The SCI Peneda-Gerês is located on a mountain region, with heights ranging from above the 700 m to the 1500 m in Nevosa, on the Serra do Gerês. Granitic rocks are dominant, which gives to the landscape an energetic orography and a naked character. On the far Northeast of the Castro Laboreiro plateau, between Lindoso and São Bento do Cando there are schists, grauvaques and quartzites. The presence of glacial formations is an important witness of the climatic changes that occurred in the past. The valleys shelter a dense hydrographic network (part of the basins of the rivers Minho, Lima, Cávado and Homem), which is fed by intense and frequent rains. As for the climate, the area in under a strong Atlantic influence, but also under Continental and Mediterranean ones, which changes as we move in altitude or inwards, thus promoting the occurrence of enormous habitat diversity. It is a great, imposing and beautiful landscape, with lots of diverse habitats, such as pastures, marshes and oak woods, alternating with shrub lands and pinewoods, to which we can associate an intense human activity. Livestock production is the main activity on the site.