Introduction
The agroforestry landscape of the Empordanet forms part of a larger landscape characterised by its soft relief with gentle undulations; scrubland and small mixed wooded areas of Aleppo pine, stone pine, holm oaks and oaks in more humid areas; medium-sized fields of crops, now mainly cereals and fodder; and, finally, in the lower parts, the streams, which criss-cross these lands while flowing to seek out the irrigation channels and most important water courses.
The edges of fields and the beds of seasonal streams and torrents are spaces where the natural vegetation still grows, playing an important role as refuge for fauna and a biological corridor respectively.
In fields and on roadsides, the vegetation is very rich in species, often including very popular and much-loved plants. This vegetation offers protection and food to a great deal of fauna. Consequently, in winter the fields are home to large numbers of birds, such as thrushes and lapwings which, when the good weather comes, return to northern Europe, where they breed. The most common reptiles here include the ocellated lizard, the Montpellier snake, which can be very long, and the Iberian wall lizard. Foxes, badgers and bats stand out among the mammals.