Los Angeles Times

Column: Has a UC Riverside researcher created the Holy Grail of drought-tolerant lawns?

Jim Baird, Ph.D., Turfgrass Specialist, at a test field to evaluate variety of grasses under saline irrigation at UC Riverside Turfgrass Research& Extension on June 17, 2022, in Riverside, California.

The cheerleader for Public Enemy No. 1 greeted me at the gates to UC Riverside's Agricultural Experiment Station with a smile and some choice words.

"Every time there's a serious drought, I'm in the L.A. Times," Jim Baird said, only half-jokingly. "Why is it always a knee-jerk reaction? When it's not a drought, I don't hear from you guys. I don't hear from the water agencies. Then we go through our wasteful ways. 'Lawns, you're the bad guys,' everyone then says."

The tall, skinny, loquacious Baird is the head of UC Riverside's Turfgrass Research & Extension program, devoted to the study of growing and maintaining lawns. He's the only such faculty member in the University of California system, which makes him the state's Mark

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