Every landscape tells a story. The challenge is learning how to read it.
The purchase of Quinta Picapau began a very steep learning curve for us. When we arrived, the soil appeared reasonably good and there was abundant water. Yet the land had remarkably little ability to retain moisture.
Years of cultivation, repeated flood irrigation and reliance on agricultural inputs appeared to have left areas of soil compacted and biologically depleted. There was little visible wildlife and the ground seemed heavily dependent upon regular irrigation and continued intervention.
Our first attempt at growing fava beans was a disaster. What initially appeared to be a simple crop failure became an important lesson. We gradually realised that we had been looking at the crop when we should have been looking at the system supporting it.
Over the following decade our thinking changed considerably. We began questioning many of the practices we had previously taken for granted and increasingly focused upon the relationships between water, soil, plants, animals and biology. From that process the Monchique Stewardship System began to emerge.
It is the framework we now use to maintain focus, guide our decisions and share what we are learning with anyone interested in our work.