Many thanks to my friend Alfredo Sendim for inviting me to hold a course at his amazingly diverse Herdade do Freixo do Meio farm. It is run as a cooperative using many innovative agricultural methods, inspired in particular by Ernst Goetsch and Syntropic Farming! I was very happy that Fernanda Botelho also joined us to share her knowledge on local edible plants!
The 3 videos at the end show Agroforestry methods on the farm at Freixo do Meio, olives intercropped with a wide diversity of edibles and other useful plants!
The day started with my lecture
The course participants were joined by a group of farm workers and well known Portuguese forager /herbalist Fernanda Botelho!
Group hug of one of the ancient olive trees!
Ancient olives
Fernanda with the biggest dandelion we found!
Alfredo Sendim, whose family have owned the farm for generations, lead a long 5 hour tour around the farm…here showing how this cork oak was scarred by poor cutting in the past!
Typical form 0f Pinus pinea, umbrella pine, source of pine nuts, an important crop in this warm, dry area of Portugal!
Water is important for the animals…
Pistacia lentiscus, the mastic tree!
Acis autumnalis and Scilla autmnalis had appearedin response to the first rains after a prolonged drought!
Medronheiro, the strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo)
Medronheiro, the strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo)
Asparagus….woody plants here…just beginning to sprout!
Acis autumnalis and Scilla autmnalis
Quercus ilex ssp rotundifolia? (Holm oak), an important product of the farm!
Field mushrooms, the first of the autumn!
Pinus pinea
These acorns were actually quite sweet !
There was large diversity on the farm where machinery couldn’t reach…here with Pistacia, Ruscus aculeatus and Umbilicus!
Umbilicus rupestris
Me with Fernanda Botelho
Smilax aspera (young edible shoots like asparagus)
Stephen Barstow 30 October · Pistacia lentiscus, mastic tree
Calamintha nepeta
The seed grinding rock!
The transport home was a cattle truck…here with my friend Jorge Carona!
My accommodation on the farm!
Prickly pear with acorns and acorn biscuits (bolota)!
Showing the diversity of acorns on the farm (pictures taken by Alfredo!)
The agroforestry area.
Whitethroat? in the Agroforestry area
Stonechat in the Agroforestry area
The Egg Temple
They had a few deer in a compound next to the Egg Temple…apparently the hens were healthier with deer nearby..
Dwarf Pomegranate and Canna
Canna
Canna
Clouded yellow and lucerne
Lily
Blackcurrant sage
Mentha suaveolens
The delivery van returning….the farm sells though their shop in Lisbon
More traditional CSA area
More traditional CSA area
Oxalis corniculata, edible weed on the CSA area
The shop
Clouded yellow butterfly on lucerne:
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Great excitement yesterday morning (11th July 2017) to hear the familiar call of nutcrackers in the garden of the rectory where I’m staying here in Hurdal! Excited to see cones falling from the tree (cut off by a nutcracker), and lots of empty cones on the ground! More information with the pictures!
I’m the “Preacher” in residence this week staying in the rectory (presteboligen) which is now run by the ecovillage ;)
I was sitting working with the window open and I heard the familiar call of a nutcracker….
In the garden, I found several good looking pine trees!
5 needles suggests probably Pinus cembra, Swiss Pine, Arolla Pine or Austrian Stone Pine (Cembrafuru) (I saw this species recently on my trip to Austria) or the closely related Siberian pine (Pinus sibirica, previously P. cembra spp. sibirica) (Korean pine, P. koraiensis, is another possibility)
P. cembra and sibirica pine nuts are important food for Siberian Nutcrackers, mainly an invasive species to Norway (when there’s a failure of the nut supply in Siberia). However, many Pinus cembra trees have been planted in Norway in the last 30-50 years as ornamental trees and many of them are now producing nuts….in Trondheim, near where I live, some nutcrackers stayed after the last invasion and are now a local breeding bird thanks to the presence of their main food supply! The birds are now helping in the spread of this species as they cache the seeds for the winter in the forest as well as locally (there are now thousands of young trees growing invading woodland on Lade in the city)! Nutcrackers have also sowed seed in my own garden (where they also feed on hazel nuts)…
Under the trees was littered with the nut shells and empty cones
P. cembra and P. sibirica are also species with nuts large enough to be useful as edible pine nuts for humans along with Pinus pinea – Mediterranean Stone pine Pinus koraiensis – Korean pine Pinus gerardiana – Chilgoza pine Pinus pumila – Siberian dwarf pine Pinus armandii – Chinese white pine Pinus bungeana – lacebarus cembra – Swiss pinek pine
I opened and cracked a few pine nut shells
We took these along as an exclusive offering for dinner that we had been invited to :) They weren’t fully ripe… would probably have been best to store the cones first…
Pine nuts and cones on a bed of Plantago major!
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
