First land in semi arid steppe

Hello, we just acquired our first piece of land after living in apartments for the last 10+ years and only having a theoretical knowledge of permaculture I realize that I’ll need to go into this with observation and small scale test sites. Add to that this is a totally new climate for me (Bsk) in a new country (Algeria) I am completely out of my element. Hot summers cold winters (but mostly above freezing) semi arid and sandy, feels like desert to me but online it says steppe.

The soil is sandy and rocky, I’d like to get started right away with cover crops and pioneer trees while we are in observation stage and still trying to make the house habitable. I don’t know yet what resources are available, but I do know that i can’t just order seeds online for any variety Id like. So I was wondering about doing test patches of legume seeds that I can buy by the kilo in any store … chickpeas, cowpeas, lentils etc and I have been gathering leucaena and Carob seeds to direct plant in the sand as well. Any reason this is a bad idea as cover crop? Can I just spread them over the sand and cover them lightly or since they are larger seeds do I need to bury them more? Hoping I can water a little in the beginning and that they’ll gather dew and use their long taproots and drought resistance nature to get them through after sprouting, is this too optimistic?

Also want to look into biochar and mulching at least around the already existing trees, but there isn’t tons of wood available. Chickens and compost are hopefully in the near future.

Julie, welcome to Permies!

It sounds like you have quite a challenge in front of you.  While I have no practical knowledge of growing in arid environments, I was thinking that Black Eyed Peas/Cowpeas might be a start as they thrive in hot, dry, sandy conditions.  They could give you a viable food crop, give a decent cover crop and fix nitrogen at the same time.

You might also consider looking at putting in swales and starting either with mulch or biochar if you can find the material, though you seem to be headed in that direction already.

At any rate, congratulations on your new adventure and please keep us updated with developments!

Eric

I do not have any depth of knowledge of the steppes, but reading up that a steppe is similar to a prairie except that a prairie has tall grasses while a steppe has short grasses instead. I would consider then... you might have some fertile soil on your hands!

I think the tricky part for you will be irrigation management. I think the dryness will be a challenge. I don't imagine you have much in the way of trees or wood mass to utilize into potential hügelkultur? That might require some machinery depending how big or how fast you would want to form them but that would be after the observation stage of course!

I'm haven't grown in a dry region before so I won't give plant advice, but I would love to know what your soil looks like. If its on the richer side that might give you different options than lets say gravel would.

It sounds unique, exciting, but not out of the range of possibilities when it comes to creating a homestead.

Could you tell us more about your site?

Welcome to the forum.

I would like to suggest that compost will be a good learning tool.

Building soil health would be another great tool.

Dr. Bryant Redhawk has a great Soil Series:

https://permies.com/wiki/redhawk-soil

I would also suggest looking into rainwater catchment:

https://permies.com/t/36676/Brad-Lancaster-Waste-Transform-waste

https://permies.com/wiki/51855/Rainwater-Harvesting-Drylands-Brad-Lancaster

Julie,

I'm surrounded by such climates. Do you have reliable water source? How much precipitation does your place receive annually? What elevation are you at? How far from the sea?

I'm in a sagebrush steppe area, and my biggest issues are (a) water, (b) wind/cold, and (c) lack of organic material.

Get irrigation established, watch for well water that has sodium in it because it will get salt on the surface.

Organic material in the soil can be biochar, wood chips, compost, and cover crops. Plants like yarrow (in my area) are great because those roots go down into the soil. If they live, great. If they die, it's organic material down into the soil.

What an exciting opportunity, Julie! So glad for you!
What sort of plants grow naturally in the area?

Thank you all for your responses! We are so excited to embark on this journey, and it’s amazing to find so many people replying.

Here’s a little more about the site :
“Djelfa, [closest town] north-central Algeria, in the Oulad Naïl Mountains at an elevation of 3,734 feet (1,138 metres) is at a point of transition between the dry, steppelike High Plateaus of the north, with their chotts (intermittent salt lakes), and the Sahara (south).”

