It's a hot one!

Record high temperatures for winter which for the last 6 weeks have really hit yards hard.

Many lawns are starting to show signs of distress due to a combination of the high temperatures and the winter irrigation rules. From 1st November the yard can only be watered once a week; typically Saturdays for odd numbered properties and Sundays for even numbered ones. With a maximum of 1 hour allowed per zone on this one day a week, you need to think about when the best time is to run it and for long.

The water companies do check, and regularly during the winter season, so just because your neighbour is running theirs twice a week or more doesn't mean you can; if you get caught the fines are hefty.

So what can you do? At the moment look at running the system twice in the one day allowed per week and where possible do it between 11pm - 4am; this is the best time as the temperture cools and the dirt is not baked hard from the days sunshine.

My yard is looking parched and whilst the organic lawn feed treatment I did has made a huge difference to its condition and how green it looks, it still needs more water. So we have changed the schedule and run it for 40 mins at 11pm (so 160 mins in total if you have 4 zones) and then it comes back on 3am for 20 mins (so another 80 mins in total for the 4 zones). Job done!