As California faces its fourth year of record-breaking drought, many communities are finding ways to cut back to meet the state’s mandatory water use reductions. Ecology and Evolutionary Biology professor Peter Bowler of the University of California, Irvine says their campus has been doing its part by converting to drought-tolerant landscaping, or xeriscaping.

"The whole campus is going xeriscape. We’re deep into getting away from turf and using plants that preferably are native but at least use little water. We have a lot of drought-resistant vegetation. These plants become dormant during the dry seasons."

Bowler also directs the campus’s Aboretum, a facility for rare and native plant species. His team has had the challenge of balancing water reduction and preserving these endangered plants.

"We have an obligation to preserve and sustain these state-owned plants, but at the same time we’re doing our very best to keep water usage at an absolute minimum."