A community of approximately 250 homes has decided to protect its neighbor, a major estuary, from its overwatering runoff. The experiment involves an automated weather station to determine how much water is needed for landscape irrigation. Once a week the station will send a message via satellite to each home's irrigation system turning sprinklers on precisely.

Tom Ash, a horticulturist with CTSI Corp., understands that the average homeowner doesn't know how to adjust their irrigation controllers when the weather changes or how much watering is actually needed. This new experiment will take that decision out of homeowners hands. Marsha Marion, a resident, states that she "was like most people" thinking that she had to water every day. "You don't", Marsha concludes.

This year-long experiment follows a smaller study done in the same area which reduced water use 20 percent and cut some homeowner's water bills in half.