Artificial turf in Windsor.

Highland Meadows Golf Course, Pelican Lakes at Water Valley and RainDance National are all in Windsor. Pelican Lakes runs 27 holes along the Cache la Poudre; Highland Meadows is a public 18 that opened in 2004.

Ptarmigan is split. Windsor Villages at Ptarmigan, platted between 2019 and 2023, is inside the town. The original Ptarmigan filings and the country club on Vardon Way are unincorporated Larimer County with Fort Collins addresses, so Windsor’s landscape code does not govern them; the HOA’s rules still do.

Section 15-3-20 of the Windsor code says no artificial turf or artificial plants may be included in any landscape plan or installed, and it covers new development and redevelopment. The Director can approve functional artificial turf as an exception when alternatives are not reasonable.

Section 15-3-10 exempts detached single-family houses and duplexes from the whole landscape article, except that the tree lawn requirement stays in effect and at least 25% of every front yard must be landscaped.

The code’s definition of landscape leaves artificial turf out, which suggests turf will not count toward that 25%. Windsor Planning makes that call, so ask before you design a front yard around turf.

By the state’s district map, about 80 metro districts have a representative point inside Windsor’s limits, 23 of them formed in 2018 or later; that count includes commercial districts.

On the Larimer County side, the largest plats are the Ranch at Highland Meadows at 644 acres, the Highland Meadows Golf Course plats at 621 acres, Fossil Ridge and Highpointe, and the median residential lot there measured about 10,018 square feet.

East of the river, the Water Valley master plan takes in Water Valley South, Pelican Farms, Pelican Hills, Hilltop Estates and Pelican Shores.

The Town buys most of its water from North Weld County Water District, with Greeley and Fort Collins-Loveland Water District as secondary suppliers. On the Larimer County side, Fort Collins-Loveland serves Windsor homes directly, and Harmony Ridge and Alexander Estates are on North Weld.

Since February 1, 2026, a single-family home on a 3/4-inch meter pays $28.33 a month plus $8.34 per 1,000 gallons up to 16,000 gallons, $12.45 up to 22,500 and $18.57 above that. The Town put the change at about a 26% rise in the total monthly utility bill for an average home using 5,000 gallons.

RainDance Metropolitan District runs its own non-potable irrigation water at $4.53 per 1,000 gallons plus a $277.68 annual capital fee per unit, so a RainDance lawn’s watering cost sits on the district’s bill, not the Town’s.

The Town’s 2026 Lawn Replacement Program paid $1 to $2 per square foot, up to $2,000 per water account, for front-yard lawn replaced with a new design that is at least 50% living plants, and the 2026 application window has passed. The program page is blunt: artificial turf is not eligible.

Resource Central’s lawn-replacement program, offered through several Northern Colorado water providers, also requires the replaced area to be at least half waterwise plants. Neither program says how it treats a yard with turf elsewhere, so confirm with the program in writing before you split a yard between a rebated bed and turf.

Soil surveys around central Windsor map mostly low shrink-swell Olney fine sandy loam and Kim loam, plus wet, gravelly river-bottom soils near the Poudre. The sandy ground drains readily under a turf base; the river-bottom pockets are where drainage deserves a closer look.

NOAA logged 2-inch hail near Windsor on June 12, 2017 and again on July 5, 2019. The Greeley UNC station averages 58.3 days a year at or above 90°F and 6.5 days at or above 100°F.