Determining how much water your yard needs each week to stay healthy and green can be tricky, but the free mobile app – WaterMyYard – does the figuring for you.
WaterMyYard is a program of Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service under the direction of Guy Fipps, Ph.D., PE, AgriLife Extension statewide irrigation specialist in the Texas A&M Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, Bryan-College Station. The program is conducted in partnership with water districts, cities and public utilities.
WaterMyYard is also a free smartphone app available for iOS and Android platforms that calculates the amount of water your yard needs based on localized weather conditions including temperature and rainfall.
Fipps said the app is very popular with users because it notifies them when it is time to irrigate. WaterMyYard currently covers an area containing about 30% of Texas’ single-family homes including major metropolitan areas like greater Houston and the eastern half of the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex.
Network saves water, money
WaterMyYard currently has more than 48,800 users, Fipps said. Water savings from the program statewide are estimated to be 2.7 billion gallons a year, enough to supply the water use of about 25,000 households each year. This water conservation equates to a water cost savings of $10 million for WaterMyYard users, roughly $230 per household each year.
Fipps’ calculations are based upon yard water use during the irrigation season, which runs from April to October for most areas of Texas. He estimates that over the past 10 years, WaterMyYard users have saved more than 17.8 billion gallons of water. The money savings are a bit more complicated to determine because of varying retail rate structures across the state, but he estimates the program has saved users around $73 million over the past decade.
“Users appreciate the savings and conserving water, but they really like the program because it simplifies the process of watering their yard,” Fipps said. “The program has really only grown through word of mouth, but the number of users has increased steadily from 580 in 2013, the first year of the program, to more than 48,000 today.”
How WaterMyYard works
To access the program, go to the website WaterMyYard.org or download the app from the Apple Store or Google Play. WaterMyYard is only available in sponsored areas, including more than 70 cities like Lubbock, Corpus Christi, Houston, Plano, Denton, Highland Park and San Angelo.
The program utilizes a network of special ET weather stations that record temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, solar radiation and rainfall to calculate local evapotranspiration rates, Fipps said. Evapotranspiration, or ET, is the science-based method for determining the water requirements of plants.
The network consists of about 60 ET weather stations along with an expanding network of rain gauges that determine weekly watering recommendations across the 12 current service areas in the state. Those recommendations are sent via push notification to the user’s phone, by email or by text messing.
Each service area has a sponsor such as the city, local water utility or water district helping cover the costs of the program by purchasing the weather stations for their areas, Fipps said.
“We do get positive feedback from the network partners, and they get positive feedback from users,” he said. “All our partners have stayed in the program since joining, and we’re in conversations with other municipalities to join. It’s not an expensive program for them, and it helps in their water conservation planning.”
Fipps encourages water districts, utilities and/or cities interested in joining the program to contact him or Charles Swanson, AgriLife Extension landscape irrigation program specialist, who runs the day-to-day operation of the network and app. Water customers in areas that are not part of the network should also reach out to their water provider to encourage joining the WaterMyYard program.
Get to know your sprinkler system
Irrigation systems apply water at different rates, which is referred to as the precipitation rate, Fipps said. The precipitation rate typically varies from 0.25 inches to 1.5 inches per hour in home irrigation systems. When setting up your WaterMyYard account, selection of the correct value for your system is critical.
WaterMyYard has an easy-to-use tool called the Precipitation Rate Wizard to assist in choosing the precipitation rate that is appropriate for your irrigation system. If you already know your precipitation rate, you may enter it directly, Fipps said. There is also an option for hose-ended sprinklers for homeowners who do not have a permanent irrigation system.
Rainfall is often the most variable weather measurement. WaterMyYard uses the rainfall recorded at the closest weather station, but users can also enter their own measured rainfall to improve the watering recommendation, he said. The app makes this easy to do.
“Being able to input your own rainfall amounts makes the WaterMyYard watering recommendations even more precise,” he said. “Once you set it up, just look for the notifications and water your lawn.”
