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The 505 Outside Blog covers topics on desert friendly landscapes practices, landscape maintenance, irrigation principles, and seasonal tips.
Summer Irrigation for Tree Health
Folks, it’s a hot, dry summer here in central New Mexico. No surprise, you say — we live in a desert. Even for our location, though, it’s hot and dry. This creates a little conundrum for us: keeping our landscape plants growing while using water efficiently. Tree and...
Albuquerque Backyard Refuge Certification Program
The ABQ Backyard Refuge Program is working with greater Albuquerque residents to create a mosaic of habitat across the city that will support a wide variety of both year-round and migrating wildlife. The program, which is managed by the Friends of Valle de Oro...
How the Water Authority is Weathering the Pending Drought
With most of Bernalillo County and much of north-central New Mexico in extreme drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, and the Albuquerque stretch of the Rio Grande potentially running dry this summer, it’s time for action. Albuquerque can use its...
How to Transform Your Thirsty Lawn in 6 Steps
You undoubtedly have seen your neighbors and friends around town removing their grass lawns and replacing them with water efficient desert friendly xeriscapes. You may yourself be interested in doing the same with your yard but perhaps are overwhelmed by the tasks or...
Great Natural Areas to Visit This Spring for Respite and Inspiration
Natural areas and community gardens are great places to find inspiration for your landscape. We often look to neighbors’ yards, books, magazines or plant nurseries to get ideas, but those aren’t the only options. The greater Albuquerque area is home to beautiful open...
How to Install Irrigation Sprinkler Bodies and Spray Nozzles
Grass lawns in the greater Albuquerque area need supplemental irrigation to survive our high desert climate. Most residential landscapes are watered by pop-up spray heads that include a sprinkler nozzle set into a spray sprinkler body. We recommend switching out your...
Favorite Ways Locals are Composting
Nationally, food waste contributes to 58% of methane fugitive emissions from landfills c/o the EPA. Composting this food waste at your home and in your community helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions while building local healthy soils. Compost is defined in the...
High Desert Landscape Design Template
All good things start with a solid plan. Developing a landscape plan saves you not only time and money, but it is more likely to result in a beautiful yard. A few generous local landscape architects donated their time and put together some landscape design templates...
Save Water, Save Time, Save Money and Get Your Rebate
The Water Authority’s desert friendly xeriscape conversion incentive rebate has been around since the early ’90s and is still going strong. Millions of square feet of thirsty lawns have been converted to healthy xeriscapes that save billions of gallons of water....
Great Natural Areas to Visit This Winter for Respite and Inspiration
Inspiration for your yard can come from a multitude of places — neighbors’ yards, books, magazines or visits to plant nurseries and botanic gardens — but it can also come from experiencing nature. The greater Albuquerque area is surrounded by beautiful open space...
Local Plant Nurseries to Check Out
A popular question we get at 505Outside is “Where should I go to get plants for my yard?” We’re highlighting our local nurseries and the uniqueness of each of them. Every yard has its own unique environment that includes things like sun and wind exposure, soils,...
Plants for 2025
It might be too early to start planting your 2025 garden but it’s never to early to start planning your yard. We’ve grabbed some of our favorite plants for you to test out in 2025. Take a look below. Lacebark elm, Ulmus parvifolia: This fast-growing shade tree should...
Lucious Landscape Design Template
A lot goes into designing a landscape, hence there’s an entire profession called landscape architecture devoted to designing outdoor spaces. A few generous local landscape architects donated their time and put together some Landscape Design templates of a typical...
Happy and Healthy Trees
Nothing adds the same quality and value to a landscape as a healthy mature tree. Trees are so important to our community now and for future generations. The benefits include cooler outdoor spaces and homes, aesthetic appeal, carbon capture, stormwater mitigation, and...
Great Garden Gifts
Below are some great gifts for that homeowner who likes to tinker in their yard and also save water. Practical gifts are always in style! Favorite Garden Books: A local favorite author, Judith Phillips has been writing garden books for decades. The book...
Chisos Red Oak, Quercus gravesii
Type: Deciduous Exposure: Sun/Shade Water Use: Medium Mature Size: 25’ x 25’ Description: A New Mexico native tree that grows fast, sometimes up to 4 feet a year. This deciduous tree produces brilliant red-maroon fall color. The leaves then fade to a chocolate...
