Chile Forum

MadTexan wrote:It looks like region 11 will work for a small time farm endeavor. Are real estate prices rediculous there? I am sure they aren't as cheap as the Pategonia region, but the only websites with listings to see are in Pategonia or Lakes region. About 10 to 20 hectares of good land with a mountain view would be just right. If I can't live in the mountains I want to at least look at them from my front porch! (and go hiking on weekends in them : ) : )

Good location, easy to access, cheap, we usually get to pick any two. Anyhoo, here is another set of RE listings, some farther north:

http://www.viviun.com/Real_Estate/Chile/Farms-Ranches/

On this real estate site you can select a region of Chile (or a town/city name from the dropdown list) You can start with keyword Aysen for the eleventh region.

http://www.compra-venta.org/chile/inmobiliaria.phtml

More adverts in Aysen region

http://www.bienesonline.com/chile/36/ai ... t/terreno/

Suzyandkids wrote:Well, as the wife I'll say I'm skeptical not so much about the weather but us being able to full fill the goals in moving in the cold regions. Up until 3 days ago I was under the impression we were moving from central texas to Belize (which was also his idea) so we could grow all our own food, work into the language slowly, etc... Now we are suddenly moving to the mountains of Chile. I'm just unsure of us being able to full fill the reasons my husband said we were moving for there.

Is it possible to grow all our own food, be self sufficient, etc.. up in the mountains?

Yea, but not sure it is cost effective when you consider that the farmer down the road is likly able to do it cheaper. Still, people do it.

If you move to the Patagonia (south of Puerto Mont is what we consider Patagonia), it will be cold / rainy about 80% of the year. Snow at lower elevations is even possible late in to the season. North of PM, rain is really your biggest thing at lower elevations. This year there was some freak snow storms from PM to about Temuco, but that happens once every 20 years or something.

Mountains are everywhere.

The Bio Bio river south is where the temperate farming climates are to be found.

OK I must have a bad map or something, because I was looking at the region that contains Temuco, and it shows region 11 and a warm, temperate climate and lots of farming going on and not much snowing. It most definitely doesn't classify it as Pategonia. What region is Temuco really in, lol.

MadTexan wrote:OK I must have a bad map or something, because I was looking at the region that contains Temuco, and it shows region 11 and a warm, temperate climate and lots of farming going on and not much snowing. It most definitely doesn't classify it as Pategonia. What region is Temuco really in, lol.

There are some unscrupulous types who wish to cash in on the cachet of the word "Patagonia" and have redrawn the maps they use to advertise themselves.

Temuco is in the IX or ninth region and I froze my arse off when I last visited that city in May (remember that I normally live among penguins). The city air is foul in winter. Admin can tell you about the indigenous folks (Mapuches) who are prepared to scalp those that they feel are improperly on their ancestral lands.

There are lots of areas in the central part of Chile that are serious agricultural areas. They are very beautiful.

They do not look cheap to me, compared to the local prices in Central and Eastern Oregon.

At various times, I have been fairly close to what many folks mean when they say self-sufficient, growing nearly all my own food. My advice is that in order to do that, you must have good soil, access to plentiful water, and a decent long growing season, with both chill hours and sufficient warm season to ripen fruits and vegetables.

It takes money to get yourself set up self sufficient in power. Wind generators, solar generators cost a packet to get set up and producing. But it can be done.

You'd have to be really devoted to the idea of self-sufficiency to produce your own cloth and sew your own clothes. It's a much better use of your time to buy them.

If you want beef, you need land and pasture, but you can raise rabbits and chickens in very little space and be self sufficient for meat.

Money to pay taxes on the land can be a problem if you are sustenance farming.

It's difficult to farm without gasoline or diesel. Biofuel from seed to tank would be possible, but an awful lot of work for the amount of return.

At any rate, to be self-sufficient, you have to be able to grow crops, so unless you intend to live 100% on mutton and never eat anything else, the Patagonia might not have enough growing season.

oregon woodsmoke wrote:...so unless you intend to live 100% on mutton and never eat anything else, the Patagonia might not have enough growing season.

It's a very old myth, and myth only, that we eat nothing but mutton down here. In fact it has become almost uncommon in the eateries. Personally I never touch the stuff because although my mother was a Kiwi she could not make any variant of the animal edible. But the locally raised beef in southern Patagonia is generally excellent -- open range and mostly free of antibiotics. And much of it is exported to the more northerly parts of Chile. And of course there are the fjords full of fish cages for the local production of salmon. Naturally neither of these are of much use to a small self-sufficiency producer, but the mention is meant to clarify what we have to eat in the far south.

If MadTexan and tribe can deal with the rather mild winter weather of the lower Simpson river valley or the aforementioned nearby Mañihuales valley area in Aysen, I suspect that some degree of self sufficiency could be achieved by experienced people. There is a great deal of flowing water in the region, and if one is willing to import a Pelton wheel generator assembly, then microhydro could be in the cards.

Pictures inside greenhouses in Mañihuales and some at the Aonikenk aggie school at Pto Ibañez . Some from rainy days
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... rr_097.jpg
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... rr_087.jpg
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... rr_109.jpg
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... rr_105.jpg
Note use of local wood in framing the invernaderos
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... SR_010.JPG
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... SR_009.JPG


Greenhouse exterior with view of mountains that the MadTexan indicated he desired; note this is winter view
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... SR_008.JPG

Solar fruit dryer design used at the aggie school. Which reminds me... dried fruit brings a good price in Chilean shops esp in the far south where it is imported, so if production exceeds self-sufficiency demand, some marketing may be an option.
http://www.fpa.conama.cl/archivos/2010/ ... Frutas.jpg
MadTexan family's new neighbours holding part of the solar fruit dryer at the aggie school

The Mañihuales area, 12 km from the town itself
http://ecoaustral2010.files.wordpress.c ... en-007.jpg

Picture at the only service station in town of Mañihuales, with view of one of the transporters of young salmon. The salmon are raised to a certain size in farms around Mañihuales and then transported to the cages in the salt-water bays around Puerto Aysén.
http://ecoaustral2010.files.wordpress.c ... en-010.jpg




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Thanks admin guy, I am looking at biobio and Temuco areas now. When you say temperate, how cold are we talking in the winter and how warm in the summer? Websites are showing mean temps of 40s in winter and 60s in summer.

Decide what you mean by mean temps. Mean temps usually mean an average between the high and low temps. You probably want to find the avg highs and the avg lows.

Yeah, that looks to be max 75 in the summer and min 20 in the winter. Rare for snow. Does this sound correct? A person can expect several days in the summer in the mid 70's and a couple nasty winter days below freezing? I looked at the historical records and there were even some days that hit 100 in the summer. One site had a bar graph just showing mean temps that put the max at 60 for summer and 40 for the winter, so I am guessing for summer that would mean some days at 75 and some at 50?? To average 40 in the winter I am guessing 30 to 50 temps most days?

My apologies, Patagoniax. I didn't mean to imply that life couldn't be good in Patagonia. Surely just about anything you want can be shipped in.

I only meant to say that it is difficult to produce everything a family needs in an area with cold winters and a short growing season. Life would be rather limited in such an area if one did not purchase items and relied 100% on what they could produce on their own land with their own labor.