Quinta do Vale
Details
- Commenced: 01 Jan 2010
- Submitted: 02 Feb 2011
- Last updated: 16 Feb 2012
- Location: Quinta do Vale, Benfeita, Arganil, Portugal
- Website: www.permaculturinginportugal.net/
- Climate zone: Warm Temperate
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%20de%2004022011710.png?1325694717 "Frederico Abreu"){kind=small}
.png?1298991549 "Vanessa Monge Augusto Fernandes"){kind=small}
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Quinta do Vale
Project Type
Rural, ResidentialProject Summary
Quinta do Vale is a family-run permaculture smallholding of around 3 hectares in the mountains of Central Portugal. It's in the early stages of transformation from a somewhat neglected traditionally-cultivated farm to a permaculture system which will include forest gardens, raised beds, medicinal gardens, off-grid renewable power generation, waste recycling, indigenous forest restoration, natural buildings, passive solar earth-sheltered greenhouses and various land-based crafts.
Project Description
Our steeply-terraced mountainside land presents some challenging constraints to permaculture landscaping and design so our particular emphasis is on designing to the existing microclimatic variations across the site as opposed to the more usual permaculture zones. The site has a range of different aspects and habitats to work with and year-round running water. Many fruit and nut trees/shrubs are already established and these plantings will form the basis of forest garden-style cultivation designed to improve soil health, water retention and fire resistance as well as provide eventual self-sufficiency in food.
We are close to the reserva biogenética Mata da Margaraça, an indigenous forest reserve of various oaks, sweet chestnut, wild cherry, hazel, holly and their associated shrubs and understorey, and will be using this as the model for the gradual replacement of what is presently flammable, dry and impoverished pine and eucalyptus forest above the cultivation terraces. We have enough forest land to be self-sufficient in sustainably-managed timber for building and firewood.
Various natural and traditional techniques are being used in building restoration and new construction, sourcing many of our materials on-site. Work is sympathetic to the unique traditions of the region, including the restoration of an original schist stone slab roof. In new construction we are exploring techniques in roundwood timber framing, cob, earthbag and earthen plasters.
We are off-grid with hydro and solar power generation in process. The hydro component, an overshot water-wheel, is fairly experimental and an ongoing project.
We use composting toilets and integrate grey water treatment into cultivation.
We will also be exploring and developing the use of homeopathy in agriculture as well as cultivating a medicinal garden.
We plan to move into demonstration and education as it becomes realistic to do so. Right now, our efforts are going into getting ourselves established on the land, clearing and remedial work on existing plantings, assembling our basic infrastructure, beginning building renovation and constructing raised beds for food cultivation.
We're not really in a position to accommodate volunteers yet, though we do make occasional exceptions for those particularly interested in working through these early foundational stages with us.
Geodesic dome chicken tractor
The quest for a lightweight chicken tractor for putting the chickens to work on the quinta.
Chicken quarters
It’s been the plan from day one to keep chickens, though it’s taken rather more days than that to get around to it. Keeping chickens is one thing. Exactly how to keep them is another. Free range? Tractor? Permanent pen?
Woodwork
Work has started on woodland clearing and diversification, turning the monoculture of Maritime pines we inherited with the quinta into a more biodiverse, edible and less flammable forest.
Hydropowered
After 2 years of tinkering and a lot of ups and downs, our water wheel is finally able to charge the batteries. And this despite the failure of the winter rains to so far materialise.
Seed saving gets political
Saving seed to plant next year with enough over to share with friends and neighbours could soon be literally illegal. Technically, in Portugal it already is.
Pond expansion
As mentioned at the end of the recent post on the ponds, I wanted to make the top pond larger and deeper to provide more variety in aquatic environment and a larger area of water around and in which to grow.
Making yoghurt
How to make yoghurt with a cool box, some insulation, a hot water bottle and a cat.
Ponds
I have been thinking for a while now about ways to retain water for longer in its passage through the quinta. Not just for irrigation purposes, but to increase the range of environments we have for growing and to support a greater diversity of wildlife.
Pine wilt nematode
Pinewood nematode, pine wilt nematode, pine wilt, pine wilt disease … all names given to the disease affecting rapidly growing numbers of the Maritime pines (Pinus pinaster) which form the vast bulk of Portugal’s forests.
October garden
On recent evenings it’s still been 20°C at 10pm with the yurt roof open to clear skies and the garden is showing few signs yet of slowing down for winter. If anything, we have more peppers and tomatoes coming on now than we did in August and September.
Mangelwurzels
Mystery beet seedlings from the market grow into something surprising ... and surprisingly good.
Companion planting update
In a previous post, I described what happened with my inadvertent experiment with lovage (Levisticum officinale) as a companion plant. Now there's a new twist.
