Low-water grass or artificial turf: buffalograss, blue grama and microclover in Northern Colorado

01How much water does a low-water grass save on the Front Range?

Buffalograss is the one with measured savings. CSU Extension says a turf-quality buffalograss lawn needs 50% less rain and irrigation per season than Kentucky bluegrass, partly because it sits dormant through spring and fall, and about an inch of water a week to stay green in summer (GardenNotes #412). Its fact sheet puts newer varieties at 50 to 75 percent less irrigation than bluegrass; an established lawn survives unwatered but goes dormant most summers and lets weeds in (Fact Sheet 7.224).

CSU’s seasonal table counts rain and irrigation together:

What that means for a yard here:

• Most of buffalograss’s water can fall from the sky. CSU puts a normal Front Range season at 10 to 11 inches of precipitation from April to October and says bluegrass needs about 24 inches of irrigation on top (GardenNotes #564), which squares with its 34-inch total. The same subtraction leaves turf-quality buffalograss roughly 6 or 7 inches of sprinkler water.
• A dormant bluegrass lawn uses less still: 14 inches if it goes brown from June to August.
• Watering habits decide the savings. CSU’s bottom line is that “species selection is secondary to irrigation management in water savings.”

Turf needs no water to grow; the rinsing question is in do you have to water artificial turf?, and bluegrass water at your provider’s rates is in our water savings guide.

02How do buffalograss, blue grama and microclover compare with turf?

Buffalograss is among the grasses CSU ranks first, with blue grama, for persisting under low maintenance (GardenNotes #561). The catch is looks and use: in eastern Colorado it is green mid-May through September, while bluegrass is usually green from March to November, and a shaded stand goes thin, patchy and weedy (CSU Extension). CSU also rules it out on saline soils and on small lawns where traffic is both concentrated and constant, and warns that watering and feeding a native lawn to look like bluegrass brings weeds (Native Lawn Establishment).

Blue grama, the other native, has excellent cold, heat and drought tolerance and establishes quickly, but it takes neither traffic nor shade. It suits a sunny area people look at more than walk on.

Microclover is sold as low-water, but isn’t here. In August 2025 an Ask Extension expert told a Colorado homeowner whose clover lawn had thinned to patches that clover is marketed as low-water mostly where more rain falls than in Colorado, and needs almost as much water in peak heat as a regular lawn, 2 to 2.5 inches a week (Ask Extension). Alison O’Connor, a CSU Extension horticulture professor in Larimer County, put it nearer an inch a week, more under traffic, and wrote in 2023 that limited CSU research found microclovers didn’t stay micro (Ask Extension). CSU’s Tony Koski adds that it stays small only if mowed often; what it saves is fertilizer (CSU Extension). Another expert answer calls clover “not drought tolerant” (Ask Extension).

03What does it take to get a low-water lawn started?

Savings come later. CSU says establishing buffalograss from seed, sod or plugs takes as much water as a new bluegrass lawn, sometimes more. Its native-lawn guide spells out the first month: a few minutes of water every 4 to 5 hours during the day for 3 to 4 weeks, then water through the first winter.

• Timing. Seed buffalograss from spring through late July. Seed sown between August 1 and October 1 can sprout and then die over winter; seed sown October through December waits for spring. Plugs set 12 to 18 inches apart need at least 6 weeks before the first fall frost and can cover in 6 to 12 weeks. In late September, that leaves dormant seeding or waiting for spring.
• Sod is quickest, but CSU says buffalograss sod costs significantly more than bluegrass sod and is much harder to find.
• Seed. Mixes labeled “native” often hold little truly native grass, CSU warns. Its guide lists sources without endorsing them, among them two Greeley seed companies, Pawnee Buttes Seed and Buffalo Brand Seed.
• Johnstown. Newly planted grass may be watered only under a Town permit, and the permit doesn’t lift the 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. watering ban, so CSU’s daytime schedule won’t fit. Our guide to sod or turf covers the permit. Elsewhere, check your town’s watering hours against that schedule before buying seed.

Turf skips the grow-in stage; when to install artificial turf covers the season.

04Do Northern Colorado codes and HOAs favor grass or turf?

Colorado’s 2025 turf law requires every town and county with zoning power to regulate turf in new residential development by January 1, 2028. It defines that turf as regularly mowed grass that is nonnative or not bred for arid conditions, and bars local governments from restricting native, arid-hybridized or low-water grass seed or sod (HB25-1113). CSU lists buffalograss and blue grama as natives, so that protection covers them. Not legal advice.

Local codes already lean that way for new landscaping:

• Berthoud lets high-water grasses such as Kentucky bluegrass be planted only for recreation, civic or community uses, and exempts native and low-water grasses. How that reaches one existing lot depends on the project; ask Berthoud Planning.
• Johnstown allows native grasses in low-traffic areas, with water dedicated to establish them, and caps turf and spray-irrigated areas in single-family rear yards at 50%, up to 2,000 square feet, on lots platted since the start of 2024.
• Loveland’s Kinston at Centerra caps lawn at 25% of a lot’s landscaped area, or 40% with an alternative grass such as buffalo grass, unless its design review board approves more.

Front yards are where a living lawn can win outright. Firestone’s code wants 75% of a single-family front yard in live plant material and won’t let artificial turf count toward it; Wellington sets the same 75% for live materials between house and curb on new single-family lots; Greeley staff say turf is currently barred from house front yards, with a permit proposal still in draft. Whether buffalograss meets a live-plant rule depends on the town’s definitions; ask Firestone, Wellington or Greeley Planning. Every town is in our turf rules guide.

On a detached home, Colorado law also makes unenforceable any HOA or special district rule that limits drought-tolerant landscapes or requires plantings to be wholly or partly turf grass, though design guidelines still apply (C.R.S. 37-60-126(11)(a.5); not legal advice). CSU still says to check city and HOA species or mowing-height rules first. For turf, see HOA approval.

05Where does each one belong in a Northern Colorado yard?

Match the grass to sun, traffic and looks:

• Sunny, lightly used, brown from fall to May is fine: buffalograss.
• Sunny and mostly looked at: blue grama.
• Shade from a big tree or the north side of the house: none of the three. CSU points shade to fine fescue, shade-tolerant ground covers or wood-chip mulch; turf has its own shade problems, covered in turf in a shady or north-facing yard.
• Kids and dogs every day: buffalograss wears away, blue grama won’t take it, and clover takes the traffic but not less water. This is turf’s strongest case; for Dog Tuff and other grasses for dog yards, read that comparison.
• Green in March and November: bluegrass with the water it takes (sod or turf), or turf.

A yard can mix them: buffalograss out front where the town wants living plants, turf where the dogs run (mixing turf, rock and plant beds, front yards with turf, turf or xeriscape). Ask each turf installer how the edge will keep the grass from creeping in; a good answer names the edging and its depth. More in questions to ask a turf installer and on our artificial turf installation page.