It’s a region of known for its sheep farming primarily. Around us people have individual plots of land that they pump water to irrigate animal feed mostly (luzerne?), also some trees like olives and pomegranates and apricots and figs. In fact we have some of these trees planted by the previous owner but at the moment not sure how many of them are alive because they all lost their leaves for the winter.
Those around us pump abundantly to irrigate as if there’s no end to the water. We have two wells, one which is definitely salty, by taste even, and that unfortunately the previous owner used almost exclusively to water the property. You can see the white salt traces around the trees. A second well with a much lower debit does provide clear sweet water. May or may not dry up in the summer.
It doesn’t seem very grassy like a prairie, let me get some pictures up here in another post, coming soon. Some cacti and brush and clumps here and there. I don’t recognize most of the native plants and have yet to identify them. First step is to find a nearby apartment to rent so we can fix up the house already on the property (essentially a concrete skeleton at the moment) and be on site in the daytime.
We quite on accident discovered too that the region produces jujubes honey, something that made my husband very excited as a passionate hobbyist beekeeper. He’s been told by the neighbor essentially forget bees there’s too many pesticides being used everywhere, the only time they bring in bees is by the truckload to pollinate fruit trees at certain periods. So this gives us hope that maybe we can still set up a couple hives.
2,34 hectares of land total, with a little bit of a drop in elevation in 2-3 steps, so our swales are surely going to go along there. We’d like to create a wildlife habitat/windbreak/buffer around the perimeter to limit pesticides floating over here. Worried about well water contamination too.  
It seems like the rainfall comes 1-2mm at a time, a couple days a month, I don’t know how good this is for collection it feels like it would be just enough to give a first rinse of the collection area before it stopped hehe.. but hopefully if we can add organic matter +++ it will help the soil hold more of that water for longer. I’ve heard of brad Lancaster I definitely need to read his stuff thank you for reminding me !

Ive read on other peoples forum pages that sometimes in arid/semi arid that too much mulch is counterproductive and the rain doesn’t reach the soil at all before evaporating. So maybe we’ll start by just mulching the preexisting trees that we’ll irrigate with sweet well water and rain water on drip, since we don’t have very much mulch material yet anyway. And try to make a ground level microclimate with dense cover crop planting while pioneer trees get started.

Speaking of pioneer trees, I’m torn between getting the seeds started in little trays and transplanting, or rather putting the seeds directly in the ground. I’ve read about the tap root going deeper in directly seeded trees than in potted and transplanted trees, but does this apply for seedlings too? We’ll probably be one week on, one week off site for at least the first year (currently living about 4 hours away).

An idea for biochar : a few hours away is a date palm oasis. People there burn away literally tons of date palm fronds every year. I know there’s more to biochar than how they are burning so maybe i need to haul in a truckload of the material and do a controlled burn on the property myself. Does anybody know if date palm fronds (deglet nour) would make for good biochar fuel?

As for yarrow I don’t know if it’s available here. To bring back in seeds one day maybe. But at least I know I can buy cowpeas and chickpeas fairly cheaply and they are supposed to be drought resistant at least.

Wow that’s a lot more than I expected to post. Thank you for reading and responding and helping me organize my thoughts in writing too

One more note I forgot to add : The climate of Djelfa can be defined as continentalized Mediterranean, since the temperatures are similar to those of the Mediterranean climate, but the winter is quite cold, while the summer is very hot. Rainfall is not abundant. Precipitation amounts to 275 millimeters (10.8 inches) per year: it is therefore scarce. It ranges from 11 mm (0.4 in) in the driest month (July) to 35 mm (1.4 in) in the wettest one (September).

Julie,

I also have continentalized Mediterranean with great diurnal differences and rather cold winters. I get freezing night temperatures in December and part of November. I get more rain, I would say 500 mm on average. Because of that I'm surrounded by oak savanna, so there is more organic matter around me.
With this little rain you need to provide water to the plants. From the fruit trees you mentioned, olives are most hardy, but mine produce almost nothing, because I'm not watering them and they don't like my cold nights. Pomegranates without watering will drop fruits.
Salty water in one of your wells will at some point oversaturate the soil with salts.
Apples, quinces, plums, mulberries seem to grow better in my climatic conditions than Mediterranean classics.

