Douro Valley has had an extra wet April, when normally the rainy season is over. According to ADVID (Associação para o Desenvolvimento da Viticultura Duriense - Douro Valley's viticultural association) this sesaon's precipitation is 25% above normal, and for the month of April 200% above the 30-year average. While this may not seem excessive, the intense April rains resulted in some of the older terraced dry walls falling down, (and flooding in Régua). Since Douro Valley is a Unesco World Heritage Site, based on a criteria that man has shaped the land to include the traditional walls and terraced vineyards, some financial aid is possible to rebuild the walls. A saving grace.
With more rainfall one may presume that means more grapes. Not the case; the weight and volume of the clusters will be heavier. The result will be at harvest, 4.5 months to go. There is a saying “don’t speak about the weather – you are always wrong!”.
Springtime wildflowers in abundância - our 5 km/3.5 mi nature trail offers this added perk. Also, as Quinta do Tedo is located in an ecological reserve, the variety of birds here is most impressive and their songs so melodic, to include the Oenanthe leucura aka black wheatear, the bird that inspired our Quinta do Tedo logo.
Horse Tedo, plowing the land, turns the soil to “breathe” and incorporates the nitrogen-replenishing leguminosae plant family (to include beautiful lupines) and the compositae (daisies, asters, marigolds, etc) and the gramigna plant families (grasses) that work against erosion.
Spring has sprung!