In a destination where climate stability is the main economic asset, the debate arises about whether ancestral knowledge can coexist with data analytics: Are cabañuelas (traditional weather forecasting methods) useful for planning the tourism business in southern Gran Canaria? While scientific models dictate the operations of large tour operators, the tradition of aberruntos (traditional weather forecasters) and natural observation remain an ethnographic resource that, for many local business owners, offers an alternative interpretation of the arrival of heat waves or harsh winters that digital tools cannot always accurately capture.
Canarian folk wisdom has historically sought to decipher atmospheric patterns through systematic observation of the environment. In the islands, where sustenance depended directly on the land and sea, the cabañuelas and aberruntos became established as manuals of magical thinking to reduce climatic uncertainty. This oral tradition allowed farmers and sailors to interpret symbolic languages in animals, plants, and celestial bodies to plan their daily tasks months in advance.
The cabañuelas method in the archipelago is based primarily on analyzing the first 24 days of August. The first twelve days predict the weather for the coming months in ascending order, while the following twelve, called "retornadas" (returns), do so in descending order. Figures like Horacio Dorta keep this practice alive on the coast of Los Silos, also using meticulous observations in December and January, where specific time slots are assigned to each month to detect changes in the wind or sea conditions.
The term "aberruntos"—a local expression derived from "barruntar" (to sense or have a premonition)—constitutes a causal relationship between a natural sign and a future prediction. Canarian folklore holds an extensive repertoire of these signs: the behavior of ants covering their nests foretells rain, while the appearance of nocturnal bumblebees heralds heat. Even domestic elements come into play, such as the belief that a sock with a hole in the toe anticipates a year of drought or that the crowing of roosters before ten o'clock at night indicates an imminent change in the weather.
Endemic flora also serves as a strategic indicator for the Canary Islands countryside. The flowering of verodes (a type of shrub) on rooftops before the leaves emerge is traditionally interpreted as a harbinger of a prosperous year ahead. Similarly, the visual analysis of Mount Teide from Tunte, or the color of the clouds—pink for heat, blue for cold, and black for rain—forms part of an empirical methodology based on the repetition of past events, carefully preserved by oral tradition.
Although current technological devices offer real-time forecasts with scientific precision, the ethnographic value of these methods remains a cultural treasure. For the tourism sector in southern Gran Canaria, these practices now represent more of a historical curiosity than a business planning tool. Nevertheless, the persistence of these predictions serves as a reminder that, in the Canary Islands, the climate continues to be the backbone of life and the economy, maintaining an invisible thread between ancestral knowledge and modern meteorology.
