Every day, shepherd André Gonçalves leads his flock of sheep and goats across hundreds of hectares of the Amendoeira Golf Resort in Alcantarilha, part of the Algarve's Silves municipality, giving the courses a rural trim under the curious gaze of visiting golfers.
Along the paths around the resort and its two golf courses, 70 sheep and 20 goats graze on grass, brambles, scrub, and olive shoots. In doing so, they keep the vegetation in check and reduce the need for human or mechanical intervention.
Both parties see the arrangement as a win. The resort cuts its environmental clearance costs and boosts wildfire prevention, while Gonçalves gets a free source of feed for his animals.
André's closeness to the resort, where he once worked in maintenance, helped nurture a relationship that is now more than a decade old.
“'ve lived next door for many years and I worked here for six or seven. I was always asking to bring them onto the course. There's plenty of grazing, it's near my house and it's good for both sides,” the shepherd told journalists in an interview with the Lusa news agency.
His passion for shepherding began in childhood, when he kept his grandfather company on the pastures and spent his time playing with the animals. He only started building his own flock at 20.
“I've had animals for 23 years,” he says. Shepherding is no longer his only source of income, as he also works as a gardener and tree feller. “I let them out in the afternoon, or for a little while in the morning. It depends on the weather.”
On a circuit of four to five kilometres, usually twice a day, around a resort of roughly 270 hectares, the sheep and goats “keep things tidy”. They munch the “tender green grass”, the brambles and the wildest scrub, he explains.
The resort's management “no longer needs to send anyone to clear it, [...] they eat everything”, he says of the fertile land on his doorstep. It is “a great help'” and a place “where there's always food”, sparing him from having to “go further afield”.
“I like walking here. I always see the foreigners playing golf, so I've always got more company than if I were up in the hills on my own, haven't I? It would be lonelier otherwise,” he says.
Golfers react with curiosity. They take photos, humoured by the sight of the herd at work all around the course, and “say they don't normally see it at other courses”.
Eliana Silva, from the Amendoeira Golf Resort's marketing department, explained that this complement to the resort's usual upkeep began “organically” but has since become part of everyday life for everyone involved.
The aim “was always to try to make sure both sides came out ahead”, she stresses. “For André, it's incredibly useful to have somewhere his sheep and goats can eat and enjoy healthy pasture, and we end up with a much cleaner, much prettier golf course, and the golfers themselves find it rather amusing.”
The resort stands at Morgado da Lameira, where a working farm once stood. Twenty years on, helping “a young shepherd who is trying to keep [the trade] alive is a way of reviving tradition and honouring that heritage”, Silva says.
Guided tours for tourists will follow shortly, but the resort wanted to do a little more to “give value to shepherding”. It has produced a 2027 calendar featuring local shepherds, with ten men, one woman and one couple.
'Each of them will tell a little of their story,' says Silva, and proceeds from a gala on 18 November will go to the shepherds to ease their veterinary costs.
Source: LUSA
Photos: TSF
