Restoring a finca garden in Mallorca

The first job on an overgrown finca is not planting. It is clearing enough to see what you have, because most rural plots on this island already contain the bones of a good garden: old olives and almonds, dry stone terraces, a cistern, and mature trees worth more than anything you could buy. Restoration usually costs less than starting from nothing.

What is worth keeping?

Almost every mature tree, unless it is dangerous or dead. An old olive is decades of growth you cannot buy back, and a carob gives shade that no new planting will match for twenty years. The marges are worth keeping even where they have collapsed, because the stone is on site and rebuilding is cheaper than importing material.

What usually goes: self-seeded scrub, anything growing into a building, and the previous owner’s enthusiasm for fast-growing conifers.

What order should the work happen in?

Structure before planting, always. Rebuilt walls need machinery and boots on ground you have not planted yet, and a beautifully planted terrace that has to be walked over during a wall repair is money spent twice.

What about water on a rural plot?

This is the question that decides how ambitious the garden can be. A finca may have a well, a cistern collecting roof water, a mains connection, or a combination. Each behaves differently, wells are regulated, and municipal restrictions may still apply to what you can water and when. Establish the real, legal, year-round supply before designing anything that depends on it. Our guide to water restrictions on Mallorca covers the rules side.

Do old olive trees need anything?

They need a sensible prune, they need the scrub cleared from their bases, and they need to be checked. Olives are host plants for Xylella fastidiosa, which is established in the Balearics, so a tree that is dying back from the crown deserves a proper look rather than more water. Do not add new olives from an undocumented source to a plot that already has healthy old ones.

How much should be planted at once?

Less than the budget allows. New planting on a rural plot needs water and attention for two or three years, and a hundred plants going in at once is a hundred plants to keep alive through their first August. Owners who plant in two or three phases lose fewer plants and learn where the frost pocket and the wind funnel actually are.

What does the finished thing look like?

On the best restorations, like it was always there. Terraces holding, olives standing clear, gravel and Mediterranean planting close to the house, and the far end of the plot left as it is. That last part is not laziness. A finca that is gardened to the boundary in every direction stops looking like a finca.

How the matching works

We do not restore gardens. We pass your job to vetted companies for terracing and stonework and planting that cover your area and work on rural plots. Describe what is there now, with photographs, and they will quote the stages directly.

Clear it, then decide

You cannot design a plot you cannot see. Send photographs of what is there and vetted Mallorca companies will quote the clearance and tell you what they think is worth keeping.