Join MMSB on Thursday, May 2, at 10am as they welcome Katie Temple from WEC as she shares learnings from the community composting projects located in neighbourhood community gardens across the City of Corner Brook. She will provide tips on how to get started, managing and growing the project. Registration for this online event is free and can be found at this link, https://rethinkwastenl.ca/food-waste/compost-awareness-week/

Join us at the Barry Place Garden to help us prepare for the upcoming gardening season! We’ll discuss plans for the greenhouse and get the beds all ready for growing.

RSVP to info@wecnl.ca or just drop by! Wear gardening gloves and bring a friend.

Join us at the Reid Street Garden to help us prepare for the upcoming gardening season! We’ll sift compost and get the beds all ready for growing.

RSVP to info@wecnl.ca or just drop by! Wear gardening gloves and bring a friend.

Interested in volunteering for WEC? In this webinar, Executive Director Katie will outline the various ways you can volunteer with WEC, from helping out with garden work parties to joining our Board of Directors. Click here to register for the Webinar. Can’t make it? Don’t worry, the webinar video will also be available on our website after recording!

Seed Starting Continued!

Our first seed starting workshop was a big hit, so we're hosting a follow up to dig a little deeper.

On Saturday, April 13th at 4 pm, we'll bring back Megan Holdfast for another hands-on workshop on seedling care, plus tons more info to give you a good start to your gardening season.

We'll cover how to give your seedlings the best start for optimal growing, which seeds to start inside vs. outside, how to harden up your seedlings to move them outside, water and nutrient needs as plants grow larger, and more. Bring all your seed starting questions!

Location TBD. RSVP to info@wecnl.ca. Fee is $5 or free for members and kids. All materials provided.

Join us for Green Drinks in March!

Lauralee Ledrew, Upper Humber Settlement Farm and Dr. Kelly Vodden, Grenfell Campus will be discussing the question: What does climate resilience look like in rural Newfoundland and Labrador?

Free entry for all including free food. Must be 19+. Donations encouraged!

The Green Drinks Speaker Series is a collaboration between Western Environment Centre and Grenfell Campus. The series invites community and academic speakers to make short presentations on a current issue.

Friends of WEC are hosting the Bay of Islands Maple Festival | Celebrating Siwkewiku's in Elmastukwek. Join them for a two-day celebration of Siwkewiku’s (the Maple Season) and learn about maple tapping!! Sign up here: https://tinyurl.com/bdfenc8w.

🍁 Thursday (Free)
6:00 Film Screening of Biidaaban at Bootleg
8:00 Maple Trivia at Retro

🍁 Saturday ($10 for All Day Event!)
10:00 - 12:00 Medicine Walk and Maple Tapping Workshop at Bowater Park (Sponsored by WEC)
1:00 - 5:00 Boil-up, refreshments, music, children's activity, and fireside art workshops at Blow Me Down Trails

🍁 Saturday Evening ($20, Pre-registration required)
6:00 Maple Feast at BMD lodge

In the event of incompatible weather conditions, the outdoor portion of the festival will take place at the Western Food Hub.

This event is supported by Memorial University Office of Public Engagement, Western Environment Centre, Food First NL, and Twisted Tuckamore Forest School.

Seed Starting Workshop

On Tuesday, March 5th at 6 pm, we're hosting a beginners seed starting workshop. We will discuss how to choose high quality seeds, the importance of organic, local and heirloom seed, plus we'll get our hands dirty by planting seeds together that you can take home.

We'll teach you all about which seeds to start now, lighting options, watering and nutrient needs and more.

Location: Corner Brook Public Library lobby

RSVP to info@wecnl.ca. Fee is $5 or free for members. All materials provided.

*NEW DATE* [Workshop is now FULL]

Learn all about baking bread with a sourdough culture - experience the full baking process from start to finish, how to knead, flour proportions, ingredients, caring for the starter, and more with experienced bread baker Hans-Steffen Lindner!

Workshop location: Corner Brook. Exact location shared with registered participants. Workshop cost: $5 or free for WEC members ($15/year). All payments can be made by e-transfer to info@wecnl.ca.

Email info@wecnl.ca to join waitlist or for more info.

Our Green Drinks Speakers Series is back for the 2023-24 season!

Justin Brake, Editor-in-Chief, The Independent and Dr. Garrett Richards, Professor, Grenfell Campus, addressing the question: How can we create effective public dialogue on the environment in NL?