Whenever I search for any resources regarding plants I want to grow, I always look for "high desert", which is even more extreme. If it grows there it will surely grow on my land.
Most advises in English for Mediterranean climate found on internet will be for California and despite I am in California (350 m elevation) it will be mostly irrelevant due to my diurnal temperature variations, late/early frosts and drying winds that I have.
Mountains are simply different and extremely variated climatically. If you are in the valley, be prepared for temperature inversion. Because of that in 2022 I had last frost in the middle of May. Nobody believed me, but my chestnuts, pistachios, pomegranates lost all leaves and one old fig was killed together with a smaller one. Surrounding areas get last frost in January.

Besides the fruit trees I mentioned, the other plants that grow wonderfully are melons and watermelons and I'm going to plant 160 of them this year - 50 different cultivars.
Grapes also proved to be successful and I will be planting over a hundred soon.
Vegetables are difficult to grow. If I grow them in winter season, they are outcompeted by the grasses that just need above freezing temperatures to germinate and grow, so by the time even the cold hardy plants like cabbage or spinach germinates, they are surrounded by a meadow.
Summer vegetables fail due to drying winds and too high temperatures. So far I had only 3 tomatoes (3 fruits) and I planted tens of them, various kinds, supposedly "heat loving". Zucchini and okra grow very well.

The other success are sheep. They eat grasses and vegetation that I can not eat and produce top quality meat that I can and want to eat. They also produce a lot of manure that I mix into my soil with the wood chips that were used for barn bedding.

Thank you for all these wonderful tips! I hadn’t thought to try melons and watermelons, I thought they’d require too much watering, do you irrigate yours?
We’re thinking of starting with goats before sheep they seem more beginner friendly hah but maybe I’ll be proven wrong. Lots of people around us are doing sheep so at least I know they should do well around here.
Do you get dewy mornings with the cold nights and warm days? Are you able to take advantage of it for the plants if you do?

Yes, I do irrigate. Trees/bushes with irrigation system and the garden manually. For years I tried not to irrigate and everything was failing miserably.
Trees are getting 30-40 liters per week per tree when it's hot. Bushes half of that. Melons and watermelons 2 l per day when hot.
I plan to lessen amount of water once everything gets established, but the objective is to produce high quality food.
Regarding the goats, I think the opposite. Goats are more sensitive to elements. They would not survive in my make-shift barn too long. They don't like to be wet. I have hairy sheep - St Croix.
Mornings are dewy after the rains. In late spring, summer and even late fall it's too warm for any dew.

Wow, there's a lot of potential there, Julie!

My land in Bulgaria is also classified as steppe. Very hot summers, coldish winters (zone 7). Is supposed to get 15" of rain evenly spread through the year but the last couple of years have seen far less, we seem to be in a rain shadow. Last year had a severe summer drought. My neighbours have a beautiful and abundant garden but irrigate heavily, and also build shade structures to cover heat-sensitive plants like their tomatoes in the hottest part of the summer. Like your property, summer rains come a few mm at a time, then autumn and winter have big rain events with storms. I need to work out a swale system to stop that water just running off as my land is also sloping.

The existing trees and shrubs that seem to do well in my garden with no irrigation are quince and hazelnuts. The apple and cherries also cropped. The peach dropped all its fruit.  I'm not there full-time so irrigating new plantings isn't an option, and I've simply planted lots of seeds to see what will grow on rainfall alone. Unfortunately a neighbour "helped" by weedwhacking the garden area in late spring and again in early summer last year, killing most of my squash and hazelnut seedlings. One hazelnut survived both cuts, despite the drought, and some squash regrew but didn't develop mature fruits.

