Masseira is a unique form of traditional

farming Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled peopl ...

practised in

Póvoa de Varzim Póvoa de Varzim (, ) is a Portugal, Portuguese city in Norte Region, Portugal, Northern Portugal and sub-region of Greater Porto, from its city centre. It sits in a sandy coastal plain, a cuspate foreland, halfway between the Minho River, Minho ...

and

Esposende Esposende () is a city and a municipality in Braga District in Portugal. The population in 2011 was 34,254, in an area of 95.41 km². The city itself (the parish Esposende, Marinhas e Gandra) had a population of 9,197 in 2001. It gained cit ...

in Portugal. The masseira technique increases agricultural yields by using large,

rectangular In Euclidean plane geometry, a rectangle is a quadrilateral with four right angles. It can also be defined as: an equiangular quadrilateral, since equiangular means that all of its angles are equal (360°/4 = 90°); or a parallelogram containin ...

depressions dug into the sand dunes of the region, with the sand piled up into banks on the sides of the depression. The term ''masseira'', from the

Portuguese Portuguese may refer to: * anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal ** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods ** Portuguese language, a Romance language *** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language ** Portu ...

for "kneading trough", refers to their characteristic shape. This practice has fallen into disuse.Póvoa de Varzim, Um Pé na Terra, Outro no Mar. The masseira technique relies upon a rectangular depression surrounded on four sides by sloping banks, known as the ''quatro valos'' ("four walls"). Each individual depression covers an area from 1,000 to 10,000 square metres.

Grape A grape is a fruit, botanically a berry, of the deciduous woody vines of the flowering plant genus '' Vitis''. Grapes are a non- climacteric type of fruit, generally occurring in clusters. The cultivation of grapes began perhaps 8,000 years a ...

s are cultivated on the banks to the south, east and west, and trees and reeds on the northern slope act as a

windbreak A windbreak (shelterbelt) is a planting usually made up of one or more rows of trees or shrubs planted in such a manner as to provide shelter from the wind and to protect soil from erosion. They are commonly planted in hedgerows around the edges ...

against the prevailing northern wind. Garden crops, such as cabbage, carrot,

lettuce Lettuce (''Lactuca sativa'') is an annual plant of the family Asteraceae. It is most often grown as a leaf vegetable, but sometimes for its stem and seeds. Lettuce is most often used for salads, although it is also seen in other kinds of food, ...

, spinach,

onion An onion (''Allium cepa'' L., from Latin ''cepa'' meaning "onion"), also known as the bulb onion or common onion, is a vegetable that is the most widely cultivated species of the genus ''Allium''. The shallot is a botanical variety of the onio ...

tomato The tomato is the edible berry of the plant ''Solanum lycopersicum'', commonly known as the tomato plant. The species originated in western South America, Mexico, and Central America. The Mexican Nahuatl word gave rise to the Spanish word ...

potato The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae. Wild potato species can be found from the southern Unit ...

, and

radish The radish (''Raphanus raphanistrum'' subsp. ''sativus'') is an edible root vegetable of the family Brassicaceae that was domesticated in Asia prior to Roman times. Radishes are grown and consumed throughout the world, being mostly eaten raw ...

, are grown in the central depression. The sandy soil of the banks stores the sun's heat, enhancing the growth of the grape vines. The banks protect the central area from the wind, and the depression is also cooler and damper than the surrounding land. A change in

temperature Temperature is a physical quantity that expresses quantitatively the perceptions of hotness and coldness. Temperature is measurement, measured with a thermometer. Thermometers are calibrated in various Conversion of units of temperature, temp ...

is created by banks only a few metres high. Allied with the four vine-covered slopes, the masseiras function as a sort of greenhouse. Large amounts of fresh water are required to irrigate the crops, together with

sargassum ''Sargassum'' is a genus of brown (class Phaeophyceae) macroalgae ( seaweed) in the order Fucales. Numerous species are distributed throughout the temperate and tropical oceans of the world, where they generally inhabit shallow water and coral ...

seaweed (gathered from the nearby

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

during the summer) for

fertilization Fertilisation or fertilization (see spelling differences), also known as generative fertilisation, syngamy and impregnation, is the fusion of gametes to give rise to a new individual organism or offspring and initiate its development. Proce ...

. This type of

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people t ...

was invented in the 18th century by the monks from the Monastery of Tibães, and was once widely used along the coasts of Póvoa de Varzim and Esposende. Nowadays, this type of agriculture is endangered due to the increase in popularity of conventional greenhouses, the chaotic

urbanization Urbanization (or urbanisation) refers to the population shift from rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. It is predominantly t ...

of the coast, and beach sand being extracted for civil construction. The City Hall of Póvoa de Varzim granted 4,948,377 m² (1,223 acres) of its territory for the exclusive use of masseiras as a way to protect this type of traditional agriculture.

References

External links

Masseira - Portal Municipal da Póvoa de Varzim

{{Póvoa de Varzim Landmarks in Póvoa de Varzim Agriculture in Portugal Culture in Póvoa de Varzim