IRRIGATION CONTROL, LEAKS AND WATER CONSERVATION!

by Kathrine Blomquist

Fall Checklist:

• Get out sweaters from closet

• Locate decorations in garage

• Check for irrigation for leaks

As I sit down to write this month’s article, it is the first day below triple digits! Yipee, we made it through another record-breaking summer! Hope you fared as well as could be and found relief from the heat in your favorite ways. The mesquite tree in our front yard had a great summer! It flourished, thanks to a leak in the drip system. The leak lasted a few weeks and although our water usage normally increases a bit in the summer, the leak contributed to a 50% increase from one month to the next. In fact, our tree grew so much we received our first, and hopefully last, code compliance violation from the City of Mesa.

So, this month’s top water-saving tip is to check for irrigation leaks - often. If a puddle is accumulating, that means there is a leak somewhere. If your yard walls are wet, that may indicate a leak as well. Due to the summer heat and travels we waited to repair the leak. Whoops - that delay wasted water (it is hard very to write that), cost money, and resulted in a citation from the city! Please learn from our mistake and fix any leaks as soon as you can, or be sure to have your landscape company check. Find one that advertises in the RoundUp or look for a Smartscape Professional (smartscape.org). Also, be sure to keep trees pruned 8’ above sidewalks and 14’ above the street to keep in code compliance with the city.

Also, now that the weather is changing, it is time to adjust your landscape irrigation system. This is easy enough to do by resetting the controllers on the irrigation timer (or, your smart irrigation controller), but how do you know if your plants, trees, shrubs, etc., are getting enough? What if you are watering too much now that the season has changed? Check out the Interactive Water Guides by Water - Use it Wisely. These interactive guides help you determine the correct amount of water to use on your plants and functional turf (i.e. grass that pets/humans use and enjoy). If you prefer to flip through a book, there is a field on the website to have one sent right to your home.

Finally, if you participated in one of SRP’s Shade Tree webinars this summer, information has been emailed about

November’s pick-up. Please check your spam folder if you haven’t seen the email yet. Thank you for helping to beautify not only your yard, but our community, while supporting Mesa’s Climate Action Plan and other great environmental benefits! If you missed out the program this fall, there will be another one in the spring.

Happy Fall! I better double-check the mesquite tree before I start on the list.