Autumn plantings for trees and shrubs once the temps have dropped from the summer highs  seem a good idea because what rain there is comes in autumn and winter. Unfortunately my husband was ill and I missed the October trip when I intended to plant lots of seeds.

I'll be interested come spring to see what grows from the seeds I scattered around last year. But for spring planting, I'll need to work out a system to use minimal water but get more trees and useful groundcover growing. Planting in hollows to catch more rainwater. Using drip or capillary systems like ollas that can go three or four weeks between being refilled.

Julie Baghaoui wrote:
It seems like the rainfall comes 1-2mm at a time, a couple days a month, I don’t know how good this is for collection it feels like it would be just enough to give a first rinse of the collection area before it stopped hehe.. but hopefully if we can add organic matter +++ it will help the soil hold more of that water for longer.

Ive read on other peoples forum pages that sometimes in arid/semi arid that too much mulch is counterproductive and the rain doesn’t reach the soil at all before evaporating.

First of all, it's probably good that you'll be busy in finishing the house the first year. It would be good to wait and watch, and see what plants are there, and alive, and what they are. Also what the neighbors grow and what they say about what does well (or not). Keep notes about temperatures, weather, when you see things blooming or fruiting, or neighbors planting, or whatever. That way you'll have some idea next year.

I live in the high desert, very very little rain or snow, and very high evaporation. It's pointless to hope that the rain would soak the soil deep enough to get to the roots. We don't get rain that soaks a whole inch (2 cm) down into the soil, not once a year, maybe once in 5 or 10 years, but then it might be a disaster locally with flash floods and deaths.

So my garden is entirely dependent on irrigation not rain or sprinklers, and I mulch as much as I can, and it really helps.  The traditional garden and irrigation systems here are diverting local streams through canals, and doing flood irrigation into beds surrounded by raised lines of soil. My location has the local stream dry until the middle of the growing season, so I have to use my borewell water to irrigate for the first half of the season.

I use more or less permanent mulch and never till or plough, so my soil has been getter darker, softer, fluffier, and richer every year for the five years since I started this garden. Not tilling also means that instead of re-forming the beds every spring and making delicate little raised lines of soil, I made big fat raised lines that serve as paths between all the beds. The first year, when I had a digger machine in for other work, I had them dig out the soil two feet (60 cm) deep. I got some help and removed the stones and mixed some manure in it, and since then have just been mulching, and sometimes adding compost on top as now I'm finally producing compost.  

I'll attach a photo of my garden the first year. In the subsequent 4 years the soil has improved under the mulch, and I got pretty lush productive growth and vegetables from it.

Hi Julie. Happy to see you've gotten some wonderful advice already. I totally agree with Rebecca to build the house until livable and observe first...
It could be a good idea to get to know all the local flora. Look up every flowering plant that catches your eye. Bring in seeds from that and divisions, bring whole plants if they're abundant. Those plants will nourish and house insects which will keep plagues better in check.

You could get some plant nursery established on the north side of the house, like the people in Jordan i believe it is where Geoff Lawton has a desert program.

That Luzerne sounds interesting. Nitrogen fixer, deep tap root, i've seen it doing quite well here in poor low calcium granite soil.
Turned out it is a localized variety. Luckily it didn't get grazed and flowered and i've gone and harvested seeds and used those in the garden. Not that many came up when i think of it, maybe i should do a more protected grow out, see if that results in better rates... Hopefully you're lucky enough to find some of those if not many from a neighboring farmer.

I don't know what people think of the goats? I've seen goats climbing trees in Morocco. I hope you get spared. Some friends here had fenced their whole property crazily at high costs and still they got out to ruin trees of neighbors. If their head can go through they manage to squeeze everything through. They rip off bark of trees killing them. They're harbringers of deserts. That's all i know of them. But i could totally be wrong.

DO they have IBC totes in Algeria? Water harvesting will be very important.

