About White Pine

These highly researched and time-tested routines serve as critical gateways to connecting with nature, being practiced regularly over sustained periods of time. They are outlined in the book Coyote’s Guide to Connecting with Nature, by Jon Young, Ellen Haas and Evan McGown. Routines such as Sit Spot, Questioning, Journaling and Thanksgiving are seamlessly interwoven throughout our days to serve as a framework for a nature-connected life.

This lineage of Trackers from the jungles of northern India, where our founder Matt Shull’s father was born, is closely linked to our school. The stories and skills of the Shikari were passed down directly to White Pine’s founder Matt Shull from his Grandfather Ernie Shull, who spent 20 years as the Shikari Manager for the Dangs District in the gorgeous foothills of the Himalayas in India.

The famous author and Shikari Jim Corbett from the neighboring Kumaon region was the first western writer to document the ancient knowledge of interspecies communication. This, coupled with the eye of a master tracker, allowed Jim to stalk and harvest some of the most notorious man-eating cats in the region. Some, like the Temple Tiger, were responsible for killing over 300 people over a 10 year period. Like Jim, Ernie utilized his incredible naturalist knowledge, paired with bird language and tracking, to harvest several cats, like the Man-Eating Leopard of Subir. It is the skills, stories and philosophy of “jungle etiquette” that define the Shikari Lineage that we are so honored to carry.

Check out our expression of the Shikari Wilderness System and how we use it at White Pine.

We owe the philosophy of Coyote Mentoring to the work of Tom Brown Jr. founder of The Tracker School in New Jersey. This system of storytelling, inspiration, shared passion and questioning guides students towards vision. The philosophy of Coyote Mentoring evolved through Stalking Wolf’s mentoring of Tom and Tom’s mentoring of Jon Young. The beauty of this method lies in its simplicity and it’s adherence to core principles. Through Coyote Mentoring, the primary function of education is to discover inspiration, passion and vision. An awesome resource for this philosophy is the book Coyote’s Guide to Connecting with Nature, co-authored by Ellen Haas, Evan McGown, and Jon Young.

This lineage began at The Tracker School founded by Tom Brown Jr., and was further developed by Jon Young at Wilderness Awareness School. Matt Shull and several of our staff have studied and currently study directly with these Elders, who are revolutionizing the nature connection movement. We are very pleased with White Pine’s current expression of the 8 Shields Nature Connection model.

The name ‘8 Shields’ refers to a nature-based framework, created to organize a collection of design principles, practices and activities for deep nature connection and community building. Since 1983, the framework has been developed by founder – anthropologist and naturalist – Jon Young, his mentors and teachers, and an international community of practitioners. The framework is organized according to the 8 compass directions. For example, the East Shield includes beginnings, newness, birth, early morning, springtime, ‘new shoots’, and the qualities of inspiration and welcome. Based on observations of nature and an understanding of nature-connected cultures, the 8 Shields framework does not derive from any one tradition. The late elder M. Norman ‘Ingwe’ Powell and Jon Young surveyed hundreds of children and adults to assign meaning to each of the 8 directional archetypes. Much consideration has been given to how the framework can best avoid cultural appropriation while also honoring the traditions which have inspired it.

The Primitive Skills lineage was founded by Errett Callahan in the United State Southwest. The society sought to promote the practice and teaching of aboriginal skills, foster communication between teachers and practitioners, and set standards for authenticity, ethics, and quality.

We are greatly indebted to the Primitive Skills movement that has raised the bar of expertise and professionalism in the ‘Survival Skills’ world. Tracing all the way back to Grandfather Ishi and the work of Carl Pope and Art Young, we see the emergence of an overwhelming sense of value and need to document that which was being lost. The movement owes itself to dedicated skills practitioners and experimental archeologists like Errett Callahan, Jim Hamm, Tim Baker, Paul Wescott, Jim Riggs and countless other ‘mountain men’ and visionaries who had the wisdom to save and revitalize the skills that were being lost.

The Peacemaker lineage from the Haudenosaunee Confederacy came to the 8 Shields lineage through the work of Chief Jake Swamp. The story of the Peacemaker is a beautiful saga of how 5 nations came to form a peace that lasted for generations. This story also influenced the creation of our own Declaration of Independence. Because of the cultural significance of these stories, we take great care to follow all of the protocols and prohibitions that Chief Jake Swamp mentored us in.

At times we are honored to host Elders from Native American, African, Asian and European traditions. The Inner Tracking framework we have established at White Pine allows us to present culture in a way that is respectful and reverent without being religious or culturally appropriative.