Creating Beautiful, Water Efficient Landscapes

Beautiful Water Efficient Landscapes

Landscaping adds beauty and value to your home. Well designed landscaping provides for attractive, easy to maintain property management. The well designed and maintained landscape is an essential part of our lifestyle and visual expectations of the world around us.

Landscaping is good for the environment. Plants provide an environmental value no high-tech solution will ever match! A turf area just 50′ x 50′ absorbs carbon dioxide and hydrogen fluoride, and releases enough oxygen to meet the needs of a family of four. Plants not only absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen into the atmosphere, but the plant leaves, roots, and soil combine to act as a highly effective air scrubber and cleaning machine. Ammonia, trichlorethylene, benzene, xylene, toluene and residues of acid rain are only a few toxic substances continually being removed from the air by healthy plants and soil.

Attractive landscapes promote wellness. Research has proven that beautiful landscapes and gardens have a considerable impact on wellness. For example, it has been shown that patients recovering from major surgery spend less time recovering in hospitals when they can view the landscape instead of a brick wall. Plus, psychologists have found that an attractive landscape plays a major role in reducing stress. Your new landscape can help you make your home a healthier and happier place.

When you professionally landscape your home everyone wins. Landscaping seems like a personal choice to many – something that you do simply because you’ll enjoy it. There’s a lot more to it! Landscaping is good for your entire community – especially when it is designed and installed by a landscape professional. Your landscape not only adds beauty to the neighborhood, it also raises property values, produces oxygen and reduces temperatures. Best of all, statistics indicate that your landscaping investment will pay off when its time to sell!

But, we must realize that the water we use for our landscape comes from the drinking water supply. In Victoria, this may be a more limited resource than we have always imagined. Ever increasing populations are placing greater demands on the existing infrastructure. Reduction of logging on the watershed will create a need for other revenues. So, the cost of water will certainly rise and conservation will be a thing of the future.

It is important, though, to realize that we can continue to plant and maintain vigorous, healthy landscapes that will preserve all the benefits of good landscaping while reducing the requirements for water. By doing this we will make the most efficient use of the resource, save money on our future water bills and maintain the beauty and value of our property and environment.

TECHNIQUES TO HELP DEVELOP AND MAINTAIN A WATER EFFICIENT LANDSCAPE

1. IRRIGATION SYSTEM MAINTENANCE

• Delegate responsibility for irrigation system time clock settings to one well-trained individual who stays in touch with the rapidly changing technology of landscape irrigation.
• On large projects, prepare two copies of the irrigation as-built plan on which each valve zone is colour-coded with the controller, valve, backflow devices and meter locations identified. One reduced size copy should be sealed in plastic and attached inside the controller door. A second copy should become part of project records on file in the maintenance office.
• Correct design errors that cause runoff onto paved areas by replacing or relocating sprinkler heads.
• Make sure all valves on each project are accessible to maintenance personnel and not concealed by shrubbery, ground cover or hidden underground.
• Install check valves to prevent water from draining through heads at lower elevations each time water is turned off.
• Schedule regular maintenance, repair, fine tuning and water pressure checks for both drip and sprinkler systems.
• Adjust irrigation schedules on automatic system time clocks as new plantings become established and as changes occur in seasonal weather, evapotranspiration rates, site conditions and water pressure.
• Schedule irrigation of slopes in several short repeat cycles rather than one long cycle, for better absorption of water by the soil and correction of surface runoff problems.

2. IRRIGATION SYSTEM DESIGN

• Increase the number of timed zones. This will better account for variations in plantings, sun and shade, grade and microclimate.
• Use underground and drip irrigation systems where possible. This will reduce drift, excess runoff and evaporation. Also, drip systems promote deeper rooting as slow accurate application allows water to penetrate deeper into the soil. Disease is also reduced because water is kept off foliage.
• Choose correct nozzles and heads for accurate coverage.
• Provide for easily operated manual overrides for the system.
• Install extra hose bibs for ease of hand watering. (Hand watering provides an opportunity to inspect shrubs and plants for insects and disease.)

