AURORA | Keeping up a lush lawn in Aurora is no easy feat.
The city of sprawling neighborhoods gets a little less than 15 inches of rainfall a year, and the most common grass that blankets front, back and side yards from Southshore to Morris Heights — Kentucky bluegrass — needs nearly two-to-three-times that amount of precipitation to thrive, which is why the City of Aurora spends the spring tempting residents to make the switch to “water-wise” landscaping.
“It doesn’t have to be sparse,” said Timothy York, a water conservation supervisor with the City of Aurora.
In fact, there are hundreds of plants, including 42 different varieties of grass, that can be worked into what many would describe as a xeriscape lawn, which uses little to no extra irrigation.
It’s not just gravel and yucca, York said, describing the city’s list of permissible plants. The city has drifted away from using the term “xeriscape” because of that generalization.
Instead, water-wise landscaping has become a smart and creative way to save water and money in a semi-arid and increasingly drier region. York, who has long been a registered landscape architect across the southwest, said per square foot of yard, a residence could save about half of what’s spent on watering a standard turf lawn. Plus, there’s the rebate from the city.
Removing at least 500 square feet of bluegrass in a front or side yard can earn a resident up to $3,000. Each year the city adds 25 to 30 water-wise lawns, but York expects that to accelerate as keeping a large turf yard becomes increasingly impractical. Applications for the rebate are due by Aug. 1.
Aurora is one of more than a dozen Colorado municipalities that offer turf replacement, and now the state might increase those numbers. State lawmakers are currently considering House Bill 151, which would allocate nearly $4 million to encourage more cities to start similar programs. The lawmakers say it’s also an important conservation measure, especially for the metroplex.
“For too long the Western Slope and the Eastern Plains have borne the brunt of water conservation,” The Denver Post reported state Rep. Dylan Roberts, D-Steamboat Springs, saying during a February committee meeting. He’s sponsoring the bill along with Rep. Marc Catlin and Sens. Jeff Bridges and Cleave Simpson.
Roberts said the measure would allow metro municipalities to “play their fair part.”
In Aurora, making the switch is relatively easy. Even planning a water-wise yard comes at a low cost. The Water Conservation team with Aurora Water offers free consultations to its customers and each year the department awards the “DreamScape Giveaway” to a customer with the most convincing video of why their yard deserves a total make-over. Last year’s winners had their yard stripped of the Kentrucky bluegrass and workers installed a drip watering system for the new plants.
Despite water-wise landscaping having a reputation of being barren, they are anything but. City rules dictate that such a lawn actually comprise 50% plant cover. That can include trees — like spruces, some maples, pines and junipers — vines and perennials.
“The options are really endless,” York said. “There are so many colors and textures.”
For normally tough-to-please HOAs, water-wise landscaping is still an option, though it may require working within some more specific rules, such as mulch color or which plants are permissible. York said a little education can go a long way with HOA boards, but because local and state law don’t allow HOAs to ban turfless lawns, it’s entirely possible to accomplish.
Beyond the obvious water savings, York said people who make the switch end up saving time and money on other supplies, like fertilizer, which also has the potential to cause problems down the road when it leaches into storm water. The native plants common in water-wise design also help local wildlife, like birds, bees and rabbits.
“Grass is not native here, it’s a non-native species, so it doesn’t offer much of a benefit to the environment,” York said.