Are You Using Too Much Water?

water waste

Sacramento summers seem to have two ubiquitous features: droughts and heat. If you are not careful, you may use too much water in your yard. Here are several ways to know that you are wasting water and money on your landscaping.

Watering Indiscriminately

When you do not know how to properly water a specific kind of plant or garden, you can make easy mistakes in the watering. Some plants need a lot of water, and others do not. The soil also makes a difference. If the soil is more dry and sandy, you should water it more often. Soil that is dense and feels like clay needs to be watered less frequently. Ask the plumbers in Sacramento about the best kind of irrigation for your landscaping. You might save water and have a better-looking outdoor property by relying on systems that do not just spray water onto your plants.

Improper Sprinkler Maintenance

You know what it is like to walk or drive by the house that seems to be watering the pavement as much as they are the lawn and gardens. This does not happen by default, as few people would prefer to waste water for no good reason. If you are having this problem, you may be losing many gallons of water every single day you turn on the sprinklers. The solution might be as simple as cleaning out the sprinkler heads or making sure that they are turned in the right direction. Replacing sprinkler heads is not particularly difficult, time-consuming or expensive. If you have a broken sprinkler head, your Sacramento plumber can give you advice on fixing or replacing it.

Failing to Change Watering Settings

The weather changes pretty radically from one month to the next. You might be quick to turn up the watering schedule in spring and summer, because you definitely do not want your garden to bake to death in the hot Sacramento sun. However, once it cools off, you need to be just as prompt about cutting down on your water usage. This will help you to conserve water and also protect your plants from overwatering.

Landscape Suffers

Anyone who has ever owned a succulent or other desert flora knows that overwatering is most definitely a problem. In a ground bed, you might think that there are no consequences for putting in too much water, because it can spread yards across and several feet underground. However, even the ground might have trouble removing water if you keep watering during a heavy rainstorm, or leave settings based on summer heat in the middle of October. If your plants are looking wilted in damp soil, you are probably using too much water.

Minimizing your water consumption on your landscaping is just one part of trying to keep the California drought in check. By looking at these potential issues, you can avoid using too much water and wasting money. To get up-to-date information about sprinkler system efficiency and the best way to water your garden, contact the experts at Ace Plumbing.