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Carrying the Fire Forward

Food Sovereignty Through Land, Knowledge & Local Capacity

Regenerating Food Systems, Land & Local Capacity Across the Upper Great Lakes

The Seven Fires Initiative is an Anishinaabe-led effort inspired by the Seven Fires Prophecy—a teaching that carries the history, migrations, challenges, and responsibilities of the Anishinaabe people across generations. The Seventh Fire speaks of a time when people would be called to remember traditional knowledge, restore their relationship with the land, and choose a path that supports the well-being of future generations.

Guided by these teachings, the Seven Fires Initiative explores how traditional foods, medicinal plants, living soil systems, seed stewardship, and community education can help strengthen food sovereignty, community health, and ecological resilience throughout the Upper Great Lakes.

Food sovereignty is more than growing food. It is the ability of communities to shape their own food systems while maintaining meaningful relationships with their seeds, medicines, lands, waters, and cultural traditions. It is about restoring knowledge, rebuilding local capacity, and creating systems that nourish both people and the ecosystems that sustain them.

Living Soil & Biological Consulting

Healthy soils are the foundation of resilient farms, functioning ecosystems, and strong food systems. Seven Fires combines soil science, biological monitoring, regenerative agriculture, and practical field experience to help growers and communities understand how their land is functioning and make management decisions that improve it over time.

Our work begins with the living processes beneath the surface — nutrient cycling, microbial activity, soil structure, water movement, and plant–soil relationships — but it does not stop there. Soil health is connected to composting, perennial production, local fertility, land management, and the broader systems that determine whether a farm or community can remain productive and resilient.

Rather than prescribing a single product or practice, we assess the conditions of each site, establish biological and soil-health baselines, and develop practical strategies around the resources already available. Through ongoing monitoring, those strategies can be adjusted as the land responds.

The goal is to strengthen natural soil processes, improve nutrient availability and water infiltration, support healthier plants, and reduce unnecessary dependence on outside inputs. Whether working with a tribal food sovereignty program, community garden, diversified farm, conservation project, or commercial operation, Seven Fires connects scientific understanding with practical implementation to build soil systems capable of supporting the land for generations.

Healthy soils are dynamic systems, and understanding how they respond over time is just as important as establishing a baseline. Seven Fires provides ongoing biological monitoring and technical support to help growers, tribal food programs, and land managers evaluate soil function, track change, and make better management decisions.

Using microscopy, soil testing, field observations, and regenerative management principles, we look at how biology, nutrient cycling, soil structure, and plant performance are responding to changes in management. Monitoring can help identify whether a practice is working, where limitations remain, and what adjustments may be needed as the system develops.

Services may include:
- Soil food web microscopy and biological assessment
- Baseline and follow-up soil health monitoring
- Compost and biological amendment evaluation
- Crop and plant health trouble shooting
- Regenerative transition planning
- Seasonal monitoring and progress reporting
- Management recommendations based on observed change
- Staff and community grower training

The goal is not simply to provide a one-time test result, but to build an adaptive management process. By tracking how the land responds, growers can improve soil function over time, reduce unnecessary inputs, and make decisions based on the actual conditions of their system.

Food sovereignty depends not only on what we grow, but on where the resources needed to grow it come from. Seven Fires helps farms, tribes, and communities identify locally available organic materials and develop practical systems for turning those resources into soil fertility.

Food scraps, crop residues, manure, fish byproducts, woody materials, leaves, and other organic resources can become valuable inputs when they are managed intentionally. We help assess available feedstocks, develop composting systems, improve biological quality, and connect finished compost back into gardens, farms, orchards, and perennial food systems.

Depending on the site, these systems can range from community-scale composting to biologically complete compost and liquid compost extracts that allow locally produced biology and fertility to be applied across larger areas.

Services may include:
- Compost system assessment and design
- Local feedstock and waste-stream mapping
- Compost recipe and feedstock planning
- Carbon, moisture, temperature, and aeration management
- Biological microscopy and compost quality monitoring
- Food, farm, fish, manure, and other organic waste utilization
- Biologically complete compost production
- Compost extracts and liquid fertility systems
- Application strategies and equipment planning
- Staff training and operating protocols

The goal is to close the fertility loop — transforming materials already available within a community into productive resources that build soil, support food production, reduce waste, and decrease dependence on fertility brought in from outside the region.

The Seven Fires Initiative promotes an integrated approach to soil and crop management that combines modern agricultural knowledge with biological processes already present in healthy ecosystems. Rather than relying on a single product or practice, recommendations may incorporate:

- Soil biology monitoring
- Compost extracts and microbial inoculants
- Cover cropping and living roots
- Reduced soil disturbance
- Organic matter management
- Agroforestry and perennial production
- Native microorganisms and locally adapted biology
-Adaptive management based on field observations

Every site is different. Our role is to help growers develop practical systems that fit their land, goals, and available resources while building healthier soils year after year.

