It is hard to believe that it is Christmas day next week as I sit here in my shorts and t-shirt. Current temperature is 25C. Somewhat bizarrely the shops are resounding to the usual Christmas songs (We're dreaming of a white Christmas!). Frosty looking Father Christmas's and red nosed reindeers are on sale everywhere. In the Chinese store there is a terrific choice of nativity figures including a tiny baby Jesus in a box which actually looks rather like a gremlin. There was carol singing in the church last night and we are going to see an Ice Spectacular in Puerto tonight so we are definitely getting in the mood despite the heat.
My time recently has been taken up with building the fish pond. To make it dog proof as well as water proof it was necessary to cover the butyl liner with concrete. It is a sort of a club sandwich: concrete, geotextile to protect the liner, the butyl liner, more geotextile, then more concrete. There remains to put on a finishing coat of mortar. It is a lot of work but made easier by using lightweight concrete. This is where the stone aggregate is replaced with a lightweight material; in this case, lava rock, or scoria. This is in plentiful supply here where it is known as picón. The Romans apparently built the Pantheon using this material and since that has lasted 2,000 years it will probably suffice for my fish pond.
Before this I had to finish installing my bottom drain. The dirty water flowing out of the pond is piped through the wall, behind which I will site the filtration, pump and hydroponic beds. In the picture on the right I have started concreting in the pipe and the bottom of the pond.
Once the liner and concrete was in place I could start building the pond edge. To look convincing, and in proportion, I had to use the largest stones I had available. This was somewhat back breaking work, rolling the rocks into position, checking that they looked alright, and then securing them in place with mortar.
The waterfall, unfortunately, cannot be very high as the pipe returning the water cannot be higher than the drain from the base of the hydroponic beds. It didn't help that David was off work for two weeks so I was left doing this on my own. David is quite accident prone and he managed to fall down his staircase at home, with no help from anyone, and injure himself quite badly. I am rather concerned what he could do to himself moving heavy rocks around!
Anyway, last week he limped back to work and daughter Harriet arrived too. So the work is now moving along nicely. In this picture Harriet is building a small wall to form a planting bed which I will fill with gravel for marginal plants.
We discovered another odd thing about our odd dogs the other day. Pongo likes to eat sweet melon. This is in addition to sneaking the occasional tomato. He had obviously had his eye on this particular melon for some time, waiting for it to ripen. One morning he appeared with it in his mouth, freshly picked.
However, they seem to thrive on their strange diet. Goofy with his sticks, rocks, doormats etc. Pongo with his fruit and veg. Wendy took a super picture of the 'boys' where they look very fit and healthy.
Regarding the finca and how I will be using the land, I had what I think may be a good idea. While the stony land presently growing Aloe vera will be used for a hydroponic/aquaponic project, I have always felt that the farthest land, which has good deep soil, should be used for growing crops. But which crops? Well, I think there may be a gap in the market for Christmas trees. Apart from plastic trees selling anywhere from €15 to €140 the only real trees available this year anywhere in Fuerteventura have been two feet tall, imported from Holland. People have been growing pine trees for the Christmas tree market in the SW of the USA since the 1960's, in similar conditions to here (dry alkaline soils). I will try it on a small scale to see how well they grow, and to see how many I can sell. In the meantime the seeds are on order from the US and I have the water pipes ready to connect up for irrigating the fields.
Let's see what 2016 will bring!