Oak Park Community Council

Water Saving Tips From Farmer Bill Tall

Any time we have a drought in Southern California, the media often flies off the handle - but between the extremes of lawn removal and complete un-sustainability there's a whole world of tips for Using Water Wisely.

SPRINKLER TIPS

• Check any automatic sprinkler heads to see their flow - spend some time observing.
• Next, look up your timing box online for the manual (most people don't keep the manual).
• Next, put cups in the area you're watering -- once a cycle of watering has passed, check the cups to see if the levels are the same in all cups. If some cups are fuller than others, you'll adjust the heads with a screwdriver.
• Retrofit: you can retrofit normal spray heads with low gallonage heads. Once you have these retrofitted heads, you can change your timer to run longer and you'll have less runoff. Deep watering less frequently is always better than frequent, shallow watering. And remember to water in the early morning (5:30a).

MANUAL WATERING

• Another way to save with heads is to turn your automatic box off completely and manually run the program -- this keeps you present to the water being used.
• You can watch your vegetables for slight wilting and then run the program manually, watching them perk right back up. This is totally cool and will become a fun game of spot the slight wilting!

START WITH SOIL

• Remember to penetrate your top level of soil to aerate it and so it gives the water and easy path to roots. A shovel or aerator will do the trick.
• Adding mulch to the top layer of all plants (about 1" of mulch is perfect) will act as an insulator, preventing water evaporation.
• Any mulch you use on plants needs to already have some source of nitrogen in it (the mulch we sell does). This keeps the mulch from stealing nitrogen from the soil and plants below.

SEE WHAT'S UP DOWN BELOW

• For potted plants, stick your finger in the top of the soil AND through the bottom hole of the pot to check moisture -- the top layer can be deceivingly dry.
• The same rule applies to soil -- you may want to get or borrow a moisture meter to see what the water situation is 12" - 24" below the surface. Often, it's perfect and we're over-watering out of habit :)