METHODS We conducted three kinds of surveys of FCMA residents:

•  Questionnaire survey among participants of the Central Valley Café Scientifique, Sierra Club and Fresno Audubon Society’s monthly meetings after talks about water wise gardening (11 questions on yard type & size, current water use and future plans).

•  A questionnaire survey sent home with 5thgrade students of Manchester GATE Elementary school after a lesson on water conservation (14 similar questions).

•  Focus group recruited by a marketing company, including 6 participants ($40,000-80,000 annual income) with questions and discussions on water. Two more focus groups from higher and lower income groups will be conducted this fall.

INTRODUCTION Fresno has been facing challenges in water conservation. Between the coupled effects of industrial agriculture and urban development, extraordinary demands have been placed on the region’s water resources. While water scarcity is a complex issue facing the entire California, Fresno did not have residential water meters until mid 2012. Per capita water use is among the highest in the nation at 322 gal/day. In residential areas 70% of the total water is used for yard irrigation. This study is a collaborative, volunteer-driven, residential landscape project in Fresno-Clovis Metropolitan area (FCMA). The main goals of this project are:

•  To understand homeowners’ perception about water use •  To understand the process of water policy formation and

implementation by the government •  To map the distribution of current waterwise yards •  To understand the effect of residential water use on

biodiversity of yard landscapes. Here we present data from multiple surveys of homeowners in FCMA.

Funding Support Together Green Volunteers Day grant, Together Green

Conservation leadership Fellowship to Kaberi Kar Gupta and National Science Foundation

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The authors wish to acknowledge National Audubon Society,

California Sate University Fresno, Fresno Audubon Society, Bonnie Balden, Gary Jones, Drs. Henry Delcore, Andrew

Jones, Las Pilitas Nursery, Intermountain Nursery and all the volunteer participants

Metering of water in a desert city: Changing green lawns to water wise landscapes with citizen scientists Kaberi Kar Gupta, Steven Jones, and Madhusudan Katti!

Department of Biology, California State University, Fresno & Fresno Audubon Society!lorises@me.com!

DISCUSSION §  Surveys suggest most homeowners have grass lawns. §  Café Scientifique, Sierra Club and Fresno Audubon

Society participants suggest that they are concerned about water issue and either already have waterwise yards or would like to do one in near future.

§  Manchester GATE’ parents were a random sample from different socioeconomic and ethnic communities in Fresno. Some are interested in receiving information on waterwise landscape.

§  Focus group participants wanted information on government ‘s water policies, water pricing and waterwise landscape but are not ready to change the landscape unless the price of water gets significantly higher

§  Further research on higher and lower income socio economic groups will be conducted to find out the perception of water use in those economic classes.

§  We will also compare water consumption, and the diversity of plants, birds and arthropods between waterwise and traditional grass yards.

SITE MAP

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Results from first focus group:

•  All agreed that green looks good. •  Families with kids like to have green space. •  Never seen well designed waterwise

landscape. “Our backyard was without any landscape design with native vegetation since we bought our home but after the children were born we have put grass for them to play and landscaper gave the grass free” – one particiapant

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Survey 2: Manchester GATE school’s fifth grade students’ parents Parents’ response to question on what kind of yard do they have was either lush green or some green with some yellow. We asked 15 questions about their daily water use and type of yard. Here are answers of two questions:

Figure 2: Homeowners & their yards Group 1: Café Scientifique Group 2: Manchester Gate parents Group 3: Fresno Audubon Society Group 4: Sierra Club

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Survey 1: Central Valley Café Scientifique, Fresno Audubon Society, Sierra Club All the participants of Café scientifique, Sierra Club and Fresno Audubon Society were interested in landscape change or have done it.

Figure 3: Would you like to get more information on waterwise yard?

Figure 1: Mapping of houses with no traditional lawns in a neighborhood

Figure 4: Do you see any birds or mammals in your yard?

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RESULTS

Figure 5: Wordle summarizing the focus group meeting