Right as RainSmart steps to water-conserving landscapes.

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Another tactic: small trenches around gardens and dips in the topography that cause rainwater to puddle around plants with roots that can tolerate it.

"The key to conserving water ... in the landscaping is, No. 1, the way you create the lots so you retain the natural rainfall -- as long as possible before it falls off," says Arizona builder John Wesley Miller.

Go With the Flow

Following smart layout and careful plant selection, products designed to further conserve and better manage water on the property also come into play.

Creating a yard that requires little watering lets a homeowner get by using captured rainwater instead of potable water. Rainwater catchment systems, ranging from large vessels with attached garden hoses to underground cisterns that work in tandem with a sophisticated distribution system, harvest runoff from roofs and gutters.

Another technique is the distribution of greywater, or water collected from household drains (not the toilet) that can be reused for irrigation--although it's one that builders and some jurisdictions are not warming to quickly.

For the parts of the landscape that do need regular watering, water-conscious builders rely on drip irrigators that slowly wet only the plant that needs attention rather than spraying water over a whole lawn. Drip irrigators are rigged to timers to deliver a precise amount of water on a schedule that eliminates unnecessary watering.

The newest irrigation systems are so "smart," they can sense whether it has rained and how much, and will skip a scheduled watering if it's not needed. They are programmable to recognize the type of plant being irrigated and to deliver the specific amount of water that species needs.

Stopping Power