Idiotic water restrictions (San Jose, Morgan Hill, August: house, landscaping, income)

[MediocreButArrogant]

Maybe it's because they don't have that much experience in implementing water restrictions, but the odd/even date rules currently in place are idiotic. The reasons should be obvious:

1) Most irrigation timers allow you to set watering days by day-of-week or by interval. The current rules require you to use interval timing, but if the month has an odd number of days, you have to reprogram your timer at the end of the month.

2) The odd/even rule makes it impossible to have your landscaper come on the same day of the week and maintain your watering schedule. Landscapers would prefer you not water your lawn on the days that they mow your lawn. If a month has an odd number of days, then their service day will have to change from one month to the next. If they can't change their service day, and you program your timer to just never water on a particular day of the week, you may have to go four days before watering.

Day-of-week watering restrictions make a lot more sense. Odd addresses could water MWF, and even could water TuThSa. Sunday could either be a restricted day or free day for everyone, depending on the conservation target. With day-of-week watering restrictions (as we have at our vacation house in Las Vegas, an area with lots of experience with watering restrctions):

1) You can set your irrigation timer to water on particular days and just leave it, it doesn't have to change based on the number of days in the month.

2) The days you can water and the days you can't are fixed, so you can schedule your landscaper to come on the same day every week

I don't see any reason why date-based restrictions were chosen over day-of-week, except stupidity.

[jbunniii]

I am ignoring the even/odd rules and am watering twice a week. My lawn is suitably brown. If someone really wants to monitor my yard every night (at 2am) to discover that I am watering on the "wrong" days, I'll point out that I'm actually watering less than the rules allow.

[StandingRoomOnly]

We are restricted to MWF here in Morgan Hill, and I agree, even/odd is a strange way of implementing water restrictions.

[mstnghu2]

The watering restrictions throughout the Bay Area are a bit ridiculous. What I'm personally doing on my lawns is to hand-water the spots that tend to turn brown with a hose/automatic shut-off nozzle. Often times automatic sprinklers over-water certain areas and under-water other areas. I have some portions of lawn that are in the shade most of the day and other parts that get constant sun. The auto sprinklers water the lawn evenly which ends up not being very efficient.

By just hand-watering (which is not necessarily convenient) the spots that get sun all day, I'm definitely saving a bunch of water and am managing to keep my lawn green. I find myself only turning on the auto sprinkler system every few days. Also, in the summer/warm weather, watering the lawn after sunset ensures that the water doesn't evaporate and actually soaks into the soil. In the winter, that's not a good idea though because the lawn can absorb too much moisture and get mildew.

[Wintermomma]

I didn't even know we had an odd/even situation. I guess I'm not keeping up. We just altered to water less often and within the required hours. Our lawn looks horrible so I feel we're doing our part. Actually also getting evaluated for the grant to change 50% of our landscaping to water-friendly, too so hopefully it won't look so bad next year!

I saw a sign advertising lawn painting services this week.

Restricting the ENTIRE city to the same days can cause havoc on the water system (LA tried that a few years ago and they had broken mains all over the place from the increased needs on the same days) so I can see why they want to spread it out. I think eventually they went to it depending on if your address was odd or even, which day you did it.

[Zeya]

I wasn't aware of the rules. I don't think anyone has posted it yet. Here it is:

San Jose Water ::

• Use of water for outside plants, lawn, landscape, and turf areas more often than every other day, with even numbered addresses watering on even numbered days of the month and odd numbered addresses watering on the odd numbered days of the month, except that this provision shall not apply to commercial nurseries, golf courses and other water-dependent industries.

I don't see anything about what time of day you can water on there, though.

Although on that point, I see a lot of my neighbors watering during broad daylight. That's the wrong way to water. You should always water when the sun is down, because it's cooler and the water evaporates less. It's all about getting the ground saturated with moisture. The way to do it is to water in several short spurts throughout the night. Watering in short spurts lets each "wave" of water saturate before more water comes in. This avoids runoff and wasted water.

The only advantage to NOT watering at night is if the sprinklers bother your sleep, which to me is a lame excuse, especially during a drought. (Well, also if you don't have auto sprinklers, that means you have to water by hand which essentially will only happen during waking hours when the sun is up.)

To summarize, if you have auto sprinklers:
- Do not water longer than 5 minutes at a time, even if you insist on watering during daylight. Water in several short bursts.
- Please do not water during the day. Run your sprinklers at night.

These tweaks will save you money and conserve water at the same time. It's a win-win.

[Wintermomma]

This is where I read about the times, but it's from mid-August:
California drought: San Jose moving to impose water conservation measures, but without fines - San Jose Mercury News

[MediocreButArrogant]

Originally Posted by Wintermomma

Actually also getting evaluated for the grant to change 50% of our landscaping to water-friendly, too so hopefully it won't look so bad next year!

We applied for the rebate program and had our front yard inspected. The few thousand we'll get back is going to be more than offset by the $12k to build a stone veneer wall along the sidewalk.

The rebate is counted as taxable income.

[bigdumbgod]

Get
Rid
Of
The
Lawn

[SportyandMisty]

Originally Posted by bigdumbgod

get
rid
of
the
lawn

^^^ +1 ^^^