Mark Shepard heads Restoration Agriculture Development and Forest Agriculture Nursery, but is most widely known as the author of the award-winning book, Restoration Agriculture: Real-World Permaculture for Farmers. Restoration Agriculture is based off his experiences at, New Forest Farm, and represents his belief in the ability of sustainably grown perennial food crops to feed us into “our resource-compromised future”.

New Forest Farm, located in Viola, Wisconsin, was once a worn-out rowcrop farm and has since become a 106-acre showcase commercial-scale perennial agricultural operation. It is considered by many to be one of the most ambitious sustainable agriculture projects in the United States. The farming system layout was founded on his innovations in engineering the runoff distribution, retention and control of water throughout the property. Next he implemented his take on adaptive mass-selection breeding with use of select perennial crops based off plant families abundant amongst the oak savanna, successional brushland, and eastern woodlands ecotypes that constituted the region prior to commercial agriculture. With the water management infrastructure in place, trees, shrubs, vines, canes, grasses, forbs and fungi were planted in likeness to their respective ecological niches, and organized to optimize efficiency in harvesting and management. Hazelnuts, chestnuts, walnuts, and apples are the primary woody crops. Various ongoing tree crops research sites are nested about the farm as well, and are an important feature in his adaptive, resilient restoration agriculture system.