How Much Water to put on Your Landscape


How Much Water to Put on Your Landscape
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Information on the plants and landscapes below can be found at www.bewaterwise.com	Watering no more than is necessary saves you money by lowering your water bill, is better for your plants, and helps protect the environment from unnecessary runoff and the pollutants that tend to go with the runoff, such as fertilizer and herbicides. So how much should you water? That depends on a number of things, such as the type of grass and soil you have, and how well your irrigation system has been designed and maintained. Here are three easy ways to get very near the perfect watering system.
Water Calculator example: 1. Go to the Water Calculator 2. Enter: the Long Beach zip code '90807'... 3. .that you're interested in your front yard. 4. .which is covered with Bermuda, a warm season grass,... 5. .that you have sandy soil,... 6. .and you use sprinklers to irrigate, as oppose to something like drip irrigation. The Water Calculator recommends watering the above site from a low of just 12 minutes per week during November, December, and January; to a high of 32 minutes per week from April through August.	Tune up your irrigation system Calculate how much to water during "normal" weather using the WATER CALCULATOR Based on your answers to questions about your landscape, the WATER CALCULATOR tells you how many minutes to water per week during 'normal' weather. You only need to do this calculation once, or until you change your irrigation system or landscape. It should only take a few minutes. See the example on the left. In hot months, like July, when a lot of watering is necessary, its best to have multiple start cycles per day, rather than running the sprinklers for long periods of time - the latter practice often leads to a great deal of water loss through runoff. Now make simple adjustments for "Actual" weather conditions Now that you know how much to water during "normal" weather, you can adjust for "actual" weather conditions using the WATER INDEX.
	Several inexpensive irrigation controllers allow you to make adjustments to the normal watering schedule using '%' increases or decreases. With the %-adjustment controller you can easily fine-tune your watering on a weekly basis using the WATERING INDEX.
Water Index example: 1. The Water Calculator recommends watering 32 minutes per week during July (see the example above). 2. Set your controller to run 4 days per week, 8 minutes per day (ideally you will have two start-times per day, running 4 minutes per start-time). 3. Every two weeks or so, set your %-adjustment to the then-current Water Index. In this example, if the Water Index was 29%, we would set our %-adjustment to '29%' of the 32 minutes, watering less than 10 minutes per week.	To Begin: Use the WATER CALCULATOR, mentioned above, to figure out how many minutes per week you should water during a typical July (when plants need a lot of water). Second: Adjust your automatic timer so it waters the correct number of minutes per week in a typical July, spreading these minutes over 3 or 4 days. See the example in the box to the left. Don't do an entire day's watering at once, if possible, break it up to two start times. For example, if the Water Calculator recommends watering 32 minutes per week, rather than setting your timer to one 8-minute watering per day for 4 days, set the timer to 2 4-minute periods per day for 4 days. This pause between watering gives the water time to soak into the ground, significantly reducing runoff.
	Third: look up the current week's WATER INDEX and set your %-adjustment feature to the percent shown at that site. A lot of water can be saved using these inexpensive irrigation controllers and making these simple adjustments every couple of weeks.
	If you would like more information on irrigation systems, read the irrigation handbook discussing the layout of the typical irrigation system, the component parts, different kinds of irrigation (spray, drip, etc.), flow rates and pressure, types of PVC pipes, and the major issues when designing or maintaining an irrigation system. And don't forget to sign up for the free California Friendly Landscape classes offered to customers of the Long Beach Water Department.
~ Thank you for conserving water - our most precious natural resource ~