Vegetable garden update
A good rain and a few cloudy days have completely revitalised the vegetable garden, emphasising again that adequate watering and shading are keys to successful growing here.
Stone steps
The terraces on this quinta are well connected by sloping ramps and dozens of schist stone staircases, but the route we use most frequently between yurt and car has, until now, involved a scramble up a slope using damson trees as handrails.
Flower power
One of the most rewarding aspects of starting to explore polyculture and companion planting in the new raised beds have been the effects of growing flowers – both ones we’ve planted and ones that grew themselves – amongst the vegetables.
New floors
As well as work on the outside of the larger building, we’ve also stripped out the floor in the left half of the building in preparation for reflooring and started cleaning and preserving the chestnut timbers.
Solar-heated outdoor shower
The solar heating system first put together in May proved workable so all that remained was to construct a shower cubicle. This was done with a stone floor and walls woven from bamboo and acacia.
Stairs
After a break of the best part of 3 months, we’ve been able to start work on building renovations again. The first priority is to complete the roof of the larger building, and to do that, we need to work on the external staircases.
Companion planting
Some sources says Lovage (Levisticum officinale) is the magic bullet of companion planting, others that it's allelopathic. Who's right and who's wrong? Or is there more to it?
Everything's coming up vegetables
Luciousness and deliciousness as the vegetable gardens start to yield fruit.
Yurt shading
It’s not rain that’s the problem when it comes to living in yurts in this climate, it’s the sun. The sun rots the canvas covers, and under the glare of the Portuguese summer sun, even a heavy 12oz canvas cover like ours will only last 2-3 years ...
Blighted potatoes
The recent untypical weather patterns have been wonderful for bringing the garden on. Wonderful for bringing on the various fungal diseases that thrive in warm, damp, humid conditions too …
Solar water heating: part 1
The first part of a solar water heating system to provide hot water for showers and living accommodation is under construction.
Hamish
A very special individual joins our project ...
Stopping for breath
With daily attention inevitably circling around all that still needs to be done to convert this land into a fully productive, self-sufficient and sustainable source of food and shelter, sometimes it’s good to stop for a breath or two.
Plumbing
Water coming out of a tap into a kitchen sink. A very ordinary photo of a very ordinary process. But when your water supply has been fetched by the bucketful from the nearby waterfall for the last year, it's a little less ordinary.
Strawberries
Discovering patches of ripe strawberries you’d almost forgotten you planted just has to be one of the greatest pleasures of growing your own! Somehow it’s even better than picking them from the beds you’ve carefully sown and nurtured.
Grapeleaf blister mite
This is what damage by the grape erineum mite or grapeleaf blister mite, Colomerus vitis, looks like. We're using canopy management to deal with grape diseases rather than spraying.
Roundwood framed outdoor dining table and seats
Making an outdoor table with integral bench seats from roundwood poles and lashing.
Polyculture planting schemes
This year’s plantings in our newly-created raised beds and Hügelbeets are the beginnings of a bigger, more diverse, species-rich and permanent scheme with more forethought and long term vision than our temporary military-style vegetable plot of last year.
Housework
Both buildings on the quinta are being worked on at the moment. A while ago we fitted chestnut doors and windows to the smaller building, and today it got a new roof.
Slugging it out
One of the main downsides to using mulch on beds is that it provides an optimum environment for the slugs. With our present duck deficiency, I have been trying a few other natural methods for slug control.
Bamboos
If the potatoes are behaving as if they’re on steroids, you can almost see the bamboo growing.
Potatoes on steroids
Or so it seems. I'm having to add a new layer to the potato box every 4 days. And this even before they had their first dose of nettle liquid plant food that has been fermenting in a barrel for them and the tomatoes …
Lowering poles
With all this raising, there had to be some lowering. Balance … Specifically, the old electricity pole right by the larger of the two buildings on the quinta.
Still more raised beds
Raised bed building is almost complete now, and planting well under way.
More raised beds
Having completed the raised beds on the yurt terrace, I’ve moved on to the terrace immediately below the larger of our two buildings.
Potato bin
Ever since first reading about cultivating potatoes vertically rather than horizontally, I’ve been wanting to try this, so in between planting trees and raising beds, I also made a raised potato bed.
Plant trees ...!
The urge to plant trees has been so strong recently I've even been dreaming about it night after night. So we've been busy getting the transition of part of the farm to forest garden underway. But then something different turned up ...
Beds raised, and Springing things
Spring is finally in the air after some welcome rain and our new raised beds are almost ready for their first growing season.
Never count your chickens before they are hatched ...
... or your alternators before they're run in. Another setback for our experimental water wheel power generation project. The new permanent magnet alternator shipped all the way from the US is a big disappointment. But we are not deterred!