Commercial Xeriscape Conversions Save Millions of Gallons
The Water Authority’s xeriscape rebate program, and predecessor programs run by the city of Albuquerque, have seen about 12 million square feet of turf replaced over the past 25 or so years. Since 2009, the top five years for program participation were: This has...
Fall Landscape Maintenance Best Practices
Just as we take shelter when the weather turns colder, so do your plants. This time of year, plants store most of their nutrients in their roots and find shelter in the ground. We can support this transition to help plants thrive during the entire winter season. Also,...
Xeriscape Conversions that use Wood Chip Mulch
Desert friendly xeriscapes are a great way to replace high-water-use turf grass with something beautiful, low-water-use and wildlife-friendly. Many Albuquerque area homeowners are taking their conversion projects a step further and choosing wood chip mulch over gravel...
The Benefit of Trees
What is urban heat? Dark surfaces like concrete, asphalt and brick absorb and retain heat from the sun. Little spaces between buildings can create heat canyons that trap this heat, forming “islands” that are warmer than rural or suburban areas. Urban heat can affect...
Subtropical Fruit Trees for the High Desert: Pomegranates and Figs
As one might guess, the subtropics are a great place to grow fruit trees and a particularly good place to find plants that are heat and drought tolerant — sort of a prerequisite for plant selection in a hot, dry place like New Mexico, or at least it should be! The...
Passive Rainwater Harvesting for Homeowners
In a June article in 505Outside, we covered Plants for Passive Rainwater Harvesting. Now we will discuss Passive Rainwater Techniques for the Homeowner. Passive rainwater harvesting allows you to collect rainwater runoff from roofs, patios and driveways as well as the...
The Giving Tree
The jujube is just one of those trees that is extra! Extra fruitful, extra nutritious, extra hardy, extra beautiful. This medium sized tree comes in 400 varieties, many of which are being cultivated and taking root in Albuquerque. The jujube tree, often called...
Keep Your Trees Happy: Build a Tree Irrigation Watering System
Trees are especially important in arid, urban environments like Albuquerque and Bernalillo County. They provide shade, mitigate urban heat, reduce greenhouse gasses and air pollution, and create wildlife habitat, among many other benefits. All trees, even...
Maintaining and Improving Mature Tree Health
Nothing adds the same quality and value to a landscape as a healthy mature tree. The benefits include cooler outdoor spaces, cooler homes, aesthetic appeal, carbon capture, stormwater mitigation and more. There are some key things to think about when it comes to...
Share Your Fruit Tree Harvest to Help Nourish the Community
If you’ve walked around your neighborhood, you’ve probably noticed cherry trees being flocked by birds and buckets of fruit with “Free Organic Apricots” signs. Yes, it’s harvest season in Albuquerque. Have you ever wondered what becomes of all that fruit? Back in...
Why Trees Die
Have you ever heard of forensic arboriculture? Probably not … but it is a thing! Figuring out why trees die can be a challenge as there are often multiple causes, and the clues may be obscured by time or a deep layer of rock mulch. If you look at enough dead and dying...
Amorpha fruticosa, False Indigo
Type: Deciduous Exposure: Sun/Shade Water Use: Medium Mature Size: 10’ x 10’ This beautiful deciduous native shrub fills with unique purple spiked flowers in May and June. This plant is adored by wildlife for its small seedpods, and pollinators love the flowers. It...
Plants for Passive Rainwater Harvesting Gardens
Passive rainwater harvesting is a great way to optimize your landscape while minimizing water use. So you may ask, “What are active and passive rainwater harvesting?” Active rainwater harvesting involves collecting rainwater runoff from roofs and other impermeable...
Favorite Mediterranean Plants for Albuquerque Area Landscapes
The word Mediterranean may bring to mind rows of lavender in southern France, an Italian villa or maybe a Spanish courtyard or Greek olive orchard. These areas around the Mediterranean Sea all share unique plants and garden design methods that are part of their allure...
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Water Conservation Program
P.O. Box 568
Albuquerque, NM 87103-0568
505-842-WATR Option 4
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P.O. Box 568
Albuquerque, NM 87103-0568
505-842-WATR