Water restrictions in Yolo County, CA — also called the watering schedule, outdoor irrigation rules, or drought ordinance — set which days and hours you can run sprinklers or irrigation.
Yolo County enforces permanent outdoor water-use restrictions through Sec. 6-8.1102 (Level 1 Drought Response) of the County Code, which applies within county-administered water service areas (notably Wild Wings CSA near Davis-Yolo airport). Restrictions include no daytime irrigation between 9:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. and no irrigation runoff. Higher drought levels add stricter rules. Inside cities, each city water utility sets its own rules.
Sec. 6-8.1102 of the Yolo County Code is the Level 1 (permanent) drought response in the unincorporated county's water service areas. The county does not operate the urban water systems - Davis, Woodland, West Sacramento, and Winters each run their own systems and set their own conservation rules - but the county directly manages County Service Areas (CSA) such as Wild Wings. Under Sec. 6-8.1102, permanent rules in those areas include: (1) no potable-water irrigation between 9:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m., except with a hand-held container, a hose with a shut-off nozzle, or for very short test/adjustment periods (drip and micro-irrigation are exempt because they apply water slowly at or near the root zone); and (2) no irrigation in a manner that produces more than incidental runoff onto adjacent property, walkways, or roads. Higher drought levels (2, 3, and 4) add days-per-week limits, prohibitions on filling decorative water features, and other measures. The Board of Supervisors adopted a Local Drought Emergency in July 2021 and approved a Wild Wings rebate program (turf removal, weather-based irrigation controllers, landscape-design assistance) in October 2021. Statewide rules also apply: SB 318/AB 1572 phases out potable-water irrigation of non-functional turf at commercial, industrial, and institutional properties.
Violations of Sec. 6-8.1102 are typically handled with a warning letter from the County Service Area, escalating to administrative penalties and surcharges on the water bill for repeat offenders. The Code allows formal enforcement under Title 1's administrative-penalty framework. Outside the county-administered CSAs, each city water utility runs its own enforcement program, often layered with state Water Board reporting.
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