CACHE COUNTY — The call has gone out for many weeks from the governor’s office, from legislative leaders, from counties and cities asking people to please curtail water usage.

On the heels of an urgent message from Hyde Park earlier this week that the flow of water into the tanks is not keeping up with the flow going out, Cache County Executive David Zook is urging residents to take the drought conditions seriously.

“It gets dry in the summer, I think people are used to seeing things dry out a little bit in summer. But I think it’s important that everybody recognize that things are a lot worse than usual right now. We know it’s always dry here anyway, we’re the 2nd driest state, but another stat that I think sometimes people don’t realize is that we’re one of the highest water users also. Not only do we have the least water but we’re one of the biggest water users,” he explained.

On KVNU’s For the People program on Wednesday, Zook said the biggest use seen is on outdoor landscaping where 60 percent of the water gets used.

Also on the program was Nathan Daugs of the Cache County Water Conservancy District. He said that lawns can get by with much less water.

“That’s one thing the state is really pushing right now is prioritize your watering. So trees and shrubs, they can’t go all summer with no water, they won’t go dormant, they will die. So if you have a limited water supply you water those first, then like David said limited watering on the lawn. The governor’s recommending two times per week, which is about a half an inch each time, so one inch per week, more than enough to keep your lawn alive,” Daugs said.

Zook said in talking with various cities in the county he found that municipal wells that normally are not affected by seasonal changes, because they go down deeper, are now being affected as people are watering more. One city told him their levels are already down to where they would be at the end of the summer.



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