With a record weak winter and extreme drought in Utah, Spring seemed to come on early and strong in many areas. When that happens many rush to garden stores to get the first flowering plants into their yards and yet Mother Nature usually has a snow or freeze or both in March or April so set those gardeners back again to pull up frozen plants and restock and replant.  Folks forget that last year had the biggest snow of 2025 in March with 3.3 inches in the City limits and then a few weeks later Little Cottonwood Canyon snow hit Alta ski resort over the 500-inch mark for the season by picking up 22 inches in two days. We could still get a dumper for all you powhounds before this month ends.

This disappointing winter snowfall is indicative of the lack of water the West now faces and as we can see Summer looming in our near future, we’re all going to have to cut back to save our resource. The Utah Department of Natural Resources has a wonderful website that shows when we should water and how much water we should use.  There’s a quote on the site: “April showers bring May flowers…not watering hours!” Many sites say that we should not start watering our lawns here-especially in Northern Utah until May 15^th.

The basic guide is that if you have a lawn, water it efficiently by following weekly, weather-based recommendations, using ½ inch per irrigation but adjusting for the type of law, soil and season. The run time on your sprinklers (if you have them) will differ with each kind of sprinkler system you own. The ½ rule really depends on your system’s precipitation rate. For example, a system that applies 1.3” per hour needs about 23 minutes to deliver .05 inches of water.

In the Spring and Fall, apply 1-2 inches of water per week. In Summer, double that almost to 2.5-3” of water per week. Best time to water is after 8PM at night until 8 AM in the morning. Overwatering not only wastes water but can lead to disease, weeds and pests in your grass. Measure your sprinkler output with a few empty cans placed near sprinkler heads to find tune your system so it’s efficiently doing its job. Target dryer areas with a hose to soak the ground and watch the weather reports to turn off your system in case we get one of those crazy atmospheric rivers like the one that just hit Hawaii. I hate seeing sprinklers on when it’s raining outside and I must say that’s a common site at many government buildings in the State. Also, you can capture rainwater to put into your gardens and even use repurposed household water from cooking.  Put in mulch to reduce water evaporation and plant water-wise landscaping plants whenever possible.