Want healthier plants? Start with your soil. This workshop for home gardeners explores soil as a living ecosystem — and how understanding it can transform your garden's resilience and productivity.

You'll learn simple, no-equipment methods to assess your soil's condition, interpret what you're seeing, and take practical steps to improve it. The workshop also covers compost extracts and compost teas: what they are, when to use them, and how to source quality compost or soil inputs locally if you're not making your own.

Led by Jo Tobias — Regenerative Soils & Living Compost Specialist and founder of RootShoot Soils — this workshop draws on over a decade of working with farmers across Western Canada. Jo's approach combines biodiversity-focused composting, microbial ecology, and microscopy to restore soil health from the ground up.

You'll leave with clear, actionable next steps to apply in your garden right away.

What you'll learn:

• How to assess soil health with no special tools

• The role of soil microorganisms in nutrient cycling and plant health

• How to use compost extracts and compost teas effectively

• How to choose quality compost and soil inputs locally