Gardening through drought: What still works this spring in Colorado

Spring is in full bloom at the Denver Botanic Gardens, where vibrant greens and colorful plants are thriving despite ongoing outdoor watering restrictions across the Denver metro area.

The gardens are showing that a beautiful landscape is still possible, even in a dry year, with a little strategy and the right plants.

"Probably a quarter of our gardens are not watered at all," said Panayoti Kelaidis, senior curator at Denver Botanic Gardens. "When you plant things, you don't necessarily have to soak your whole garden. You can spot water where you've just planted."

As much of Colorado faces drought conditions and limited outdoor water use, many homeowners are questioning what, if anything, is worth planting this spring. Kelaidis said choosing plants adapted to Colorado's climate can make all the difference.

Cacti and other water‑efficient plants are one obvious option. "If you plant a cactus, you don't have to water it," Kelaidis said.

But water‑wise gardening doesn't have to mean sacrificing greenery or beauty. Throughout the gardens, there are examples of plants with full foliage that thrive without heavy irrigation.

"If you look here, there's beautiful foliage everywhere," Kelaidis said.

For gardeners hesitant to embrace a desert aesthetic, Kelaidis said there's no reason to avoid planting much of what you like in your gardens.

"There's absolutely no reason why you can't plant many plants in a drought year because they're drought‑adapted," he said.

What experts caution against is making big landscape changes that require heavy watering to establish, particularly lawn conversion projects.

In Golden, park managers are encouraging patience when it comes to turf.

"Doing any kind of landscape conversion does require a significant amount of establishment watering," Stansfield said. "For that reason, we would not recommend doing any sort of turf conversion heading into the spring."

Instead, officials are allowing city grasses to remain dormant as long as possible and suggesting homeowners do the same. Brown lawns, experts say, are not dead lawns.

"Forcing your turf into dormancy, or even not that extreme, is not going to kill it," Stansfield said. "It's just going to be one year where it doesn't look super lush and green."

There may even be a benefit to letting grass go dormant. Kelaidis said withholding water from bluegrass can help reduce Japanese beetle populations, which rely on green lawns to survive.

"If you don't water bluegrass, you will kill Japanese beetles," he said. "They only grow and live if they have green grass."

Ultimately, experts say the focus this spring should be on smarter water use rather than abandoning gardens altogether.

"Plants that have evolved in climates like ours, they know," Kelaidis said. "They roll with the punches, and we have to learn to do that too."