In and through the rolling hills of Connecticut in North Stonington is a working farm. The farm is called Better Together Connecticut Inc. (Non-Profit). What they do there is both unique and amazing in their community and industry. It’s operated by Dr. Stefana Pecher and recently we had a great conversation about her upcoming event. It’s the 2nd Annual Hempstock!
Ring-Ring (I know phones don’t ring anymore. Get over it. It’s for dramatic effect.)
Me: Hello? Hi. Is this Dr Pecher?
Pecher: Yes. How are you doing John?
Me: I’m doing well. How are you today?
Pecher: Excellent, thank you. Excellent.
Me: So is this going to be your second annual hemp stock?
Pecher: Yes, it is. Yes.
Me: What are the dates for the festival?
Pecher: So, this year we have the VIP infused dinner, Friday, August 5. But this is not a public event. It’s private. It’s for everybody that helped put it together along with our guest speakers and entertainment. Hempstock is Saturday, August 6, and the rain date is Sunday, August 7. But I don’t think we’re going to need that.
Me: Before we start talking about bands, burgers, and CBG; tell me a little bit about your farm. Tell me about the farm and what you do on the farm. I know you do a thing with veterans. Tell me more about that.
Pecher: So it’s kind of a miraculous thing and really it’s one of the positive things that came out of Covid. We were able to structure our services and our holistic services for veterans and the community, but also first responders because we work with a lot of them. And so on the farm we have the mini horses that are a therapeutic mini herd. And these little guys are not for riding, they’re just for touch therapy and grooming and grounding and things like that. We also have chickens and then we have the actual farming itself, which is a form of therapy. So these three things, that’s what we’ve got on the farm right now we’re still developing some art therapy programs and that should be coming up in the fall. But for now that’s our main focus because we’re very busy on the farm doing the actual work with the veterans.
But now it’s interesting, we’ve kinda’ partnered with UConn students of cannabis and different professors have kind of come out of the works and started working with us so that we can actually expand all of our hemp, organic, regenerative, sustainable farming, but not just hemp, vegetables too, to provide food sustainability for the community. So we’re doing a lot with local school lunches, and feeding seniors.
The second half of what we’re doing for veterans is over at the Country Wellness Center, which is across the street. And that’s where we have all of our holistic wellness services in addition to classic medical services. So over there we’ve got a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, floating salt pod, sensory deprivation chamber, infrared sauna, halo therapy, dry salt therapy, reiki massage, along with a few other things.
So what we’re doing with this particular festival now, we are raising funds so that veterans can have access to all of these things for free at no charge.
And why do we care? Because we’ve actually seen such benefit that one of the patients, a veteran himself, a longtime patient of mine, was so compelled to help us after he had a long bout with Covid and that hyperbaric chamber helped, just one treatment. And he was compelled to share this with the rest of the world and started to send letters to insurance companies, etc. So it all just came together in this beautiful way, he’s going to be running the stage this year.
So we’re raising money for veteran services, but also for those therapeutic mini horses since they have vet and food bills.
Me: Are you still offering your hemp curriculum?
Pecher: Yes we certainly are and we’ve got lots of people working with us on that. Yeah, this year we focused more on CBG hemp so we’ve got some beautiful strains of like Langhorn and as usual we coopt with our veteran farmer friends. Not only do we cover the entire area of seed to table but now we’ve added cloning and we just got our CO2 extractor. It does a pound at a time. It’s just a little one.
Fantastic Music Line Up
The Rowan Brothers, Soulshot, “Sandman” Sandy Allen, HannaH’s Field, The Mike Crandall Band, Natasha Gambrell Shadow Dancer, Lee Mixashawn Rozie, DOPEY LOPES & The UP ALL NIGHT BAND, and Cuppa T. Jones: House of Blues.
Me: Aside from bands and your educational pieces, are there going to be any guest speakers like last year?
Pecher: Yes. So, Senator Summers has sponsored us and she always helps us with all kinds of things. We have a whole bunch of speakers, they’re all scientists this year. They kind of came out of the woodwork. It’s incredible. And on top of it we got Haven Earth out of Texas to come up here and give us a workshop on Hemp Crete and Hemp tiny home building.
Yeah. And that’s the stock that everybody throws away. Well, that’s what we’re using to build. So it’s a whole other approach. It’s not just like, oh, weed, get high. Well, that’s nice. Yeah. Everyone have a good time, no problem. But at the same time, it should be like, well, what’s happening out in the world? And we are very behind here, like in Europe and Asia, everywhere people are adopting this and already doing it. And we’re not even beginning. It could really change how we live.
Me: Are you doing any food vendors and stuff this year?
Pecher: Yes, we have food vendors. There’s Sarcastic Suites, Eastern Peak Watch, they’ve got a very nice restaurant in Charlestown, and i thought “Why can’t we grill burgers and why can’t we use all of our organic produce?” So we’re doing that too with a few other creative recipes.
Me: so what’s the price of admission to Hempstock 2022?
Pecher: Online it’s $20, and at the door. It’s $25, but veterans are half priced and kids under twelve are free.
Click here for the website and tickets.