Free entry for all including free food. Must be 19+. Donations encouraged!

The Green Drinks Speaker Series is a collaboration between Western Environment Centre and Grenfell Campus. The series invites community and academic speakers to make short presentations on a current issue.

The second session in our Local Food All Year series will be all about sprouts and microgreens. Learn how to eat locally, even into the winter! Join the Western Environment Centre for an in-person sprouting and microgreens workshop on Saturday, February 3rd at 4:00 pm.

Learn how to grow your own affordable, fresh greens in your house all year! Location TBD.

Fee is $5 or free for Western Environment Centre members ($15/year). RSVP to info@wecnl.ca.

[Workshop is now FULL] Learn all about baking bread with a sourdough culture - experience the full baking process from start to finish, how to knead, flour proportions, ingredients, caring for the starter, and more with experienced bread baker Hans-Steffen Lindner!

Workshop location: Corner Brook. Exact location shared with registered participants. Workshop cost: $5 or free for WEC members ($15/year). All payments can be made by e-transfer to info@wecnl.ca.

Email info@wecnl.ca to join waitlist or for more info.

We're starting another workshop series, Local Food All Year, all about how to eat locally, even into the winter! Our first session will be hosted by Chef Alex Blagdon of Alder Cottage, who will show us how to use alders in baking and cooking.

This workshop will happen Wednesday, January 10th at 6:00 pm online. Link to be shared closer to the event. Email us to be added to the list to receive a reminder!

Our Green Drinks Speakers Series is back for the 2023-24 season!

On Wednesday, December 13th at 7:00pm at Bootleg Brew Co (92 West Street), we have Lori Deeley, Visual Artist, and Dr. Rachel Webb Jekanowski, Grenfell Campus, addressing the question: What does energy justice mean in NL?

Lori Deeley is a Visual Artist, Art Educator, and Art Therapist who lives in Kippens. Lori grew up in the forests and waterways of Nova Scotia's eastern shore. After living, exploring, and painting the Canadian Prairies, she and her family moved to Newfoundland in 2001. Newfoundland has become her home, where she raised her family, and is deeply connected to the land and waters of this beautiful province. This connection feeds her art practice and is essential to her spiritual, mental, and physical well-being. 

Dr. Rachel Jekanowski is an interdisciplinary scholar researching cultural histories of energy and resource extraction. Rachel works as an Assistant Professor of English at Memorial University's Grenfell Campus, where she teaches film and literary studies. Rachel is also affiliated faculty with Grenfell's Environmental Policy Institute. She serves on the editorial boards of two academic journals: as reviews editor for Journal of Environmental Media and as a co-editor of The Goose: Journal of Arts, Environment, and Culture in Canada. In her spare time, she also helps run the Grenfilm Society's monthly screening series. 

Free entry for all including free food. Must be 19+. Donations encouraged!

The Green Drinks Speaker Series is a collaboration between Western Environment Centre and Grenfell Campus. The series invites community and academic speakers to make short presentations on a current issue.

Join the Western Environment Centre as we continue our Community Roots Project with our workshop series focused on Regenerative Gardening. Regenerative gardening works with the ecosystem to build soil fertility, encourage biodiversity and grow amazing food!

This workshop will focus on fascinating conversation to introduce participants to the basic principles of permaculture.

Permaculture design is a unique approach to meeting human community needs while regenerating the life-affirming systems we depend on. During this workshop, we will discuss permaculture ethics and principles that guide resilient living by cultivating beneficial relationships among various elements, whether in a garden, a building, a foodscape, or an organization, by ultimately learning from and mimicking nature.

Permaculture is not a single technique but rather a dynamic weaving of the approaches, technologies, and sustainable solutions around us. Permaculture is a set of tools and principles to shift our way of relating - from individualism and competition to connection and interdependence.

While permaculture design is inherently hands-on, we will tinker with these topics through conversation as a way of getting acquainted with what the permaculture principles mean in our lives.  

Workshop occurs Sunday, Dec. 3rd (4-5:30pm) in-person at the Centre for Research and Innovation, Corner Brook and also via Zoom for those who would like to attend remotely. Please RSVP by email to info@wecnl.ca and/or register HERE for the Zoom option.

Join the Western Environment Centre as we continue our brand new Community Roots Project with our workshop series focused on Regenerative Gardening. Regenerative gardening works with the ecosystem to build soil fertility, encourage biodiversity and grow amazing food!

