Introducing the montado, the cork and holm oak agroforestry system of Southern Portugal

Abstract

The Portuguese montado is an agro-silvo pastoral system quite similar to the dehesa in Spain, and covering in Portugal most of the Southern region of the country, Alentejo. The trees in the montado are cork oh holm oak, and the system is mostly acknowledged due to the cork production, but also due to its singular savanna like land cover pattern, its multiple and complementary productions, the support of a diversity of ecosystems services and its biodiversity. The present special issue covers the diversity of components of the montado and of perspectives required to understand and assess the functioning of the system. This Editorial introduces the montado system, describes its extension and similarities to the dehesa in Spain, and addresses the multiple productions and externalities of the montado. It also refers to the several components of the system. It focus on the uniqueness and values of this system, stressing its potential and threats, and the requirements for integrated knowledge production. In the end of the Editorial, each one of the papers that compose the special issue are presented.

Mushrooming Communities: A Field Guide to Mycology in Community Forests

“…Apart from cork oak montados, which are ancient agroforests still ongoing in latifundiary regimes below the Tagus river [24], most forests result from pine and eucalyptus plantations that disrupted and replaced the complex agro-silvo-pastoral systems that existed in Central and North Portugal, which connected life at the villages with the mountain areas [25,26]. Agriculture was produced in an intensive regime of polyculture which was made possible through the access to the common lands that were true multifunctional spaces and provided pasture, natural fertilizers (brushland), firewood and a diversity of natural products such as mushrooms, berries, medicinal plants, construction materials, water, among others.…”

Overgrazing in the Montado? The need for monitoring grazing pressure at paddock scale

“…Depending on historical use and location, montados can be structurally and even functionally very diverse (Pinto-Correia et al 2011). This diversity that generates imbalances between feed resources supply and demand, should be well understood.…”

“…This is particularly pertinent in complex agro-silvo-pastoral systems such as Mediterranean oak woodlands (i.e. montados in Portugal and dehesas in Spain, covering *3.5 million ha (Pinto-Correia et al 2011)), (Fig. 1).…”

Bases ecológicas para implementar un sistema de uso silvopastoral en la región patagónica de Aysén, Chile

“…Es por ejemplo el caso de las explotaciones de dehesas en España y de los montados en Portugal, muy estudiadas desde diferentes disciplinas (Marañon 1988, de Miguel y Gómez-Sal 1992, Pineda y Montalvo 1995, Etienne 1996, Schnabel y Ferreira 2004, Mosquera-Losada et al 2005, Rigueiro-Rodríguez et al 2008, Jose 2009, Pinto-Correia et al 2011. Es conocida su eficiencia en el uso de la energía y los nutrientes , Gómez Gutiérrez 1992, San Miguel 1994, Pineda y Montalvo 1995, Joffre et al 1999, de Miguel 1999, Olea et al 2006, Moreno y Pulido 2008, Gaspar et al 2009) y su independencia de fuentes externas de energía (Campos Palacín 1984) ya que el reciclado de nutrientes se produce de forma constante y casi automática, con escasos esfuerzos por parte del hombre (de Miguel 2002).…”