The Rural We: Tes Reed
The nature guide creates programs that help people find their wild and reconnect with nature.
Helping you “Find Your Wild” is a calling for Tes Reed. She works with all ages, genders and abilities facilitating outdoor experiences and retreats in the woods. She offers a wide variety of programs that range from camping in the woods for a week to a wild campfire cocktail party. “It is in reconnecting to the natural world that we find ourselves,” Reed says. Whether you’re venturing out into the wild for the first time or can’t get enough of the woods, Reed will create an outdoor experience that’s just right for you.
I still live in the old Colonial farmhouse in New Marlborough my parents bought before I was born. Dad was a dentist in the city, but he really just wanted to be a farmer. We lived on 18 acres, with hundreds of acres of surrounding woods and pasture. Dad was into the land, and I grew up thinking everyone knew how to find different plants for remedies, grow your food, raise chickens. I realized as an adult that not everyone knows this. It was thanks to my dad.
I was a criminal investigator for the state of Massachusetts being recruited by the FBI prior to becoming a mother. I decided to move home and pursue a family. When I was homeschooling my daughters, I wanted them to have an experience with a young woman who was deeply connected to the earth. I was actually dreaming up this person but found her in Michelle Apland at Flying Deer Nature Center. She even knew the name of the program we’d create: Daughters of the Earth. We got together a group of homeschooled girls, and that’s when my daughters began entering the woods with Michelle, and me alongside.
Michelle left for a while to go to Hawaii, so we started doing the program here, in my woods. When she came back we put together a girls rite of passage, which we’ve been doing for close to 18 years now. It was a weeklong camp in the woods for girls around 11 to 12. Then a mother came to me and said she had a group of eight boys that she wanted me to run a rites of passage in the woods for. So we did a separate boys programs for many years. About 13 years ago I started co-directing a three-year program for girls at Flying Deer with Michelle.
Now the kids I took in the woods when they were 10 are in their early twenties. When they come home, they want to have time in the woods. I have all sorts of women’s programs: a Wild Earth Sisters Retreat, which meets a couple time a year. There’s a Wild Writing group. People will hire me to walk their land and tell them about it. I’ve been asked to run a guided hike or have a wild cocktail party. One of the programs is a Girl in the Woods overnight where we learn the art of making fire, building shelters, discovering wild edibles and exploring natural mysteries. I can also create personalized outdoor experiences for friends and family.
I still teach water aerobics three times a week. I’m a gardener and walk dogs — doing the Berkshire shuffle. I’m so blessed. My life is really sweet.
