Awakening the soil (1) - a dance of Rye and Yeros

Our land has 150 almond trees, planted in rows. The soil is very dry, there are a lot of rocks, the land has been grazed by goats and sheep for many years. It has been plowed and compacted. We want to create biodiversity, but also respect the almond trees which are already there. How do you do that?

Our first step has been removing the rocks from the soil. Also, we wanted to protect it from livestock for a while, so we used an electric fence.

In November we covered the first part of the land with sheep and goat manure out of the local stable. We sowed a mixture of yeros (a local pea - legume) and rye. Yeros is a great fertilizer, while rye opens up the soil with its deep root system. Both together are a wonderful combo to let the soil know something to nurture it is coming. We covered everything with a layer of 2-3 cm of ecological straw.

We are december now, it looks like the seeds are sprouting and we are very curious to see how they progress over the rest of the winter. For sure we keep you updated.