Hyper-tufa gardens are the latest rage...These miniature, self-contained rock gardens can be planted in your garden or set on a patio or walkway. They have several tiny plants and rocks to resemble a crevice garden with gravel mulch. Water only once a week during the growing season. Prices range from $85-150

Xeriscaping (pronounced "z"-hard "e"-"r"-soft "e"-scaping) can be achieved a variety of ways.

Ideas to help minimize water usage with Xeriscaping:

• Install a drip irrigation system wherever possible to lessen evaporation.
• Before starting a new landscape, be sure to invest in proper soil preparation!
• Expand the borders around your lawn to incorporate some rolling berms. Add mossrock boulders, perennials, and mulch to create a low-water usage alpine rock garden.
• Replace rock in planter beds with small bark mulch. Mulch helps hold moisture and is also an exceptional weed barrier. Using mulch can reduce your watering by as much as 75 percent. Quoting TruGreen Chemlawn, "If your woody plants are properly mulched (2-3 inches deep) then water requirements will be considerably less than what is required for a lawn unless they are recent transplants. DO NOT water your ornamental beds on the same schedule as your lawn. It will likely be too much water. The best way to determine if your landscape plants need water is to rake the mulch back and check the soil at their base. If the soil is dry, apply at least an inch of water so it will go through the mulch to the roots."
• Increase the size of your Patio and/or install pathways or dry streambeds through your yard to lessen the size of your lawn and create some visual interest.
• Use colorful yet xeric perennials such as coneflower, salvia, coreopsis, liatris, sage, sedum, poppy mallow, lamium, hyssop, iceplant, shasta daisies, or penstemon.
• Remember that your automatic sprinkler system is not totally automatic. Be sure to turn it off for a few days when it has rained. Reduce your watering rates during the spring/fall.
• Use a surfactant, such as Revive or LOC, to help water penetration.
• Install one of our new xeric turfs, which need water only once a week and less-frequent mowing.

An appealing use of Xeriscaping is by installing an Alpine Rock Garden:

• Alpine Rock Gardens - The most beautiful, low-maintenance way to reduce water use. A typical alpine rock garden starts with a berm and a large selection of stone half-buried into the dirt. This concept allows for a variety of plant material for maximum color and texture. Once established, water every seven to ten days. Crevice Gardens are a very small-scale alpine rock garden where the plants are tucked into tight joints in the rock.
• The Denver Botanic Gardens has beautiful examples of these types of gardens to give you ideas.

Xeriscape Picture Gallery:

Xeriscape Pictures - by clicking on the "picture" below, a new browser window will automatically open up with a full-sized picture displayed. When you are finished viewing the picture, simply close the window.
Picture	Description	Size
	Hyper-Turfa Garden	19k
	Xeric Rock Gardens 1	196k
	Xeric Rock Gardens 2	95k
	Xeric Rock Gardens 3	88k
	Xeric Waterwise Garden	197k