Patios and Walkways
Adding a water feature to your landscape adds a serene and tranquil dimension only found through the sound of water. Water features include ponds, waterfalls, fountains or rain gardens.
Water features can be designed to include plants, and, in the case of ponds, designed to house fish. They are often designed with rock and stone and are most often integrated into a larger landscape plan.
Rain gardens are popular choices when dealing with water runoff. Rain gardens allow rainwater runoff from areas like roofs, driveways and walkways the opportunity to be absorbed into the ground and returned to the earth’s natural water supply. Adding rain gardens can reduce the amount of pollution that reaches water bodies (lakes, creeks and streams).
Although they don’t hold water on a regular basis, water diversion channels (also known as dry river beds) are an attractive way to run water around the foundation of the house and reducing erosion of the soil. These channels can be planted or can be left natural with only stone.
In addition to using landscape water features for conservation, rainwater harvesting is becoming a popular option for homeowners. Rainwater harvesting is a method of capturing rainwater for storage in underground tanks to be available for later use for watering plants or other outdoor water use. For more detailed information about water conservation and rainwater harvesting, visit our water conservation page.
