When I moved in with Scott in 2013, we decided we wanted to make our home as environmentally friendly as possible, which included reducing our water usage. Reno is in the high desert and has hot summers with highs often in the 90 to 100-degree range, making water a precious resource. Scott had lived in the house for 14 years before I arrived and had already done some xeriscaping in the front yard, but still had a small lawn. We quickly decided our first project was going to be taking out the south-facing front lawn. Keeping it green was an exercise in futility and wasted a lot of water. This was the first step on our journey to reduce our water use and make our yard easier to maintain. What follows is a summary of our decade-long adventure in xeriscaping!
Front Yard
Here’s our front yard in June 2013:
You can see it was already getting dry and was a bit unkempt and in need of some love.
This is our front yard in June of 2023:
The plum trees have grown over the last 10 years and now shade the plants beneath them, so we are changing plants to more shade-loving species. We took out the invasive Russian Sage.From this angle, you can see that we removed the maple tree to the left of the locust and the pine tree next to the house, behind the locust. They were either too close to other trees, the house, shading our solar panels, or threatening our sewer line. Then we planted flowers and shrubs where they had been. We took the Russian Sage out of this area and planted a shrub, echinacea and poppies. We removed the Scotch Broom that was under the bay window. It had become overgrown and collapsed during 2022’s heavy winter snows.
We took out the lawn and replaced it with decomposed granite (DG). We also added pots for flowers on each side of the front steps.
Here are some August photos of the front yard:
Aren’t the Black-Eyed Susans and Correopsis glorious? The tall grasses outdid themselves with all the winter and spring moisture.We added a meditating frog and shasta daisies this year, looking forward to watching them fill in! We will add more flowers to this area where the Scotch Broom used to be in the upcoming summer season.
Back Yard
This is our back yard in June of 2013:
We had a small concrete patio and lots of lawn. There were aspen trees by the back fence and a large elm on the metal fence to the left of Scott. These trees were all removed over the years. The aspens were trying to grow a grove in our neighbor’s and our yard, and the elm was pushing the metal fence over.Our concrete patio with our grill, outdoor tables and container garden (tomatoes, flowers, and basil). Clearly it was a real squeeze!Looking to the west, there are raised wooden beds (behind Scott) and more containers, plus a dwarf willow that got out of hand. The locust tree to Scott’s right was still a baby.
This is our back yard in June of 2023:
In 2015 we took out part of the lawn and put in pavers and in 2022 we expanded the pavers, removed the lawn and put DG in the east side. We added patio furniture, a fountain, more containers of flowers, bird baths and other yard art. Now we have a large area for entertaining and it is much easier to maintain.Here is the view back to the west showing the DG with custom concrete stepping stones made for us by a friend. We have planted shrubs, decorative grass, and flowers in the corners. There’s an ash tree in the center flanked by metal Kokopellis, and the tomato plants are to the right in the orange containers. Scott is relieved to no longer have to mow and fertilize the lawn!Along the west fence we added a DG area and planted this beautiful Japanese Maple. I’d always wanted one and it loves this spot under the neighbor’s maple tree. All the old wooden raised beds and the dwarf willow were removed, now we have more containers in this area with herbs and succulents.This is our beautiful coral honeysuckle along the north fence flanked by a succulent and decorative rock. We planted marigolds in the box planters that we replaced with begonias in late August. Our grill is now just to the left of the succulent. It’s better having it away from the house.This shows the DG area and the east fence, the ash tree in the center and tomato boxes to the left.
The best way to really see the yard is through videos. You can click this link to go to our Google Photos album that has videos of our yard during the different seasons: Videos of Our Yard.
Water Savings
So, how did we do with our water savings? Here’s the table showing our use from our water bills:
After xeriscaping our yard, we now save 36,000 gallons of water per year! That is 35% less than what we used in 2013 trying to water our lawns! In the heat of the summer, we use about 50% less on average than we did before. Plus, we spend less time maintaining the yard now that we don’t have to fertilize and mow the lawns.
You can also see how much more we use in the six months where we are watering outdoors versus the winter months when the system is shut off and we are only using household water. Just out of curiosity, I added it up and for our household, we use about 47,000 gallons of water per year. For the landscaping, we use 20,000 gallons. So our household use is about 70% of the total and the landscaping now only takes 20%. It used to take 57,000 gallons and make up 55% of our total water use!
We love our new yard which is way more functional and beautiful than what we started with, plus it uses a lot less water, while taking less of our time to maintain (and less chemicals). We have learned that our yard is an evolving landscape, ever changing, so stay tuned as the journey continues!
