Eternal Green

Happy Trails: Roy Rogers' and Dale Evans' final resting place at Sunset Hills Memorial Park near Apple Valley, Calif. is now covered by artificial turf.

A California cemetery has become the first in the nation to install artificial turf, sparking stories in the national media and drawing interest from other memorial parks. The turf is from a Las Vegas distributor and is being installed at Sunset Hills Memorial Park near Apple Valley, in the Southern California desert.

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Sunset Hills estimates the switch to polyurethane turf could save the cemetery $180,000 in water and maintenance over the next three years.

Representatives from at least nine cemeteries around Phoenix, Ariz. have visited to explore the option for their own facilities.

Despite the occasional joke, Hitt and others say the artificial turf looks real and is an economic, aesthetically-pleasing solution to keeping a cemetery green in an arid, desert climate where summer temperatures soar into the 100s.

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Hitt said that Sunset Hills' turf looks real and that he's had to tell some customers that it's artificial.

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The phone number at Sunset Hills Memorial Park is (760) 247-0155.