Congratulations to the winners of the Truckee Meadows Water Authority's 2008 Water-Efficient Landscape awards. If you enjoy visiting other people's gardens the way I do, you can take a photo tour of each winner's garden by visiting TMWA's site.

I don't know about TMWA's winners, but I would be under horrible pressure if a camera crew were headed to my house. When I take photos of my yard, I have to frame them very carefully to avoid weeds, bare dirt, and other ugly patches. The full-yard views of the winners look great to me.

I could never win a water-efficient award, either. I try. We use drip irrigation everywhere except the grass, and we've removed more than half our grass. I think our biggest water problem is leaks in the system we don't notice right away. I'm hoping our (Phil's)  brush removal campaign this summer helps with that.

By the way, it had been a while since I'd visited TMWA's landscape guide site, and I'm going to have to spend some time there. It looks as if it has a lot of helpful information about water-efficient gardening.