Follow these tips to conserve water while tending your lawn. Lawns that receive too much water become weak and prone to disease. Watering properly will encourage grass to grow strong, deep roots.

• Water early in the morning, which cuts down on water loss through evaporation.
• Don’t treat all areas of your yard the same way. Grass in a sunny, windy site may need water more often than grass in a shady, sheltered corner. Run sprinklers only where and when they’re needed.
• Time-test your sprinklers. Run them for 20 minutes and dig down to see how deep the water is reaching. (Dry soil will be paler than wet soil.) Sprinklers should run long enough to reach 6 inches deep. Keep testing every 20 minutes to see how long it really takes.
• Water deeply. Watering to a 6-inch depth encourages grass to have strong, deep roots and ultimately cuts down on the frequency of watering.
• Make sure sprinklers are aligned to hit the grass, not the sidewalk or driveway.
• Set up a rain barrel to collect and store rainwater from your roof, and use that water to irrigate your lawn and garden instead of turning on the tap.
• In spring, overseed the lawn with a mix that includes a high proportion of drought-tolerant fescue grass.

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