Pasco County watering rules: your day, the hours and what's exempt

The county assigns the day by the last number of your street address. Well and surface water users follow the same schedule as county water customers:⁴

The county's guide says no irrigation is allowed between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m., whatever the water source.⁵ The Water Resources page gives the watering window in force today.

Every automatic sprinkler system needs a working rain sensor, soil moisture sensor or similar device that stops it when the ground is wet enough.⁶

Reclaimed water customers also water once a week, on the same day as the table above, and only between midnight and 8 a.m. The county can add mandatory reclaimed water restrictions in an emergency or drought. Reclaimed water isn't safe to drink and is for decorative landscaping only: don't use it on vegetable or fruit plants, hook a hose to it, fill a pool with it or wash a car with it. For checking a sprinkler system, reclaimed pressure is on Tuesday from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. and Friday from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m..⁷

The district's year-round rule allows these:⁶

• Beds, shrubs and other plants that aren't lawn, as needed, with drip, micro-irrigation, a soaker hose or hand watering with a shut-off nozzle.
• Dry patches of lawn, by hand only, during the allowed hours.
• Testing a sprinkler system, once a week, up to 10 minutes a zone, with someone there.
• Watering in fertilizer or pesticide where the label or the law calls for it: one quarter inch within 24 hours unless the maker says otherwise, during allowed hours. A professional applicator who posts a dated sign can water outside them.
• After a named tropical storm or hurricane warning, one extra watering within 72 hours to rinse salt off plants.

New lawns and plants get a 60-day establishment period. In the first 30 days they can be watered on any day. From day 31 to day 60, they can be watered three days a week, on the schedule the Water Resources page gives for your address and water source. A whole sprinkler zone can be run only if at least half of it is new planting; scattered new plants are watered by hose.¹

At any time, under the district's rule:⁶

• leaving a hose running with no one there;
• hand watering a lawn on a day that isn't yours, or more than once a day;
• hosing a driveway, sidewalk or building to clear what a broom could;
• leaving a broken sprinkler head or leaking faucet running after you've been told about it.

Report suspected misuse of any water source, reclaimed water included, on the county's misuse form.¹ Send water conservation questions to SaveH2O@MyPasco.net.⁴ The district's list of local contacts gives Pasco County's restriction line as (727) 847-8131 and its violation line as (727) 847-8171, and names a contact for each city in the county.⁸

City and county officers help the district enforce its rule.² If you need relief from the district's rule, you ask the district for a variance; relief from the county's own measures is asked of the county.⁹