Keela Permaculture Farm Portugal

We are an off-grid permaculture project in Portugal. We open our homestead and farm to visitors who want to attend a Permaculture Design Course, Food Forest Course, Natural Building Course and Yoga retreats with Permaculture.

We are working on restoring an abandoned agriculture farm into an abundance of food and life through Food Forests, Agroforest and land restoration activities. We have established working Permaculture systems with various natural buildings including Straw Bale, cordwood and cob. Our in-house yoga teacher can also provide you with morning yoga when you visit us.

Permaculture Design Course

Permaculture Design Course Portugal
Design and build permaculture systems and get a certified PDC certificate from the Permaculture UK Assosiation

Eco Yoga Retreat with Permaculture

Eco Yoga Retreat with permaculture
Eco yoga retreats in nature, with permaculture workshops and more. Click here for dates

Food Forest Courses

food forest course
Learn how to design, implement and manage a food forest.

Natural Building Courses

Natural Building Courses
Stone work, wattle and daub, straw bale, clay plaster, earth bags, lots of fun and daily yoga.

Permaculture & Yoga Volunteer programs

permaculture volunteering
Off-grid community living while learning, having fun and working hard

Reforestation Program

Reforestation
Donate towards our carbon offset and reforestation program or join us in January 2020 to help plant.

Latest Blog Posts

Registering an Organic Farm in Portugal

Posted in Animals, Fundao Portugal | Leave a comment

Organic Seeds and Trees Portugal

A list of places to buy trees, seeds and general shops for your homestead for people living in the Fundao area.

Posted in Fundao Portugal | Leave a comment

What is Permaculture Part 1 – History and Ethics of Permaculture

I like to define Permaculture as a philosophy that follows three core ethics and systems designed based on twelve principles. Permaculture combines natural systems that mimic nature while incorporating modern technology. Permaculture aims for a more sustainable future by each of us producing more, consuming less and working together.

Posted in Permaculture, Publications | Leave a comment

Planting a salad garden

This blog post is to help you plan, design and maintain your salad garden for a continued supply of salad all year. This article was published in our monthly gardening peace in the Central Connects Magazine.

Posted in Publications | Leave a comment

Planting Cover crops in the vegtable garden

Welcome to the first edition of the monthly gardening blog that will feature in Central Connect magazine in Portugal. The focus of this article and future articles will always lean towards the edible garden, known in portuguese as ‘A Horta’. To download your copy of the magazine, scroll to the bottom.

Posted in Growing Annual Vegetables, Publications | Leave a comment

December in the Garden or Farm in portugal

Here is my December gardening article for the central connect magazine. Summer has ended, the rains have started, and the cold is coming. This brings new tasks in the garden and on the homestead. Here is what we are up to at Keela Permaculture Farm this December.

Posted in Permaculture, Publications | Leave a comment

Tropical Strawbale Greenhouse Shower Room

In addition to our outside shower, we have an inside wood-powered shower in our greenhouse. This gives the beautiful feeling of showering outside in nature but inside in the warmth of the greenhouse. The hot water heater heats the greenhouse, and guests stay nice and warm.

Posted in About Us, Natural Building, Permaculture | Leave a comment

Photos from Permaculture Design Course Sept 2022

Photos from our September 2022 certified two-week Permaculture Design Course. Week 1 had two theory classes per day and two practical classes per day. On the weekend, students had the opportunity to visit another local farm for a work exchange. On week two, students were split into design groups; each had to complete a permaculture […]

Posted in Permaculture | Leave a comment

Photos from Oct 2022 Natural Building Course

Photos from our 5-day natural building course in October 2022. Students got to experiment with various Natural Building methods, including wattle and daub, earth bricks, earthbags, cordwood, cob, earth plaster, lime plaster and straw bale. Please take a look at the photos below from the five-day course. You can also check our video from our […]

Posted in Natural Building | Leave a comment

Permaculture Chicken System Video

Posted in Chickens, Permaculture Chicken System | Leave a comment

Harvesting Grapes for making Wine

We run a small co-cop where we make wine collectively together and am just making this short post so share to those in the coop who are harvesting grapes for the first time.

