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I am thinking about taking a 2 month road trip. I want to turn the water off to the house when I leave. So, that means no water for the lawn.
I live in Denver so it gets toasty in the summer. But I have been reading about how the lawn will go dormant and not die.
That sounds great!
But what really concerns me are my trees. I have five large trees (House was built in 72). Three are pines of some sort and two are green leaf trees. Each are over 30'.
If the lawn dies that is fine but losing any of the trees would be just horrible!
I think you have to be careful - yes, grass will go dormant, but at some point, if there has been little to no rain, it may have trouble coming back. As far as the trees, if they are older trees, I would think there would be no problem.
Would it be a big deal to have the lawn watered once a week when you are gone? When are you planning on going? We have had a wetter spring than I remember in a long time. At this rate, maybe you'll be okay!
I don't know if there were automatic sprinklers there in 1972...so most likely they were native trees or trees that do well in that region. Established trees are pretty hard to kill if they are planted in a region they do well in. I think if they weren't planted in an appropriate region then they would have died long ago...sprinklers or not!
Yeah , good call on the trees. All of them look great except one. But the sewer was replaced before I moved in. And the trench ran close to that tree. Roots were cut.
The tree is about 3/4 green with new leaves. I think it is just trying to figure out how to survive with some roots cut.
I live in Denver so it gets toasty in the summer. But I have been reading about how the lawn will go dormant and not die.
If you have Kentucky bluegrass, yes! The lawn should make it through summer.
The trees will be fine too- we shut off our sprinklers late last summer for a road trip too, and all our trees (9 hr old Aspens, Pines & Spruce) did ok. They got some water from the neighboring lawns, I guess
Location: Sometimes Maryland, sometimes NoVA. Depends on the day of the week
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At 3/4 acre, we never water our lawn or trees. It goes dorment in the hot, dry summer and its fine. You should be fine. Actually, even when we lived in a townhouse, we never watered our patch of lawn. Such a waste of water.
Actually, it better for your grass to not water, or at least not water often. One rain/watering a week forced the roots to grow much deeper and then it can sustain itself longer during drought. If you have a sprinkler system set up on automatic, start cutting it back so it waters less frequently but for longer times a month or so before you leave. Like if you water daily, switch it to every other day for twice as long for a week, then every 3rd day for a week, then twice a week for a week, etc.
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