Growing in Portugal - year one.

Started by BarriedaleNick, August 20, 2021, 16:50:16

Previous topic - Next topic

BarriedaleNick

It has been interesting this year to see the differences in growing here to the UK.  Of course a lot of knowledge is easily transferred but some things I am having to learn all over again.
Firstly my soil is massively depleted.  Nothing will grow without ferts and even with them the ground is so hard that roots struggle to penetrate unless you rotovate.  I am used to London clay but the heat here makes the soil totally brick like from April onwards.  Irrigation helps but only to a certain extent and there is only so much time you can spend watering.  Here the blue fertiliser is king - it is sold by the ton from local agri shops and delivered in lorry loads to the local farmers.  I have tried it but without rotavating deeply it doesn't do much.
The solution is as it always has been - manure.  So I managed to get 8 tons delivered only to find it way too hot and successfully killed my first sowings of virtually everything.  I should have know as it was steaming and smelled terrible but I got over excited by the prospect of endless melons and chilis - they all died or went backwards.  I found a stables and did a few car loads and that has really helped later crops and the addition of chicken poo both in pellets and from our girls has started to turn things around. 
Water - it doesn't really rain from April to October and the day time temps can get into the low 40s.  That and the wind means the soil is bone dry almost as soon as you water!  Still we have a well and pump but working out the best way to use it is a challenge.  It is so fast that it literally has lifted young seedlings out of the ground and it washed away our carefully made planting hollows.  Everyone seems to use seep hoses, drip hoses or sprinklers but I need to work out how it will cope with the pressure.  Meanwhile we have three 1000 lt tanks which we fill from the well and gravity feed with hoses - still takes well over two hours for both of us to do the veg and fruit.
Some things have done well - melons, chilis, peppers and aubergines will thrive.  Tomatoes also but the wind takes its toll on tall varieties - next year will be more determinate bush types..  Sweet potatoes do really well but my traditional spuds were a write off - they just never took hold.  Carrots and parsnips are difficult in the heavy soil but I managed in London so I will adapt.  You can, with a fair wind, grow anything here maybe with the exception of blackcurrants but it is a question of investment of time and energy.
Fruit is amazing.  We had hundreds of kilos of earl plums and are just getting the late coking ones coming on, apricots are great but blink and they will be gone, peaches have been good and the later yellow ones are just cropping.  Sharron fruit, cherries, apples, pears all do well once established and of course we are in the capital of wine here so grapes do really well - most of our vines need replacing though as they are not producing fruit.

So it has been both invigorating and hugely disappointing but I feel we will do a lot better next year and we will develop systems to help us.  Seeing what some of our neighbours have produced is hugely motivating!
Moved to Portugal - ain't going back!

BarriedaleNick

Moved to Portugal - ain't going back!

Beersmith

Fascinating!!

Thanks for sharing. Despite some disappointments you seem to be adapting very quickly and some real triumphs.

Things can only get better!!
Not mad, just out to mulch!

ACE

I noticed in some hot rainless places I have visited that they use dark chippings as a mulch, they take up the 'dampness' that happens overnight and it drip feeds the plants. The spanish islands use volcanic grit to the same effect I understand that volcanic dust is sold as a fertiliser so get to your nearest volcano and fill yer boots.

BarriedaleNick

You might be on to something there Ace - night temps are not so hot so we go get quite a dew on cars etc...
Did I mention the snails?

Moved to Portugal - ain't going back!

Beersmith

Quote from: BarriedaleNick on August 22, 2021, 11:37:03

Did I mention the snails?


That's intriguing?  What do they eat?

Do you have any native birds like thrushes that use them as a food source?
Not mad, just out to mulch!

BarriedaleNick

The snails here go into aestivation for months when it is hot and dry - they seal themselves in and wait it out.  Oddly they choose high places to do this like trees and fence posts, rather than hiding under rocks etc.  The biggest predator is people, they are sold here as caracois and they are a sort of bar snack really, not a lot to them but if you go to the beach bar you can get a huge plate of them for a few euros...
I guess the birds leave them alone but most birds here are either small tits and sparrows or massive great Storks!
Moved to Portugal - ain't going back!

Beersmith

Not mad, just out to mulch!

pumkinlover

How bizzare that the snails find the hottest and most open place. That said they do climb up windows and other surfaces here, though not in quite as many numbers. Odd that they are not predated on other than the local publicans.

Obelixx

Gardeners here tend to have munching machines to break up stems and small branches to make a woody mulch they put on their borders.  Much finer than chipped bark.  The council beds have the same and it seems to work well judging by how good the municipal plantings look on roundabouts and so on.   

We don't have enough of that so I use chipped bark on the permanent beds and in the veg plot I hide a seep hose under it in the soft fruit bed and trust to the foliage of the squashes and dahlias to keep the sun off the seep hose in their bed.   Tomatoes and chillies in the polytunnel also have a seep hose.

We grow all our brassicas under nets to keep off both chooks and butterflies and that acts as a bit of a sunscreen too so less baking.

A friend of mine whose garden is next to the Marais Poitevin which comes all the way up to the coast here has those snails too.  The ones we get here are the more usual ones seen in restaurants.  I feed them to the chooks or lob them across the road into the hedgerow or else just crush them.
Obxx - Vendée France

Powered by EzPortal