show these types of systems scaled up in a camper van.
I will show and describe the components of a battery power box, then assemble one from the component parts with student participation. The battery will be turned off to minimize risk. Once the power box is assembled, it will be used to make tea, then connected to a solar panel to recharge. The second part of the class will be a tour of a camper van to show the electrical systems and how each component gets scaled up for camper vans.
Bob Newmyer is a lifelong crafter and maker of many things - woodworker, camper builder, gardener, carpenter, plumber, electrician, maker of historical artifacts. He has learned skills from everywhere he has been.
Bob has spent many years helping folks build what they need. It’s a long list. Tiny house wiring and plumbing, outdoor showers for yoga enthusiasts, van cabinetry and electrical work for traveling folk, building historical site buildings, building his own shop and garage, community garden work. He has recently been helping set up a community tool library.
The camper van project began in 2017 in a new Nissan cargo van and took two years of extensive carpentry and electrical design and work. It was a bridge project that was started a year before retirement from 17 years on the IT help desk of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
Julieann Hartley
Eating Acorns
Julieann Hartley is a local music therapist and nutritional therapist. After Julieann hiked the Appalachian trail in 2015, she was diagnosed with Lyme disease and began seeking out wild foods as a way of healing her body. Instead of counting miles, Julieann now focuses on counting plant and animal species while she is out adventuring. She loves to teach others about the plants and their uses, believing that education is key to sustainable land conversation. Her favorite wild foods are acorns, wintercress greens, hen of the woods mushrooms, dandelions and black locust flowers.
Julieann will be teaching a class about foraging and preparing acorns and will be providing a recipe for her favorite food of all time: acorn pancakes.
Doug Householder
TBA
"Arkansas Doug" Householder has trained in and taught survival from the tropical jungles of South America and Hawaii to the Sonoran Desert, but calls the Ozark Mountains home. He is a highly skilled outdoorsman who teaches at top survival schools. You may recognize him as founder of Earth Trekker Bushcraft.
Jackie Ryan
Botanical Drawing
Not Your Average Plant Walk
Jackie “Rainbow” Ryan is an artist, wilderness instructor and yoga teacher who is dedicated to using creativity to help cultivate relationships between people, their bodies, and the magical earth they come from. She has been teaching Hatha Yoga for 10 years and also loves facilitating ecstatic dance and contact improvisation. Jackie started teaching wilderness skills 7 years ago and opened Rainbow’s Nature School in 2021. Jackie has a BA in Studio Art from the University of Vermont. Her paintings are an abstract world of color and serve to transform energy and emotion. Jackie’s teaching style embodies a combination of calm presence, silliness, improvisation, and curiosity.
You can find Jackie’s artwork at visionfaerie.com and her nature school at rainbowsnatureschool.com.
William Ruiz
Drumming
Drum Circle
William Ruiz, a drummer and multi-instrumental percussionist, is an American Native, Indigenous mixed with Portuguese, Spanish, Taino. His career as a musician started as a freelance interstate street busker across the USA before auditioning and becoming a Music Under New York performer.
Based in New Jersey, William also spends a lot of time performing around the world.
He is a well-respected award winning artist having received the Taino award for musician of the year as well as numerous awards from the United Nations for being an ambassador of music and peace.
Ruiz has appeared for interviews/performances on CNN international news, Hot 97 radio as well as WBAI. He is known for playing Log drums, Tongue drums, the HandPan, and Hand drums while wearing his trademark Ghungroo sneaker bells/Aztec Ayoyotes ankle shakers. He also plays various other percussion instruments.
William has collaborated with many world-renowned musicians. He performs solo, with drum groups, and his 4-piece musical group. He also hosts drum assemblies, workshops, and private drum events for children through grants, nonprofits and as a freelance teacher (K – High school), adults, colleges, and corporate events throughout New York State/the five boroughs of New York City, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania.
JT Stokes
Beeswax Candle Making
Come learn the basics of pouring & dipping beeswax candles, as well as the ~4,000 year long history of candle making. We’ll discuss crucial temperature ranges, calculating burn time, and tips for wick selection. This workshop will also include information regarding how to avoid overpaying for tools and avoiding surface blemishes. Our main focus will be dipping taper candles. We’ll talk about tips for pouring molded candles, including a single-pour method. Each attendee will dip a taper set (2 candles) of 100% beeswax.
Jillian-Taylor’s philosophy is rooted in deep ecology, preparedness, and a healthy balance of tactical and whimsical living. Her pursuits in candle making began while she still sat behind a desk at the National Wildlife Federation, dreaming of fighting the rampant tide of ecological destruction. While there she experienced her first earthskills gathering, and within two years she had left office life behind to pursue living an earth-based life.
Considering a lack of access to genuine healthcare and pesticide-free food, JT dove into pursuing foraging, foodways, agriculture, and herbal medicine, while integrating other off-grid skills. Now, one decade after her first bushcraft apprenticeship, she’s a storm worker, nomadic permaculturalist, and journeywoman of primitive life ways and traditional ecological knowledge.
Andy Dobos
Tracking Woods Walk
Andy Dobos mentors people of all ages in Nature skills under the name Forest Wolf Programs. He has almost 20 years of experience teaching Nature based skills such as wildlife tracking, friction fire, spoon carving, bow making and much more. Andy earned an advanced completion certificate for White Pine Programs Wildlife Tracking Apprenticeship and a level 3 certification in Track and Sign from CyberTracker Conservation. He holds a bachelor of fine arts degree and has studies traditional crafts for his whole life. He is also the organizer for the Cattail Gathering, a Nature skills gathering in Litchfield, CT.
Nick Spadero
Friction Fire
Hunting Talk
Nick Spadaro has been practicing primitive skills for nearly two decades. Lucky to study with some of the best, he is currently focusing on learning to hunt and fish for wild game in New England. He homesteads offgrid in central NH with his partner Wren, and their adopted pitbull Cricket.
