Hay
Original title: Feno
Hay in Madeira: when it is cut, where the best comes from (Ponta de São Lourenço), the quantities entering Funchal and prices.
This name is given to grasses that are eaten by animals after they have been dried. The time for cutting hay is chosen to obtain fodder that is both plentiful and of good quality. On the coast the plants are harvested in May; in the uplands the work takes place in July.
The hay from Ponta de São Lourenço is among the best Madeira produces, but a great deal of dried grass also comes to Funchal from Caniço, São Gonçalo, Camacha, etc., for stall-fed cattle. About 500,000 kilos of Madeiran hay, generally made up of species of the grass family (Gramineae), enter the city every year. Much wheat straw comes from Portugal as animal feed.
Formerly the average price of every 15 kilograms of Madeiran hay was about 30 centavos, but this year the hay from Ponta de São Lourenço sold at 150 centavos.
Andropogon hirtus and Agrostis castellana, grasses very common in Madeira, are known by the name of hay (feno) even while still green.
In this article
Place
Places mentioned · 06
Abroad
- Camacha
Santa Cruz. Supplies hay to Funchal.
Camacha is an upland parish above Caniço in Santa Cruz municipality, founded in 1676 with its seat in the São Lourenço chapel. The Elucidário covers its church, role in the 1828 Miguelist invasion, quintas, levadas, the Poiso shelter house, its Pentecost pilgrimage, women's padded skirts, its plants and gardens, and its famous wickerwork industry started by Hinton.
- Caniço
Santa Cruz. Supplies hay to Funchal.
Caniço is a parish in the municipality of Santa Cruz, lying on the boundary between the captaincies of Funchal and Machico. Its early settlers included Gaspar Rego, Vasco Fernandes Rego and Álvaro de Ornelas, whose family founded morgados there; its alcaide and judge were appointed by the Funchal senate. The parish includes the Garajau statue, the Jesuits' Socorro residence and the Quinta do Barão da Conceição.
- Funchal
Receives about 500,000 kg of hay yearly for stabled cattle.
The capital of the archipelago and seat of the principal captaincy, where settlement began; it was made a vila c.1451–52. Its bay, the widest in the archipelago, lies between Ponta do Garajau and Ponta da Cruz and offers sheltered anchorage, though its harbour had never been studied oceanographically. The Elucidário discusses it as a health resort with climate data and records the January 1906 disturbances, the Danish prince's visit in May 1846 and recent volcanic cones in the area.
- Ponta de São Lourenço
Machico. Produces the best hay in Madeira.
The Ponta de São Lourenço is the long, narrow eastern headland of Madeira in the parish of Caniçal, said to be named after the caravel São Lourenço, with a lighthouse on its islet. The Elucidário describes its geology, seasonal vegetation, islets, fossil calcareous bodies at Piedade, land snails and use as pasture. The steamer Forerunner sank there in 1884, and a submarine bank lies between it and the Desertas.
- Portugal
Source of imported wheat straw for fodder.
Portugal, the mother country of Madeira. The Elucidário notes that artillery detachments were sent from the mainland to garrison Madeira before 1877, that Madeira was linked to Portugal by telegraph cable in 1874, and that woad and gifts of honey were formerly sent there from the island. Mainland oranges and olives are compared favourably with those of Madeira and Porto Santo.
- São Gonçalo
Funchal. Supplies hay to Funchal.
São Gonçalo is a suburban parish at the eastern end of Funchal, created in the sixteenth century, part of whose territory was added in 1927, when it also became a julgado of the Funchal comarca. The Elucidário notes its professional embroiderers producing the finest work, its levadas, its hay supply to Funchal, its shearwater hunters, and that it was the birthplace of Padre Manuel Fernandes de Sant'Ana; it contains Alpires and the Quinta do Rochedo.