Firstly, we acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the un-ceded nations throughout Australia and recognise their continuing connections to land, water and community. We pay our respects to them and their cultures, and to elders past, present and emerging.

Milkwood is based in from talune / Cygnet, in southern lutruwita / Tasmania – on Melukerdee country. We pay rent to SETAC.

Milkwood is dedicated to teaching and sharing permaculture skills, for living like it matters.

It all began in 2007, on a farm in New South Wales, Australia…

We started off as just a small crew: Kirsten Bradley, Nick Ritar (and later our kiddo, Ash) – when we moved to Nick’s family farm in NSW Australia, in 2006, to build a tiny house and grow some food. This somehow turned into a wild and wonderful, permaculture-farm-school-experiment-thing – called Milkwood.

We welcomed students and teachers from all over the world to our tin-shed classroom during those years, and we all learned a lot!

Fast forward to now – we are a small team of educators, facilitators and doers.

Together, we teach permaculture living, organic veggie gardening and home mushroom cultivation, to help create resilient and abundant households and communities, wherever we can.

We do this by providing free online resources & offering world-class training – skills that give you the confidence to create permanently sustainable systems.

Students leave our courses ready and able to design and implement a better future for their families, farms and communities.

And you can learn with us, from anywhere in the world.

Most recently, we have poured everything that we’ve learned – from years of teaching, learning, growing and collaborating – into creating world-class online student learning experiences.

So now, you can join us and learn from anywhere – hooray!

Head this way to see all our upcoming courses – and get inspired to live life better…

Our Mission

We inspire and enable households to take action to cultivate resilient communities and ecosystems. We energise individuals to engage with the social and environmental challenges we all face. 

Good food, healthy soil, resilient homes, regenerated ecosystems and a safe future for all. Skills for living like it matters.

Our Current Teachers

Our Past Teachers

Permaculture ethics

Earth Care

People Care

Fair Share

Meet the Milkwood Team

Nick Ritar

Managing Director

Course developer, permaculture educator and doer, steward of the Milkwood crew,  Milkwood business manager, mushroom educator.

Kirsten Bradley

Kirsten Bradley

Creative Director

Course developer, permaculture educator and doer, steward of the Milkwood crew, sharing good words for the good life.

Caine Barlow

Caine Barlow

Community Mentor

Mycologist, fungi educator and writer. Passionate about communicating all things fungi, especially fungi cultivation. Lover of rainforests and isolated landscapes. Permaculture renter, fermenter and gardener.

Jane Herring

Jane Herring

People Care & Accounts

Mini market gardener, passionate about all things related to chickens, food growing and community, and steward of a very cute puppy called Alvin.