I hope the humor comes across in this thread. It's a short rant inspired by a post I just saw about the new law that protects us Californians from fines for having brown lawns during the drought. Which is great and all but why have a brown lawn in the first place?? Let me know if you feel the same way! :)

Hey fellow Californians, your lawn doesn't HAVE to be brown, or excuse me, gOLd (eye roll).

I'm in Sacramento and our summers are incredibly hot with many days in the triple digits. Our restrictions are at 2 watering days a week, in the evening or early morning. Actually, these "restrictions" just sound like good watering practices to me. I've found this schedule to be more than sufficient for maintaining a green lawn even in the height of summer.

I get the distinct feeling that most of the brown lawns around town are caused by a lack of knowledge about proper watering/mowing/fertilizing. I don't know if it's just my area but I get the sense that most people think you are supposed to crank on those sprinklers for 10 min every day. I admit, being that this was "common knowledge", I used to think the same thing. I get a lot of questions (read: accusations) regarding my very green lawn. Enter my excited explanations about how I use CHEAP organic fertilizer that I buy at the feed store (alfalfa meal, soybean meal), mulch mow my own lawn as needed, and only water an inch on my allowed days and less often when temps are lower. My audience generally responds by staring blankly back at me with eyes full of pity for my youthful naïveté, then they go home and trudge on with their usual lawn care routine grumbling about how water restrictions have ruined their lawns. Well that's fine by me, I'm still the one rolling around my luscious green carpet all summer long.

The best decision I ever made for my lawn was to fire my "gardener" (who by the way introduced a million new weed types that I spent a year removing) and take over my own lawn care following tips found on these forums. So thank you ALL for your knowledge and willingness to share your experiences and recommendations! Honestly, my lawn is not perfect and it does get slightly stressed midsummer, but it sure does look perfect compared to 99% of my neighbors'.

So come on California, don't be afraid to let go of 'what you've been doing for the past 30 years' or 'what your gardener says to do' or whatever else is keeping you from making some simple changes. Your lawn will love you and reward you! And we can all get past this drought happily and learn to waste less water drought or no drought.

(Also posted this to the California gardening forum)