Landscape Strategies during an epic drought

Hot Tip #1 – Don’t fertilize this spring or summer. Fertilized plants start growing faster and need more water. With some exceptions, your landscape plants can get by without fertilizer.

Hot Tip #2 – Deep infrequent watering is more effective than watering frequently for just a few minutes.

Hot Tip #3 – Only water what’s important. Vegetable gardens are making food. Trees provide shade and improve your property value. If you have an award-winning rose garden that you love, that’s important! Most of the shrubs in our landscapes can get by with no extra water.

Now, about that lawn…

Plants have lived for thousands of years without our assistance, and they’ve developed ways to cope with difficult conditions. Lawn grasses are divided into two categories, warm season and cool season grasses. All of our Tehachapi lawns are cool season grasses. They grow actively in the spring and fall, and go dormant during the hot summer unless watered regularly. Let’s take advantage of those cool season grass qualities. Water just once a week now while the weather is cool and the grass is in its active growing phase. Continue for the next month or so to let the plants store up some resources. When it gets hot – stop watering! Let your grass go dormant for the summer. Like a bear in winter, the grass is going to sleep through the heat of the summer. Dormant grass is a gold or tan color, dead grass would be more grayish.

Once your lawn has gone dormant, it is not going to green up again until the temperatures drop a little as we start into fall. The change of temperature is the cue the plant is looking for to start growing again. The experts say dormant cool season grass just needs a good soak about once every three weeks to keep the grass crown and roots alive. Start watering again in fall when the temperatures get a bit cooler and the grass will come out of dormancy and green up.

Remember, your trees have probably been supported by lawn watering all these years. When you turn off the irrigation system for the summer, you may have to drag the hose out and give the trees a good soak once or twice a month.

So, how many minutes is that on your irrigation timer? Call for a free Irrigation Check-Up! Contact Liz Block, Water Conservation Coordinator, at (661) 822-5504 or [email protected].

Our Water Heroes of the Week are all of those large shopping centers along West Tehachapi Avenue and Tucker Road that are letting their lawns go brown! And for those with emerald green lawn – free Irrigation Check-Ups are available for you, too.

For Brown Lawn Heroes throughout Tehachapi Valley, strut your stuff! Come by the TCCWD office and pick up a free lawn sign: 22901 Banducci Rd, Tehachapi.