Focus on preserving, producing, and sharing culturally important seeds and traditional food crops. This includes Three Sisters seed stewardship, seed-saving education, seed increase projects, and support for community food production. By strengthening local seed systems, communities can build resilience, preserve traditional knowledge, and improve access to culturally significant foods.

Explore the cultivation and stewardship of traditional medicinal plants while supporting community wellness, education, and cultural revitalization. Potential activities may include medicinal plant gardens, educational workshops, traditional plant identification, and community health partnerships focused on reconnecting people with traditional medicines and plant knowledge.

Perennial crops form the long-term backbone of resilient food systems. Seven Fires helps farms, tribes, and communities plan and establish orchards, food forests, hedgerows, native food plantings, and other perennial systems that can provide food, habitat, and ecological value for decades.

We also support localized nursery and propagation systems so communities can begin producing more of their own planting material rather than relying entirely on outside suppliers. This can include fruit and nut trees, native and regionally adapted species, rootstock, scionwood, seed propagation, and small-scale nursery production designed around local conditions and long-term needs.

Services may include:
- Orchard and food forest planning
- Native, fruit, and nut species selection
- Agroforestry and hedgerow systems
- Site and microclimate matching
- Local and regionally adapted genetics
- Rootstock, scionwood, and propagation planning
- Seed-grown and vegetative propagation systems
- Micro-nursery and community nursery development
- Plant establishment and transplant protocols
- Soil and fertility planning for perennial systems
- Phased planting and long-term maintenance strategies

The goal is to build perennial systems that are productive, locally adapted, and increasingly self-sustaining — while creating the knowledge and plant material needed to expand them over time.

Healthy food begins with healthy soil. This area focuses on compost systems, compost extracts, soil biology, seed inoculation, and practical approaches to restoring soil health. Through education and demonstration, the initiative aims to promote biologically active growing systems that reduce dependency on outside inputs while supporting healthier plants and ecosystems.

Every landscape has its own soils, water patterns, microclimates, existing plant communities, infrastructure, resources, and management needs. Seven Fires helps farms, tribes, communities, and land managers understand these existing assets and develop long-term plans that work with the land rather than against it.

We begin by looking at what is already there — what is working, what is underutilized, where limitations exist, and where new opportunities can be created. From there, we connect soil health, food production, perennial systems, composting, water, infrastructure, and available resources into a practical plan for the site.

Services may include:
- Site assessment and asset mapping
- Soil, water, topography, and microclimate considerations
- Identification of underutilized land and infrastructure
- Regenerative land-use planning
- Annual and perennial food-system integration
- Orchards, food forests, agroforestry, and habitat plantings
- Compost, fertility, and resource-flow integration
- Nursery and propagation planning
- Labor, infrastructure, and management considerations
- Phased 1-, 3-, 5-, and 10-year implementation planning

The goal is to create a clear path from what the land is today to what it can become — building each phase intentionally so that investments made now support the larger vision rather than needing to be undone later.

Community growing spaces provide opportunities for food production, education, cultural revitalization, and community connection. The initiative seeks to support community gardens, food forests, demonstration sites, and other projects that increase access to local food while creating spaces for learning and stewardship.

Food sovereignty depends on the transfer of knowledge between generations. This area focuses on workshops, hands-on learning opportunities, mentorship, and community events that connect youth and families with traditional foods, medicines, growing practices, and stewardship values.

The Seven Fires Food Sovereignty Initiative is intended to complement and support existing tribal, community, educational, health, and natural resource programs. We welcome conversations with tribal departments, schools, nonprofits, growers, healthcare professionals, land stewards, and community members interested in exploring opportunities for collaboration.

BUILD WITH SEVEN FIRES

Seven Fires is built through collaboration, local knowledge, and long-term relationships with the people and communities connected to the land. Every project begins with different goals, resources, challenges, and existing strengths, so our role is to listen first and develop practical work around what is already in place.

We welcome conversations with tribal programs, community organizations, growers, educators, conservation partners, land managers, and others working to strengthen local food systems, restore ecological function, and build greater local capacity.

Partnerships may include technical assistance, site and asset planning, soil and fertility systems, compost development, perennial food production, nursery planning, training, or longer-term implementation support.

If your community or organization is developing a project, facing a land or food-system challenge, or looking for technical support to move an existing vision forward, we would be glad to connect.

Let’s build from the land up — strengthening the systems, knowledge, and resources that future generations will inherit.