Saving water when gardening

For saving water in your garden, you need to plan first what type of plants you are planting in your garden whether it is appropriate or not for your environment and is it necessary for the plant to be watered regularly. You can also gather information on drought tolerant plants (such as hebes, lavenders, buddleias and rosemary), plants that do not need regular watering (such as echinacea, ceanothus, geranium and red hot poker), garden water features and different types of lawns which include synthetic turfs and various grasses from couch grass to buffalo grass. It is good if you could plan a water-efficient garden that has healthy and compost soil which can retain moisture and provide nutrients. In order to save water when gardening, you can use lots of effective ways and below are some of the things that you can do.

What you need:

  1. Drip Irrigation Systems
  2. Fertilizers
  3. Grass Seeds
  4. Lawn Sprinklers
  5. Drought tolerant plants
  6. Plants that does not need regular watering
  7. Soil Polymers

Method:

  1. Ensure your sprinkler system always in good condition and immediately repair any broken, missing spray heads or emitters.
  2. Install a drip or low-volume irrigation system which enables you to save more on water usage.
  3. Do less mowing, do not rake up the clippings and also avoid over watering the lawn. Your lawn needs only 1 inch of water per week and if you are using a sprinkler, you can test by collecting your sprinkler water in a can in order to know how much water is being used.
  4. Do not water unused portions of your lawn and let it turn brown and use the water instead for other things.
  5. Replace lawns and plants that needs heavy water demands with drought-tolerant plants for example hebes, lavenders, buddleias and rosemary.
  6. Before watering, you must check your plants for any moisture for instance whether the plants has curling leaves, a grayish color and permanent wilting, which indicate that it is under watering. For over watering case, you can see that the plant leaves will turn yellow and in the end it will drop.
  7. Always keep your beds and lawns weeded because weeds steal moisture from your plants. Besides that, mix soil polymers which can retain moisture into your garden soil. Use this option when you are planting beds or containers, or drill holes around the soil of your existing plants and place some of the polymers inside them. You can also use mulch in order to retain moisture inside the soil.

Additional Reading:
http://www.ehow.com/how_2136_conserve-water-garden.html
http://www.savewater.com.au/how-to-save-water/in-the-garden

Image Credit:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rachelpasch/2698362377/