Properly watering your lawn is crucial in assuring the water is getting where it is needed and not being wasted. Water used for lawn and garden irrigation can easily be wasted if it is misdirected at areas where it will just run off. Being aware of when and how much to water will save you a lot of money and save our precious water supply system.
Here are some helpful tips on watering your lawn from the US EPA!
Add Sprinkler Spruce-Up to Your Spring Cleaning List
Experts estimate that as much as half of the water we use outdoors is lost due to evaporation, wind or runoff caused by inefficient irrigation methods and systems. Before you add water to your newly planted garden this spring, do a little “sprinkler spruce-up” to clean up on water savings outdoors. It just takes four simple steps: inspect, connect, direct, and select.
- Inspect your system for clogged, broken or missing sprinkler heads.
- Connect points where the sprinkler heads connect to pipes and hoses. If water pools in your landscape or you have large soggy areas, you could have a leak in your system. A leak about as small as the tip of a ballpoint pen (or 1/32nd of an inch) can waste about 6,300 gallons of water per month.
- Direct sprinklers away from your driveway, house or sidewalk in order to apply water only to your landscape.
- Select a seasonally appropriate watering schedule that meets your landscape’s minimum needs. Better yet, select a WaterSense labeled irrigation controller—which uses local weather data so your system waters only when necessary—to replace a traditional clock-timer scheduling system.
Source: US EPA