Services and Advice for Water Smart Use Inside Your Home
In the Sacramento region, about 45 percent of a household’s water use is indoors—most of that in the bathroom. Toilets alone account for more than a quarter of a household’s water use, followed by clothes washers (22 percent of indoor water use), showers (17 percent), faucets (16 percent) and leaks (14 percent).
Rebates »
Rebates and incentives for replacing older toilets, commercial washing machines, and irrigation components with high-efficiency models such as Smart Irrigation Controllers
Top Ways to Save »
Tips for saving water—and money
Water Smart Landscaping
- Sacramento Region Smart Irrigation Scheduler This tool calculates run time minutes per week for your sprinkler zones based on current weather and rainfall.
- Water-wise gardening in the Gold County Region Create your wish list of low water-use plants! This comprehensive database includes 1,800 plants classified by plant type, botanical name, common name and water use. It includes garden tours for design ideas, a garden gallery to search for water efficient plants that meet your needs, water conservation tips, and much more.
- Tired of Your Thirsty Turfgrass? This site provides lawn options that are not as thirsty as traditional lawns.
- Roseville WaterSmart Plant List This WaterSmart Plant List is a nice printable list that contains some of the most common very low, low, and moderate water-use plants appropriate for the Sacramento region and offers an extensive diversity of plants to suit any style and any size landscape.
- Homegrown Habitat Plant List The California Native Plant Society has a new plant database for California Native Plants.
- Eco-Friendly Landscape Design Plans for the New California Landscape The site provides residents and landscape professionals with turn-key landscape and irrigation plans and tools for creating a beautiful, eco-friendly landscape, including four distinct landscape plans: Recreation Destination; Right as Rain; Neat and Petite; and Wholesome Habitat.
- Inspiration Garden The Inspiration Garden at the Utility Exploration Center is a living example that demonstrates how water-efficient landscaping is beautiful, lower maintenance, thrives with less water, and the best match for California living.
- UC Davis Bee Haven The Bee Haven is a unique outdoor museum that provides resources for local bee pollinators, inspires and educates visitors to create pollinator habitat gardens, and provides a site for the observation and study of bees and the plants that support them.
- Bee gardening resources
- Does Your Garden Have Maximum BPG? (Bees Per Gallon)?
- Recommended Low-Water Bee Plants for Northern California
- The Bee Gardener – Bee gardening news and education from the UC Davis Bee Haven
Landscape Contractor Referral Lists
Indoor Water Use
Water Efficiency
Recycled Water Fill Station
Graywater
- RWA Graywater Information
- Elk Grove Rain Garden
- San Francisco Graywater Design Manual
- Graywater code
- Laundry to Landscape Graywater – video
- Greywater-Compatible Cleaning Products
Publications
- Garden Smart – Create a beautiful stress-free Sacramento-area landscape year round
- A Homeowner’s Guide to a WaterSmart Landscape
- Top Ways To Save Water Indoors and Outdoors
- Rules of Thumb for Water-Wise Gardening
- Water Efficient Landscapes (WEL) In the Sacramento Region
- Watering Tips for Beautiful Gardens
- Tips for Tree Care During Drought
- Caring for Trees in a Drought
- Caring for Trees in a Drought – Spanish
- Sprinkler Tune Up
- Sprinkler Check Up
- Sprinkler Repairs
- Sprinkler Tool Box
- Sprinkler Symptom Solver
- Landscape Survival Tips for the Drought
- River-Friendly Landscaping Guide to Mulch & Grasscycling
