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.
more “November Gardening Blog: Cover crops in the vegtable garden 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.
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.
Photos from our September 2022 certified two-week Permaculture Design Course.
Join us for our future Permaculture Design Courses
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 2-week course or join us for a future course.
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.
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 how we do it.
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 to share on how to make a sheepskin rug. more “How to make a sheep skin rug – Easy and quick way”
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.
List of different Natural Building Techniques that can be used in a Natural Building.
Here are our principles for natural building.
more “Natural and Sustainable self build building Principles”
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.
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. more “Thomas Henfrey – Permaculture Design Educator”
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 you.
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. more “Baby animals are so cute – births on the farm”
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. more “Permaculture Internship Video”
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.
more “Olive Press Fundao / Penamacor / Castelo Branco / Idanha-a-Nova area”
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. more “Buy a tree for a gift”
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.
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. more “How to Kill Eucalyptus Naturally on Organic farms”
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. more “Private Farm tour & Consultations”
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. more “Offgird eco farm stay Portugal”
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. more “Gluten Free Bread Machine recipe with Carob Flour”
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. more “Update from the farm”
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. more “Closed for guests due to covid restrictions”
We made a youtube video on our morning tasks at Keela so you can see he we start our day. There is nothing better than getting to connect with nature, get some fresh air and connect with animals and plants every morning before breakfast. more “Morning Tasks on a permaculture farm”
This winter we are planting out our newest agroforestry field in multiple stages. A field to integrate fruit crops, reforestation and sheep pasture. This week we planted in 54 fruit trees into the agroforest along swale lines. Have a read about the stages we have completed and what we have left. more “Fruit trees going into the agroforestry field”
In November 2020 we planted our first 13 trees in our new agroforestry system. We have prepared this field over the last year with swales, fencing, cover crops and a pond and now they have 13 cool new trees! This field will have a forest planted that will offset carbon, create habitat for wildlife and provide food, medicine, timber, firewood and hay for animals.
We wrote a three-page article on Sheep Wool Insulation for permaculture magazine. It talks about ways of cleaning and using insulation. More people should be using wool for insulation, this article looks at the effort vs cost saving. We have subscribed to this magazine for a few years and can highly recommend it to you. more “Our first Article in Permaculture Magazine”