Discovering the in-between:
I’ve begun exploring the land that surrounds our property. To begin with, I’m focusing on an area of 31 hectares. I started doing this because since arriving here, I’ve noticed several concrete water tanks positioned in locations above villages. I didn’t have much time or headspace to give them much thought until recently, but now I’ve become very curios to find the location of the various springs and water mines that feed the tanks.
During the morning excursions with the sheep is the best time to go exploring, with the toddler still sleeping in the shack. Though I haven’t found any water sources yet, and the project is in its early days, I’ve come to gain a new perspective on the area.
Since I started shepherding the sheep in the hills, we typically followed a series of logging tracks, tracks that have not been driven on for many years, but still navigable by foot. In my search for water, I’ve had to follow even older logging tracks - barely passable - and when I get to the end of them, need to follow game trails, the sheep in tow behind.
It’s on these game trails, made by deer and boar, sometimes even on the trails of rabbits, that I realised something about the place. Though the whole land has been engineered by humans, it’s a neglected place. But the fact that the place is neglected is not what makes me wonder, it’s that the place seams to have been forgotten…
It’s an eery, almost physical sensation, when making footprints in a place, and then to realise that there is no indication of other human presence, not for many years. Yes, there is the occasional piece of trash, as is normal in these parts where loggers work, but these occasional bottles and plastic packets don’t indicate that the place is remembered; through the years, they have become a testament to the fact that the place is forgotten, antique trash.
The place is full of life, you don’t need to look far to find a game trail, a print, a pile of scat. It’s plantation, but it almost feels wild. There are patches of pine that grow as thick as grass, clearings small and large, native trees trying (and in some cases succeeding) to recolonise areas that were denied to them. I’ve come to think of these places as the in-between, those areas forgotten by people, left to the wild animals, sandwiched between the corridors of land that are either managed, or at least visited.
The in-between is a place not to get lost in - you don’t need to walk far to get back to the world of people - it’s a place to become lost within.
I’ll be writing in more detail about my search for water in next Wednesday’s newsletter for those who are interested.
General Updates:
The rains have finally arrived, the topsoil has gone dry in places, but now it is rehydrating. From what I hear, the springtime in Portugal should be much wetter than it has been.
We are borrowing a ram for a week, hopefully we will have a few lambs on the farm by October.
My mother is visiting from England, so with the extra childcare, I have some time to get a few more chores sorted.
Preparing For The Cork Harvest:
As I wrote in a previous edition, we will be selling some of our cork this year.
I climbed down into the mixed woodland to prepare the space around the trees for the workers to strip the bark. I first used the strimmer to remove the bracken, occasionally needing the secateurs to clip away the bramble and alder buckthorn. After I’d finished on our side of the valley, I crossed the flat bottom terrace where our big chestnut tree grows, splashing through the little creek in my wellingtons, and began the work on the other side.
The north facing side of our valley is much more overgrown than the south facing side, I had to cut through many more alder buckthorns to free up the space around the cork oaks, but it was satisfying work. The buckthorns have all been cut before, so they are very bushy, I usually leave one or two shoots standing if they are not too close to the cork oaks for the workers, this way they should grow taller and join the canopy above.
After I’d worked my way passed the corks that grow on the south side of the bottom, I looked back and admired the job. The result is a space that can now be walked through much easier, with new dapples of sunlight reaching the leafy floor, which will encourage new trees to grow (so long as I maintain the balance between the invasive’s; the bracken, and the buckthorns.
Pollard Update:
I checked the pollarded oak trees the other day. It’s been almost half a year since they were cut, and now they are all showing signs of life. Of the five trees that I cut, three were quick to produce new shoots, a fourth bloomed late but nonetheless is going strong, the fifth tree is only now budding. I was worried about the last tree, but seeing the new buds is uplifting. It just goes to show how each tree grows in an individual way.
A few of the trees have grown so fast that the largest shoots are too heavy to anchor into the tree, bending downwards instead of growing upwards, I broke those branches off to give a better shot for the others. Here is a lesson that I’m in the process of learning: I think I need to let the new shoots all grow together in the future and begin pruning them after the first year. What I did with this group of trees was select the shoots to grow when they were still in the budding phase, but this may have resulted in the most successful shoots growing too fast and therefore becoming too heavy to support themselves.
Next time, I’ll let them grow together (hopefully slow enough to grow strong). The side effect of this is that I’ll definitely be providing fodder to the wild grazers by not rubbing the buds from the lower part of the trunk.
On a final note, I’d like to thank the readers who upgraded their subscription to include the full Wednesday newsletter. In yesterday’s edition, I wrote the story of how me and Jackie came to live on this land. For next Wednesday, I’ll write about the various ways that people collected and used water in this region and what the future might bring.
Now that we are settling into our new routine, Jackie has found some time to make another YouTube video, it’s available here on substack right now, bundled together with the extra newsletter as a bonus. On Saturday, it will be out for free on YouTube.
Thanks for reading along, see you next week!
The feeling of such large areas being abandoned and forgotten is very strange to me. You talked in one of your videos about the terrible depopulation of the Portugese countryside, which of course somewhat explains the situation. An interesting contrast with my own region of France, covered with forests and woods but certainly not abandoned - everywhere signs of visits, activity, management. Because this area has never lost its dairy farmers, who also traditionally lived from the forests, harvesting trees but equally things like lichen (for the perfume industry) and wild plants. I wonder how your forest ecosystem was managed before local people started leaving. Looking forward to your piece on water next week, and going to watch the video right now!