The best time to visit a water-efficient landscape is on a sweltering, late summer afternoon. By then, the garden has had a couple of months to bake in our ovenlike sunshine, and many gardens are looking pretty tired.

Not so in the Water Efficient Landscape at the San Juan Water District in Granite Bay. The garden proves that low water can mean lush and green. There's no ragged lawn or bedraggled foliage here.

Squeezed between busy Auburn Folsom Road and Folsom Lake, it showcases the beauty of a well-designed, low-water-using, climate-appropriate landscape. It gives gardeners ideas they can take home with them.

The 86,444-square-foot garden is full of tough, mainly sun-loving plants that can bask in the sun- shine and take all the heat a California summer can throw at them with nary a complaint about the weather and hardly any water at all. In fact, most of the garden is watered a scant three minutes twice a day.

Yet, black-eyed Susans stand tall against the heat, their butter-yellow petals looking cheerful. Catmint, with its rough, gray-green leaves and masses of tiny, cool-blue flowers, creeps along the ground beneath roses and lavender. Fuzzy caterpillar-like creamy pink inflorescences of the ornamental grass pennisetum hang on lax stems above slim green blades. They sway with the slightest breeze. Tufts of ground hugging Santa Barbara daisies scramble along paths, insinuating themselves among taller plants.

The garden is divided into nine theme gardens. A walking tour of the garden starts on the deck under a towering oak tree. It sends its long limbs out over the deck, and the leafy canopy gently filters the light and throws shadows on the ground.

First stop: the rose garden.

A stairway leads you to a long, pergola covered brick walkway. Climbing roses twine themselves around the posts. Roses fill the brick edged beds. Stepping stones lead to a small corner gazebo. Using gravel instead of a lawn, and incorporating features like the gazebo reduces water needs in the garden, says Judy Gagnier, customer service manager with the water district.

The sound of running water lures you into the pond garden. The koi come looking for food. Pink water lilies float lazily on the water.

"Believe it or not, ponds can be water efficient," Gagnier says. The pond has a liner to prevent leaking, she explains, and the water recirculated. Further, the planting helps filter the water and keep it clean sans chemicals.

Follow the roadway counterclockwise to the rock garden. Tiny white Santa Barbara daisies mingle with blue catmint. Nearby tall agapanthus stems lean their nodding indigo blue flowers over the path.

Next vignette is the turf substitute garden where gardeners can learn how to create an inviting garden that relies on hardscapes like patios, walkways and decks instead of lawns.

And who can resist an herb garden? Six triangular beds separated by gravel pathways are all planted full of herbs like lavender, catmint, rosemary, yarrow and more. Herbs are perfect California summer plants, Gagnier says.

That brings us to the perennial garden, which most resembles a suburban backyard with its sweep of lawn flanked by beds of perennials. Alongside the sun-lovers is a shade garden. Redwoods hover over azaleas, ferns, star jasmine, hydrangeas and more.

Finally, for those who garden with deer, there's a garden of deer-resistant plants. Surprisingly there are scores of plants deer dislike: Christmas rose, red hot poker, New Zealand flax, ferns, lavender, rosemary, Oregon grape, santolina. A ceramic fawn adds a touch of whimsy.

Nicest of all, though, are all the chairs and benches for sitting in the garden to admire the flowers, take notes or enjoy the scenery.

You won't want to leave.

Call The Bee's Pat Rubin, (916) 321-1075.