In the middle of winter, when the earth is sodden and claggy, it is difficult to imagine the heat of summer and the irrigation that same earth requires. We have learned to work with the land, and use the natural springs which occur in sometimes convenient, sometimes inconvenient places. Once we started our planting scheme on the hillside at the front of the house, we installed a small depositó [water storage tank] below the big fig tree [below].

This collected water from a small spring and fed it via a system of black hosepipes [all agricultural hosepipes are black in Spain, they come in a bewildering array of dimensions] to the areas to be regularly irrigated. We planted a few climbers around it, and a couple of years later it was covered nicely. It does the job effectively and uses our natural spring water, which is free and gravity-fed from the spring. In 2013, we extended an irrigation channel down the hillside so it would water a line of elfas [oleanders] planted beside the steps. Fed by a black hosepipe from the small depositó, a stream of water would trickle down the hillside from plant to plant. That was the idea, and that is the irrigation system used by all the local farmers. So, first the channel was dug… … the tap on the hosepipe was turned on and the water started to trickle…… it reached the elfas …… until finally, the water ran through it from top to bottom. 5 to remember
pegajoso/a – claggy/sticky
inconveniente – inconvenient
una manguera – a hosepipe [although locally here it is referred to as una goma]
desconcertante – bewildering
una selección – an array