3. WATER MANAGEMENT IN TURF GRASS

• Control thatch (which can cause water runoff) by vertical mowing to improve water penetration into the soil and root systems.
• Aerate. This should be done progressively to encourage root penetration to a depth of 8 12″. (Roots of Kentucky Bluegrass will thrive to a depth of 36″ with proper aeration.)
• Reduce turf areas which are only cosmetic. Concentrate your lawn areas to where people use them for outdoor activity. (U.S. surveys indicate that turf grass is the major consumer of water.)
• Where circumstances permit, irrigate turf during night-time or early morning hours. Just before dawn is an excellent time since evaporation losses due to sun and high air temperatures are at a minimum, relative humidity is highest and winds are usually calm.
• Avoid placing sprinkler impact heads and spray heads on the same zone. These heads have substantially different water application rates and over or under watering is inevitable when both types are controlled by the same station.
• Use drought tolerant species of TURF GRASS. (Many new species are available that have traditional blue-green coloration and are also slower in growth habit. i.e. Oregon Tall Fescue.)
• Maintain moderate to low levels of nitrogen in the soil.
• Keep grass to a minimum of 2.5 – 3 inches during hot summer months. This will conserve water by reducing transpiration and also cool soil.
• Mow less often and irrigate more deeply and at widely spaced intervals compared to standard practices. Once per week is ample for a properly installed TURF GRASS. Taller grass will prevent excess evaporation.
• Keep blades sharp. A clean cut will reduce evaporation from leaves.
• Control weeds…they rob significant amounts of water, plant nutrients and growing space.

4. GARDEN MANAGEMENT FOR WATER CONSERVATION

• Reduce total lawn areas and replace with more drought tolerant ground covers. They can be just as effective and attractive as grass.
• Group plantings according to water requirements. Then add your extra zones. (Known as Hydrozoning.)
• Use more species of plants that are natural or local.
• Reduce grades by incorporating retaining systems creating more gentle slopes.
• Select drought tolerant and hardy species. There are many available.
• Plant thirsty plants in shady and protected locations. Plant hardier plants in exposed locations.
• Use mulches wherever possible. (Studies indicate that up to 75% of precipitation falling on bare ground in warm conditions is lost to evaporation. Proper mulching can save up to 95% of this.
• When possible, grade soil down toward tree trunks to help catch and contain irrigation water.
• Remove turf from around tree trunks and mulch.
• Incorporate more hardscapes into the landscape.
• Learn proper pruning techniques to conserve plant moisture.
• Periodically sprinkle leaves of shrubs and plants to remove dirt, prevent disease and insect invasion.

5. SOIL MANAGEMENT

• Good topsoil is the most important consideration in a well planned, healthy, water efficient garden.
• Know your soil structure and infiltration rate.
• Amend to provide for greater penetration and retention of water.
• If soil type is clay based, add humus and sand.
• If soil type is sand based, add humus and clay.
• Increase organic fraction (humus) to 25 – 30%.
• Provide for 6″ of well drained soil under turf areas.
• Provide for 18 – 24″ of good, well drained soil under shrubs, trees, plants and vegetable gardens.
• Constantly monitor soil moisture with sensors and especially visually.
• Use mulches to keep soil cool in summer and warmer in winter, retain water and control weeds.
• Water only when soil approaches permanent wilting point.
• Note: Many sprinklers apply water at rates that are three times as fast as most soils can absorb it!

6. KEEP RECORDS OF YOUR WATER USE

• Measure rainfall in a rain gauge.
• Record or be aware of your daily weather conditions.
• Constantly re-evaluate your irrigation system, zone by zone.
• Determine average water loss through evapotranspiration on a daily basis and irrigate to replace.

7. WATCH FOR SYMPTOMS OF WATER STRESS

• Learn the visual indications of wilting and water stress.
• Watch for symptoms of over-watering including:
• Excessive runoff or standing water
• Wheel or foot ruts
• Excessive worm castings
• Weed infestations
• Excessive slug and snail populations
• Thinning turf
• Wilting
• Do a regular walk-about to inspect your garden. You will be able to spot potential problems before they arise, and better still, you will get the maximum enjoyment from your investment.

ALTERNATIVES TO THE “TYPICAL” YARD

Changing our vision of what to expect in a typical landscape is an idea that is catching on across North America. Water is a precious resource that will cost more and more as time goes by. So, water efficient gardens are an important consideration as a great deal of domestic water is used in the landscape, especially to irrigate turf grasses. This, coupled with the demands for less maintenance, has opened the doors and minds to some very attractive, economical and water efficient alternatives. There is now available a large palate of native and drought tolerant plants that can be used in local landscapes. There is also a wide variety of attractive hardscape elements that can be incorporated.

A word has been coined in the U.S. to describe water sipping landscapes. The word is XERISCAPE. It comes from the Greek word Xeros which means dry. It does not, however, imply the creating of deserts. It simply implies a water efficient garden that can also be lush and vigorous.

With some thought and planning, the results will be astounding. Above all, a Xeriscaped property can be low maintenance and cost effective.