What kind of horrible prickly shrubs grow over there? Here we have may thorn and sloe. Dreadful for tires, but they grow hedges with them. To keep animals in or out. They have a suckering habit. Shoot up like mint does from the roots. They can gain a couple of meters if not cut down.
I keep telling the farmer to let it go. I want to plant trees in the middle of a grove. Just mimicking nature.
Birds love to hide in there, they're relatively safe from predators and the berries are edible at some point. SO the soil gets richer over time. As well the leafs drop and small branches. It used to be punishable by whipping to burn down a maythorn grove, they called maythorn the oak mother. People were more sensible in the middle ages than we give them credit for i came to conclude. (just kidding)
So you need horrible prickly shrubs in your life, we all do.
There surely must be something that plays that role.

Do you have a picture of your place? That can sometimes trigger a lot of ideas and comments.

Love reading all your responses! Here are some quick pictures :

Trees look very much dormant to me. Remind me of peach trees.Dead trees quickly lose small branches.
Should think of a way in desalinating the well water in a passive way.
Just thinking out of the box hère..
What if you'd have an IBC tote full of salty water on the south end of the building in full sun. Air tight connected to a hosepipe which you'd hang on the north side against the 'colder' wall from the top snake it left to right and back again and manage to get airflow pulling through the hose or push the air with a fan on solar electric...
In theory this système must give some desalinated water.
The fan kicking in just after sun down forcing the hot watervapor through the fast cooling pipes...
Pipes underground,...
No idea.

Or superdroughtresistant trees. Like those edible cacti. I've seen people bury a few of those leafs with newly planted trees. And another person in Texas dessert planting thousands of cactae to kickstart a forest.

When watering my plants in the hoop house in summer. I do deepwatering. Better to get the water deep in the ground than just at the surface. Better give a few trees a lot and give up on some others that don't stand a chance.. Maybe the strongest can be saved to be brought to seed...

Challenging for sure. Devil is in the details as they say. But thinking about principles and trying crazy stuff ,small scale, failing, thinking again, improving again. Sharing online. Using the expérience of others... It must lead to a robust system.

Looking at the images I would classify it as semi arid on par with low yearly precipitation of around 250 mm.
Make sure to take care of the trees that you already have, because establishing anything in such climate is quite difficult and I think they need to be irrigated to produce any fruits.
It would be great if you got sheep and started incorporating their manure soaked bedding into the soil for the future garden. Remember that goats may easily destroy your precious trees. Is there any pasture/meadow on your piece of land?

Are there holly oaks (Quercus ilex) growing nearby?

Some varieties of holly oaks have sweet acorns which can be eaten like chestnuts. Otherwise, livestock loves to eat the acorns and leaves.

Glad I persisted and searched what you had posted beside the tortoise.  
The aerial view of the property is a huge observation advantage for you.   Learn from the previous owners successes and failures.  With the permaculture knowledge you have gained and have available map out the existing structure with notes of whether it worked and what permaculture principles were applied or ignored. and could make it work better.  

The well water question is what salts are actually in the water?  Some salts will actually be advantageous for animals.  which brings up the question of goats versus sheep.  Depends on your goals.   The size of your holding would not indicate the goal of raising meat as a primary goal.  Cycling the produce of your land to make it more productive for your needs is the appropriate goal.  An area that produces abundant grass would be suitable for a sheep and rotational grazing but would that meet your household needs.   A dairy goat can be kept in a small pen and fed from the produce of the land that you do not eat.   I have many years of experience with both.  Sheep go under fences but goats go over the by jumping or trampling.  My recommendation is to look for a location as you draw up you permaculture plan where you could build a secure pen that you pass by from the house to the land and feed the animals.  Start with chickens maybe rabbits and when the land is producing a surplus add a goat.  

If you want bees you want flowers first to keep them from going to where they may be poisoned..  So that may take some time to observe and develop continuous sources.

It sounds a lot like where I live. We get a bit more rain, but not much.  I would consider okra and sorghum. Also, tepary beans from the desert southwest of the US and Mexico.  Lucerne is a name for alfalfa.