Sometimes you have to spend to save. For $15 to $60, an outdoor water timer can cut your water bill.
"You simply set it to how long you want the sprinkler to run and it automatically shuts off after that amount of time," said Stacy Genovese, Technical Director, Good Housekeeping Institute.
The Melnor Aquasentry with Aqua Timer checks soil moisture before watering the lawn to see if water is needed.
It ranked high in Good Housekeeping's product test.
"It has a wireless moisture sensor. So you just take the sensor, mount it into your lawn, and it monitors how wet the grass is, so if there's enough moisture in it, it doesn't let the sprinkler go on," said Genovese.
Just connect it to your spigot, and on the other end you connect your hose. When done, the sprinkler automatically turns off.
If that's too much work, Good Houskeeping says check out the remote rain from L.R. Nelson.
"You don't actually have to go outside to turn the water on and off. You can control it with this remote control, and it works up to 100 feet away from the spigot," said Genovese.
And for those with a big yard, Good Housekeeping likes the orbit yard watering system. It can control up to four hoses for zoned irrigation.
Don't think you use that much water running your hose? For every half hour it runs, you're using up to 300 gallons of water - that's enough for almost two weeks worth of showers.
