Oklahoma Master Gardener Perceptions of Water Conservation Strategies.

With growing concern for water conservation across the United States and in Oklahoma, there is a need to educate citizens of proper methods to conserve water resources in the home landscape. The purpose of this project was to educate Oklahoma citizens of proper home lawn and landscape water conservation methods.  The objective of this project was to create an Oklahoma lawn and landscape water conservation guide will be developed, published, and freely available on the Oklahoma State University turfgrass website (http://turf.okstate.edu).  A seminar was held at the Oklahoma Master Gardeners State Conference in June 2011 to help identify key knowledge areas concerning home lawn water conservation among Master Gardeners workshop participants.  Paper surveys were administered to Master Gardener seminar participants to obtain their knowledge and perceptions of water conservation methods in Oklahoma before and after attending the workshop.  An additional survey was administered to non-seminar Master Gardener participants, where information was gathered only on their current water conservation methods.  Based on the respondent data, there are several water conservation topics that need to be addressed in the lawn and landscape water conservation guide including: yearly irrigation system calibration, use of a rain and soil moisture gauge for the irrigation system, proper care for mulch, use of a rain barrel in the yard for alternate irrigation, correct plant design/grouping in the yard, and proper lawn cultural practices. In addition, based on the respondent data, the Master Gardener workshop was effective for increasing participant knowledge of key lawn and landscape water conservation methods.