Brother Fish Ranch Workshops
Hands-on.
Traditional.
Yours.
YOU WERE MADE TO MAKE THINGS
Somewhere along the way, we stopped using our hands.
At Brother Fish Ranch, we're bringing that back - in small groups, on the land, guided by people who love what they teach.
You don't need experience. You just need to show up.
The Ranch doesn't just teach you to make something - it reminds you that you already know how.
These crafts don't belong to one culture. They belong to all of us. Rattle making, drum making, and working with natural materials are traditions found across Celtic, Druidic, Pagan, Indigenous, and countless land-based cultures worldwide. At Brother Fish Ranch we honour all of those roots.
CHOOSE YOUR WORKSHOP
RATTLE MAKING WORKSHOP
A two-day hands-on experience rooted in one of the oldest craft traditions on earth. Guided by Butch MacPherson & Debby Rowland at Brother Fish Ranch, just minutes from Calgary.
Limited to 13 people.
$125 + GST per person — all materials included.
What's Included: Your rattle is crafted from a quality kit — then made entirely your own. Take it home, sit with it, and embellish it over time with fur, paint, feathers, or a crystal that calls to you
What You’ll Experience
Your hands in raw materials from day one
A craft tradition spanning Celtic, Druidic and land-based cultures
Butch's guidance every step of the way
Space to add your own crystals and meaningful objects
A finished rattle that is completely yours
All materials provided. All skill levels welcome.
Who is this for:
You want to create something with your hands, not just think about it.
You’re craving space to slow down and focus.
You value meaningful experiences over busy ones.
You’re open to learning something new in a grounded, supportive setting.
You want to leave with something you made — and something that shifted.
ADVANCED RATTLE MAKING WORKSHOP
This workshop is designed for those with some hands-on experience — whether through our Beginner Rattle Making workshop, leatherwork, beading, sewing, or any craft tradition.
If you're not sure if you're ready, you probably are.
Guided by Butch MacPherson & Debby Rowland at Brother Fish Ranch, just minutes from Calgary.
Limited to 13 people
Investment: $250/per person
Your rattle. Your embellishments. Your lineage.
Your hide is provided at the workshop — elk, moose, or deer depending on availability. You'll use cutting templates to shape it, then spend time on embellishments — painting, four direction coloured sinew, crystals, feathers, and fur.
This is where your rattle becomes unmistakably yours.
What You’ll Experience
Two days deep in the craft — building on what your hands already know
Advanced techniques for hide work, shaping and construction
Guided embellishment — painting, four direction sinew, crystals, feathers and fur
Butch's knowledge of the deeper traditions behind each design choice
A finished rattle that reflects who you are — not just what you made
Who is this for:
You've already made something with your hands and felt what that does to you.
You're ready to go deeper.
You want your rattle to carry more — more intention, more detail, more of you.
You value craft that takes time and rewards patience.
You're ready to sit with the process — not just the product.
CYANOTYPE WORKSHOP
Painting with light and land.
A two-hour workshop on five acres of Foothills country — just six minutes from Calgary.
Walk the land. Gather what calls to you — leaves, feathers, grasses, flowers. Arrange them on sun-sensitive fabric.
Let the light do the rest.
You'll leave with a one-of-a-kind Prussian blue printed scarf — made from what this land offered you, on this day.
Permanent.
Unrepeatable. Yours.
No experience needed. Just curiosity and a willingness to slow down.
Limited to 13 people
Investment:
June 27 - Stampede Bandana $95
July 25 & August 29
45 X21 Scarf $155
The land provides. You just show up.
This is more than a craft workshop.
It's a morning on the land - and a piece of it you get to keep
What You’ll Experience
A morning walk on the land — foraging what calls to you
Arranging your findings on sun-sensitive fabric
Watching the sun do the printing
The reveal — rinsing your scarf and seeing your print emerge
Leaving with something permanent, unrepeatable, and completely yours
All materials and fabric provided
Who is this for:
You want to slow down — really slow down.
You're drawn to making things with your hands.
You love being outside and want an experience, not just a class.
You want to wear something that no one else has.
You just need a reason to spend a morning on beautiful land.
15" DRUM WORKSHOP
What if your outfit told a story only you could tell?
Some things are meant to be felt, not just heard.
The drum is one of the oldest instruments on earth.
Before orchestras. Before recordings. Before earbuds.
There was a hand, a hide, and a heartbeat.
At Brother Fish Ranch, you'll spend a full day building your own 15" hand drum from the ground up — stretching the hide, lacing the back, shaping something that will carry your voice for years to come
Butch MacPherson will guide you through every step — not just the how, but the why.
This isn't a craft project. It's a reclamation.
Limited to 10 people
Investment: $375
You'll leave with more than a drum.
You'll leave with something that knows your hands.
What's included:
15" drum frame
Hide and all lacing materials
Drum beater — built from a softer hide
Embellishments — fur, coloured sinew, and a crystal
Butch MacPherson's guidance for the full 7 hours
Care instructions for your drum for life
What You’ll Experience
Learning the full drum-building process from hide to frame
Stretching and lacing your own hide under Butch's guidance
Understanding the traditions and meaning behind each step
Time to connect with your drum before you leave
Walking away with a 15" hand drum and beater, both built entirely by you
All materials provided. Limited to 10 people.
Who is this for:
You've felt drawn to the drum for a long time.
You want to build something that will last decades.
You value learning the why, not just the how.
You're ready to give a full day to something that matters.
You want an experience that goes deeper than a class.
Prerequisite: Some hands-on craft experience helpful but not required.
YOUR GUIDES AT THE RANCH
We don't just teach these crafts. We live them
Meet your hosts
BUTCH MacPHERSON
Outdoor Educator, Naturalist & Workshop Guide
Butch MacPherson is the kind of person who makes you feel like you've known him your whole life — and that the outdoors has been waiting for you all along.
A lifelong naturalist and outdoor educator, Butch has spent decades learning from wild places and passing that knowledge on with patience, humour, and genuine love for the craft. Whether he's scaling a rock face, carving a line down a mountain, or guiding a drum making circle, he brings the same unhurried presence — the kind that makes you slow down just by being near him.
Butch is an accomplished rock climber, a skilled skier, and a competitive cattle penner who has ridden alongside Debby Rowland more times than either of them can count — including at the Calgary Stampede, where their team competed against some of the best in the country.
In the workshop circle he is equally at home. His knowledge of traditional earth-based crafts — rattle making, drum building, and the stories woven into both — runs deep. He teaches the way this knowledge was always meant to travel: slowly, deliberately, hand to hand.
When Butch is your guide, you're not just learning a craft. You're learning how to pay attention.
Meet your hosts
DEBBY ROWLAND
Debby Rowland doesn't fit neatly into any one category — and she's perfectly fine with that.
She spent years navigating the boardrooms of corporate oil and gas, mentoring people through the kind of transitions that don't show up on any org chart. Along the way she discovered what she already suspected — that the most profound growth happens not in conference rooms, but in quiet moments of honest reflection.
Today she brings that same depth to everything she does at Brother Fish Ranch.
A certified 3 Brains coach and Sufi tarot reader, Debby works with the whole person — head, heart, and gut. — mind, body, soul.
She understands that real transformation is slow, layered, and often arrives sideways.
She also came 3rd out of 450 teams at the Calgary Stampede's 150th anniversary cattle penning competition — so she knows a thing or two about showing up fully and trusting what you've trained for.
At the Ranch you'll find her among her horses, chickens, dogs, and cats — living the life she built deliberately, and welcoming others into it.
Brother Fish Ranch isn't just a venue. It's what happens when someone decides to stop performing and start living.
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