Cáñar (Alpujarra-Granada) is located in the southern slope of Sierra Nevada at 1014 meters altitude. Its origins as a settlement date back to late antiquity. Although the possibility of a previous settlement is not excluded, what is clear is that the Muslim influence in the landscape still persists today, especially in the irrigation systems and cultivation terraces, with numerous channels and irrigation ditches interconnected.
In this municipality we have conducted several activities due to the uniqueness of its landscape, even within the Alpujarra, characterized by the particular relevance of its rich agrosystem. It is a cultural landscape, deeply anthropized after centuries of occupation and exploitation of its natural resources. Agricultural activity has added great environmental value to this landscape with its chestnut forests and botanical wealth connected to the traditional irrigation systems. This unique landscape is also enriched by the oak forest of Cañar, the southernmost of Europe, which survives during the long seasonal summer drought thanks to the humid mists that rises from the Mediterranean, and the net of irrigation channels that crosses it. An authentic and valuable gem of the southern side of Sierra Nevada.
60 volunteers and the Local Irrigators Community clean Barjas medieval irrigation channel. Its maintenance is crucial to reactivate the agrarian production.
Students of Alpujarra High School in Orgiva (Granada) participate in the recovery of the traditional irrigation channel of Barjas (Cáñar, Granada).
We celebrate the Grandsparents Day at the Alféizar School in Cáñar. The local elders explain to the students, using old photographs, life in their cultural landscapes.
University of Cordoba team study farms characterisation and crop management in Cañar.
Organised in collaboration with the ecology lab CEAMA, aims to understand the landscape evolution and the changes produced managing its natural resources.
UCO, IISTA and IGME monitor the historical Irrigation systems of Barjas, infiltration area of Cerromán and source of Pueblo Alto with capacitance water level recorders.
The study focuses on the use of the melt water in agriculture, the traditional distribution of resources and the institutional features of the Irrigators Community.
Topographic survey of the historical irrigation systems running through the territory, using GPS and mobile GIS technology.
Meetings with long-term purpose to improve the agricultural and livestock activity in the area, in the context of current market dynamics.
After twenty years of abandonment, using traditional techniques and knowledge provided by the local irrigators community and with help of 180 volunteers.
Exibition themes were the traditional activities, mountainous landscapes and the recovery of the traditional irrigation systems of Barjas. View the gallery
The University of Cordoba conducts a soil and agroclimatic study to determine which products would be most profitable and suitable to cultivate.
Growers from Cáñar visit plots of organic production together with ecological production associations’ partners as Ecovalle and Ortigas.
A local group of farmes from Cáñar creates an organic farming association. called ECOCáñar.
Seminar about guarantee systems in organic production for farmers in Cáñar, organised by the Universities of Córdoba and Granada and Arqueoandalusí Ltd.
UGR organised a guided tour with the local irrigator community for 32 students in Agroecology of the International University of Andalucia in Cáñar (Granada).
UGR organised a guided tour with the local irrigator community and the guides of Natural Park for 14 students of the Master in History of the UGR in Cáñar (Granada).
UGR and UNESCO-AND organised a guided tour with the local irrigator community and guides of Natural Park for 25 students from the Alpujarra High School in Órgiva.
UGR organised a guided tour with the local irrigator community for 15 volunteers that participated in the recovery of the irrigation channel of Barjas (Cáñar).
The university of Granada, Arqueoandalusí Arqueología y Patrimonio S.L. and UNESCO center of Andalucía visit the high mountain irrigation channel of Cáñar (Granada) with the environmental agent of Natural and Nacional Park and the Geological and Mining Institute of Spain.
We have began interviewing local growers about the relationship between snow and the historical irrigation systems; and the ecosystemic services provided by traditional irrigation practices at Cáñar.
Several members of Fluvial Dynamics and Hydrology research group took different measurements of flow, relief and channel bed properties of the Barjas traditional irrigation system, to assess its hydrological properties and model its operation.
Cañar's city council, with the support of the MEMOLA team, and the financial aid of the Alpujarra Local Development Association, started the recovery of a historic route which connected the village with the higher mountains
The documentary of the rehabilitation of the traditional irrigation system of Barjas with English subtitle
El sábado 28 de junio del 2014 se inauguró la acequia de Barjas en Cáñar (Alpujarra, Granada). Tras más de 30 años de abandono su recuperación ha sido posible con la ayuda de más de 180 voluntarios procedentes de distintos puntos de la geografía nacional e internacional
La limpieza de las acequias de riego es una labor que cada año realizan los regantes de Cáñar para asegurar el buen funcionamiento de los riegos durante el verano.
El viernes 6 de junio del 2014 se organizó en el Colegio Público Rural El Alféizar en Cáñar (Alpujarra-Granada) un encuentro intergeneracional en el que los más mayores contaban cómo vivían antiguamente en Cáñar
