Our Philosophy

Some of our ecological ancestors were fungi partnered with cyanobacteria. In remembering this, we acknowledge that we live on unceded Abenaki territory where blood, bones, and living chords lie below soil. As "settlers" living during 'The 6th Great Extinction,' aiming to transform extractive into regenerative systems, we nurture foundational partnerships with microbial, fungal, and botanical networks.

MycoEvolve honors the cradle to grave potential below and around our feet. When we tend ecological networks we revitalize, and facilitate socio-ecological rehabilitation; rewiring, realigning into eventual rematriation where our shared earth homeland is equitably tended. We learn and practice interspecies communication. Listening, observing, sensing, responding

MycoEvolve aims to reconcile how humans are disturbing earth's balance. Through research, earthworks, and education we support land tenders to consciously, diversify habitats to support pollinators' resilience, protect the watershed, grow eco-literacy, and facilitate equitable land access. As we nurture trophic networks, in which we are nested, we facilitate interspecies collaboration and renewable resource sharing synergy.

---

Contact Us

​Long Term Vision

• ​Traditional indigenous practices coupled with sound restoration science guide land management in site specific mycoremediating, phytoremediating green infrastructure*  
• Community members enhance water quality, pollinator habitat, and equitable land access through how they tend surrounding landscapes**
• Youth, versed in ecological literacy, grow earth care and repair skills, while living balanced lives protecting and revitalizing  resilient ecosystems. 
• Original Peoples regain access to ancestral homelands and lifeways while all marginalized groups and beings thrive through nurturing earth community partnerships.

*Including mycorrhizal &/or saprophytic fungi, and pollinator friendly, native polyculture flora, particularly along: rivers, drainages, point & nonpoint source pollution sites.

**Including farms, residences. lawns, school campuses, business fronts, property edges, parks, highway embankments, golf courses, industrial zones, brownfields, and Superfund sites.

---

Team

Founder, Earth Tender, Researcher, Educator, Facilitator, MycoLab Member & Mentor
Jess Rubin (she/her, they. we) practices listening to and reading surrounding landscapes. While gardening and wilderness guiding, Jess earned herbalism, nature awareness, outdoor education, & permaculture certificates, a BA from Cornell University in Ecological Literature with Native American Studies minor, an MS in Environmental Studies with VT middle & high school science teaching licenses from Antioch NE, and a MS with a concentration in Ecological Landscape Design from UVM Plant Soil Science Department. She served as a nature mentor, wilderness guide, university farm co-manager, Waldorf earthcrafts educator, public school science teacher, environmental studies college adjunct, university guest lecturer, scientific researcher, conservation crew leader, ethical rewilding gardener, and corridor monitor, while remaining a lifelong student of trophic relationships. 

As a restoration ecologist and educator, dedicated to interspecies collaboration for ecological reconciliation, Jess aims to ethically rewild landscapes. Jess tends MycoEvolve's community branch Mycolab, while serving as a Myco-Phytoremediation Research Technician in the UVM Plant Soil Science Department. Jess fosters eco-literacy in school programs and writes plays about watershed health for Very Merry Theater. She offers community members opportunities to grow eco literacy, ecological restoration science knowledge, and technical skills on local farms and in urban wilds. Additionally, she serves on the leadership council of Vermont’s Fungal Scientific Advisory Group (FSAG), which aims to elevate fungi through documentation, increasing understanding of fungal communities, diversity, sensitivities, and role in natural communities for conservation. She is honored to mentor high school students in King Street Center. She is grateful to her ancestors, mentors, and collaborators.   Relevant resume.

---

Myco-Phytoremediation Research Intern
Ruth Stumpfoll (none/any) is an undergraduate student at UVM studying plant biology and music. In an effort to reciprocate the nurture of plants, Ruth has contributed to restoration work and bringing creation care into their place of worship in Maryland. Ruth’s love of learning inspires them to continually grow, whether as a gardener, cellist, or sword fighter. Ruth is excited to practice conscientious science and foster interspecies relationships with MycoEvolve.

---

Rematriation Assistant
​Marlie Hunt (she/her) is a proud Auntie, sister, daughter, friend, dancer, weaver and most importantly a student of her community and the Earth. She is currently an undergraduate at UVM studying English and Agroecology. She grew up in Addison County as the youngest of four on a dairy farm. Her family has a deep ancestral history in Vermont on both her father and mothers side, pulling her to continue to strengthen the long line of land based relations that her family holds dear. Marlie hopes her work at Shelburne Farms will support her own relationship to land, create community connections and strengthen a space for Indigenous community members to be involved in land tending and medicine making.  

---

​Volunteer Coordinator, MycoLab Core Member
Brianna Arnold (she/her) is a creative facilitator, song carrier, youth mentor, and student of earth. She received a BA in Plant Biology from the University of Vermont and has pursued studies in permaculture, outdoor education, yoga, and collaborative leadership. Brianna fosters her passions for education, nature and stewardship as the Educational Programming Coordinator for Branch Hill Farm and as a mentor for youth and teens with ReTribe. She has also volunteered with the Caliata Initiative, a participatory action research group that supports Indigenous agrarian communities in Ecuadorian highlands. Woven through Brianna's service are values of joy, courage, patience, and tikkun olam, translated as: repairing the world.

---

Photographer & Videographer, MycoLab Core Member
John Howard  (he/him) is a photographer and videographer (of Black Oak Media LLC) who is passionate about conservation, land stewardship, healing damaged ecosystems, and public land access. specializing in creating media for environmentally and socially impactful businesses, as well as artists, creatives, and inspired people.  Website: john-howard.com

---

Abenaki Plant Teacher and Consultant for our Shelburne Farms Research
Grandmother Carol McGranaghan was born and raised in Vermont and is a member of the Abenaki Nation of Missisquoi. She served as Chair of The Vermont Commission on Native American Affairs for several years. Her presentations to schools and libraries around Vermont have and continue to include subjects on Abenaki culture, history, and customs as well as plant identification, care, and use of wild plants. She has provided testimony to the Vermont Legislature on the Vermont Eugenics Survey and other topics which affect Abenaki. She has also served on the Racial Equity Task Force and serves on the Friends of the State House board of Directors. She guides us in plant palette and harvesting strategies traditional to her peoples on her ancestral lands and facilitates educating Abenaki youth (via Circle of Courage), and works with other Abenaki  such as Holly LaFrance of Alnobaiwi in our research plots. You can read more about here here in her work with the Abenaki Artist Association.

---

MycoLab

​MycoLab is a network of  scientists, educators, practitioners, academics, community organizers, artists, students, and volunteers, collaboratively led by a core team. As the community branch of MycoEvolve, MycoLab facilitates connection and learning through hands-on experiences, bioregional engagement, and educational resources. We aim to be an activated, compassionate node for Earth Care Community. 

---

learn more

Community Support

MycoEvolve is grateful to work with talented beings. Our team consists of project-oriented, seasonal, Covid-responsive, grassroots nurturing networks. Many life forms (living & transforming) were/are foundational to our inspiration & endurance. A special shout out to all Original Peoples, youth, elders, marginalized humans, community volunteers, interns, specialists, young workers &  Radical Mycology Community .

Learn more

MycoEvolve in the Media

Learn more

We Are Ready to Ground Into Land

​We listen for where we are called to land, root, and tend, in service to watershed Pitawabagok
​ (known by Abenaki as 'The Lake Between;" by settlers as "Lake Champlain").

learn more about OUR dream home