Posted in Wine Making | Leave a comment

Planting trees in the summer

Planting trees in the summer is never ideal but sometimes we just need or want to do it. Ideally, we plant trees bare-rooted trees in Automne (or spring for more frost-sensitive trees). However, we have moved big olive trees and planted potted trees in the summer and this week we planted 21 and this is […]

Posted in Agroforestry, Reforestation | Leave a comment

How to make a sheep skin rug – Easy and quick way

A lot of homesteaders chuck away the sheepskins when the process lambs and so this is a wonderful free resource that anyone can get and turn into a high-quality natural rug. We have been making them for a few years now and are perfecting the method so I thought I would write a blog post […]

Posted in Natural Building | Leave a comment

Natural Building Applied Technology

Here are some of the technologies that can be used alongside Natural Building Techniques. To join our natural building courses please do check out this link.

Posted in Natural Building | Leave a comment

Natural Building Techniques

List of different Natural Building Techniques that can be used in a Natural Building.

Posted in Natural Building | Leave a comment

Natural and Sustainable self build building Principles

Here are our principles for natural building.

Posted in Natural Building | Leave a comment

Permaculture Diploma Portugal

If you would like to start or continue your Diploma in Applied Permaculture Design with the Permaculture Association you may do this at Keela Yoga Farm. We have opportunities as Teaching apprenticeships, teaching assistants and design work experience at our Permaculture Farm with Tom Henfrey, the only official registered Diploma teacher in Portugal. Diploma in […]

Posted in About Us, Permaculture | 1 Comment

Thomas Henfrey – Permaculture Design Educator

We would like to introduce Thomas Henfrey. Tom is a co-teacher at Keela Yoga Farm’s Permaculture Design Courses. He is the only certified Permaculture Diploma tutor in Portugal. He is an author of various permaculture and ecology books and has 20 years of experience in Permaculture and Ecology.

Posted in Staff | Leave a comment

Registering Sheep in Portugal

We have been through the process to get a licence for sheep and register sheep in our area of Fundao in Portugal and should apply to any area in Portugal I thought I would type up the information to share as it was quite confusing for us and would like to make it easier for […]

Posted in Animals, Fundao Portugal, Sheep | 1 Comment

Baby animals are so cute – births on the farm

Keeping animals are such a joy, especially when you can integrate them into the farm to reduce work load and increase fertility. Not to mention all the food you get. This year we have had so many births of piglets, chicks and lambs and here is a little into and some photos for you.

Posted in Animals, Chickens, pigs, Sheep | Leave a comment

Permaculture Internship Video

Want to know what it is like on one of our Permaculture internships? Check out this 20 min video showing what we got up to each day during the Summer 2021 internship. Remember internships are different seasonally and annually but this will give you an idea.

Posted in About Us, Permaculture | Leave a comment

Olive Press Fundao / Penamacor / Castelo Branco / Idanha-a-Nova area

List of Olive presses in our area. Between Penamacor, Fundao and Castelo Branco Area, please leave comments about the ones you have used or if you know any others.

Posted in Cooking & Preserving, Fundao Portugal | Leave a comment

Buy a tree for a gift

Gift a tree to your loved ones! A birthday, Father’s day, Christmas present or whatever occasion you like. We will do a personalised video of the tree planting for you to share.

Posted in Reforestation | Leave a comment

Chicken food forest update

We planted a chicken food forest two years ago with many species of plants. Fallen fruit and low hanging fruit will be for chickens, middle fruit for us and the highest fruit will be for wildlife.

Posted in Chickens, Food Forest, Permaculture Chicken System | Leave a comment

How to Kill Eucalyptus Naturally on Organic farms

Eucalyptus trees are bad for the environment and a fire hazard in Portugal. We have killed many areas of Eucalyptus on our farm and we would like to share with you how we kill eucalyptus trees.

Posted in Agroforestry, Reforestation, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Private Farm tour & Consultations

We can show you around the whole farm or focus on certain areas for a private tour and consultation. We will be happy to give you any advice you need and answer any questions you may have about your plans and your project.

Posted in About Us, visit us | Leave a comment

Offgird eco farm stay Portugal

You are welcome to stay and experience our off-grid permaculture farm in Central Portugal. Find out what off-grid living in nature is all about, learn from us how we got started and see some of our permaculture and off-grid systems.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Gluten Free Bread Machine recipe with Carob Flour

A simple gluten-free recipe with Carob and Rice flour, both ingredients readily available in Portugal. I just tried this one day and it is the best gluten-free bread we have made.

Posted in Cooking & Preserving | Leave a comment

Update from the farm

Here is an update on what we have been doing on the farm, information on upcoming yoga retreats and volunteering opportunities, and farm-stay holidays and experiences with us.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Closed for guests due to covid restrictions

We were set to open our doors for guests again in two weeks but last week Portugal went back into a strict lockdown, so we have to close until further notice.

Posted in About Us | Leave a comment