Easy Drought Tolerant Landscaping Ideas

Everyone wants to conserve water. There is no better way to do this than by replacing your existing landscape with drought-tolerant landscaping elements. Here are easy ideas to get you started.

Desert landscaping with cactus and drought tolerant plants in the front yard of a house ** Note: Soft Focus at 100%, best at smaller sizesThe first thing to do is consider how you can substitute grass in your yard by replacing it with a selection of drought tolerant plants. Some grasses are themselves resistant to drought. These include deer grass and euphorbia. Your local home improvement center can give you more ideas for varieties that will grow healthy with little water.

Cordyline is a great plant to use in place of grass. Also called Festival Grass, the evergreen plant is made up of dark, burgundy leaves that look like large blades of grass. It is perfect to grow alongside colored foliage and can work beautifully when planted in containers as well as in the ground.

Another idea for drought-tolerant landscaping is to consider how you can replace the grass already there with pathways made up of pebbles slate tiles or slabs. You can also choose to add garden beds to create visual focal points in front of the house. These will take more time and work to design and implement, but they allow you to add a beautiful landscape while taking up space formerly occupied by grass and other plants.

You can get away with inexpensive path designs by using river rock or cement. The rocks can form natural-looking pathways that give visitors an appealing view of your landscape as they walk through your yard.

These pathways and garden beds also take up space so you have to worry about adding fewer drought-tolerant plants. Another idea is to create a sunken flower bed. This involves removing the existing soil and then planting flowers like lavender. This is an evergreen plant that flowers with violet buds. It loves the sun and, when the rain comes, it would accumulate in the sunken bed.

There is an abundance of different flowers and plants to add throughout your yard to add color and depth to the landscape. Be careful about water runoff. This happens around sidewalks and pathways. Prevent it by adding a strip made of plastic along them. These strips are embedded into the ground so they are not readily visible.

If you have decided to replace a good deal of grass in the yard, the runoff will be less of a problem. This is because grass requires lots of moisture, especially during the summer months. With less grass, there is less of a need for water and less of a runoff problem.

Planting a drought-tolerant landscape does not mean you cannot plant some plants that need more water than others. Put these in containers and you can restrict their need for moisture while still getting their colorful beauty.

These easy ideas will help you meet local requirements if your municipality has them. If you just want to do your part in conserving water, they will inspire you.