Kathy Blakeslee's passion for organic gardening and growing medicinal herb plants, roots and barks along with the study permaculture and garden house design gave birth to Ashbury Herb Gardens, this organic herb farm is  tucked away in the rolling hils of Baraboo in Sauk Country, Wisconsin.  Kathy was the fomer owner of Spring Valley Garden's in Loganville, Wisconsin which she created in 1982. This diverse herb farm featured over 300 unique varieties of culinary and medicinal herbs. Additionally Kathy featured a  cooking school 'from garden to table' in which customers could gather their own organic vegetables and fresh herbs from the gardens to prepare in their recipes they cooked in their classes in Kathy's cooking classes held in her stone garden set in middle of the herb gardens.  Spring Valley Gardens was featured in many national publications including on the covers of 'Grower Talks' and 'Horticulture' magazines, that business has since been sold.  Kathy and her husband Joe now spend part of their life in Baraboo, Wisconsin where she created another organic herb farm called  Ashbury Herb Gardens and sells now only at the Dane County Farmer's Market in Madison in the early Spring where she still has the same booth and location which she has held for the past  24 years and now due to her busy schedule of consulting and travelling her farm is no longer open to the public but you can see her on Saturday mornings at the farmers market in Madison, WI  in early Spring, the rest of year she lives and teaches in the San Francisco Bay Area.  Kathy is also a botanist, horticulture  and permaculture instructor, author and phyto medicine specialist and consultant for the Harmony Project llc. based in Tanzania, Africa (www.harmonyproject.biz). She is also involved with studying indigneous cultures and their medicinal healing plants along with their extraordinary uses.   Kathy is also an herbalist and a certified Holistic Life Coach  continuing her strong desire to support the both organic and environmental movements in the United States.

Kathy is  an active member of Bioneers, Dane County farmers market,  Marin Organics, Slow Food Nation, Herb Society of America and Olbrich Gardens.  She has worked with Alice Waters, Smith and Hawken and Agua Bella Organics in the San Francisco Bay Area among others.

Kathy hopes to write a book soon on her studies and exploits in the herb world and her journeys abroad where she will share her accumulated  knowledge of her years of growing herbs, organic living, teaching alternative  healing practices along with phyto-medicine.   The title of her book may be  ' Indigenous cultures and their healing secrets '

 Kathy focus to bring together some of the most extraordinary visionaries in today's world to help her carry out this vision.  

 Kathy's mission is: to heal through natural medicines and to learn more about phyto medicine and teach it's applications.  Kathy provides inspiration, products and services which will empower you to reclaim the basics of an organic lifestyle, sustainable habits, a life of healthy organic food along with the extraordinary spirit of living in community with a shared purpose.