Learn all about the basic principles of fall garlic planting in our second workshop in this series, all about planting and fertilizing garlic. Workshop is rescheduled for Sunday, October 29th at 2:00 pm.

We are delighted to visit regenerative growers Lauralee and Mark Ledrew of Upper Humber Settlement Farm, 186 Veteran’s Dr., Cormack for a hands-on workshop all about how to successfully plant fall garlic using regenerative growing methods. It will include various fertilizing strategies and all the other details you need for an abundant and robust garlic harvest next year!

Entry is free for members or $5 for non-members. Open to all levels of gardeners/growers!

For more info or to RSVP email info@wecnl.ca

Our Workshop Series continues this fall with a focus on mushrooms! On Wednesday, September 27st at 6pm we will host our third intro to edible mushrooms walk.

Email us at info@wecnl.ca to RSVP. This workshop always fills up fast! Cost is $5 or free for WEC members and for children. Location will be shared with registered participants (Corner Brook area).

Join the Western Environment Centre as we begin our brand new Community Roots Project with a workshop series focused on Regenerative Gardening. Regenerative gardening works with the ecosystem to build soil fertility, encourage biodiversity and grow amazing food!

Learn all about the basic principles of regenerative gardening in our first workshop in this series, all about no-till growing and the use of different mulches. Workshop happens on Monday, September 25th at 5:00 pm.

We are delighted to visit regenerative growers Lauralee and Mark Ledrew of Upper Humber Settlement Farm in Cormack for an interactive workshop which will cover: how to do sheet mulching, hugelkultur beds, raised beds, and straw bale gardens.

Discussions will focus on the different materials and mulches you can use to create no-till gardens, from cardboard and straw to kelp, hay and wood chips.

Entry is free for members or $5 for non-members. Open to all levels of gardeners/growers!

For more info or to RSVP email info@wecnl.ca

WEC is proud to be hosting Ashley Hall's session "Mycorrhizal Symbiosis in Regenerative Agriculture" in the Fungi Symposium happening at the Centre for Research and Innovation in Corner Brook Aug. 22-24. This talk will be the inaugural session of our Community Roots: Local Food for Climate Action project, which focuses on the importance of local and regenerative food systems for the health of our communities and our planet.

Session description: "Neophyte beekeeper, farmer and integrated environmental planner Ashley will guide us through an introduction to the hidden, interconnected world of fungal-plant relationships. Comparing traditional and contemporary approaches to food production, exploring terminology and outlining fungal functions in ecosystems, all with a dose of humour, this talk will appeal to the gardener, forager, biologist and farmer in all of us."

If you are interesting in attending the symposium, registration is managed by Grenfell (not WEC) and can be accessed here.

For this workshop, some previous mushroom foraging experience is required. We'll focus less on beginner info and principles, and more on actual mushroom foraging so that we can all bring some home (if we find any!).

Email us at info@wecnl.ca to RSVP. Cost is $5 or free for WEC members and for children. Location will be shared with registered participants. Requires transportation capable of driving on a forest access road in Corner Brook area. Please wear blaze orange.

We’re having a garden work party at the Barry Place Garden Sunday, Sept. 17th - come join us to get our garden in great shape for the fall!

When driving along Griffin Drive, turn onto Boland’s Ave near the fish plant. The garden will be on your right. RSVP to info@wecnl.ca or just drop by! Wear gardening gloves and bring a friend.

We’re having a garden work party at the Caribou Road Garden Saturday, Sept. 16th - come join us to get our garden in great shape for the fall!

The garden is at the corner of Caribou Road and Bliss Street. RSVP to info@wecnl.ca or just drop by! Wear gardening gloves and bring a friend.

Our Workshop Series continues this fall with a focus on mushrooms! On Thursday, September 14th at 6pm we will host the second of three intro to edible mushrooms walks.

Email us at info@wecnl.ca to RSVP. This workshop always fills up fast! Cost is $5 or free for WEC members and for children. Location will be shared with registered participants (Corner Brook area).

We'll be at the Blow Me Down Community Garden on at 2 pm on Sunday, Sept. 10th with a photographer to do a photo shoot and we'd love your participation! We're getting some stock photos done for our website and social media. Come along to work on your plot, chat with other gardeners or get your photo taken.

RSVP to info@wecnl.ca if you can attend!