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Golf Course Management ‘Down Under’
By John H. Foy, Florida Green Section Director |
The Green Section’s 18 regional agronomists provide web updates
that discuss turf and course management issues encountered while
making Turf Advisory Service (TAS) visits. During the first
three weeks of October, I did not make any TAS visits in the
Florida Region because I was serving as the championship
agronomist for the 2008 World Amateur Team Championships hosted
at The Grange and Royal Adelaide Golf Clubs in Adelaide, South
Australia. This was my fourth World Amateur, and this has been a
wonderful opportunity to visit other parts of the world and be
involved with course preparations for the "Olympics" of golf.
Argentina and Turkey will host the next World Amateur Team
Championships in 2010 and 2012, respectively.
In this year’s Women’s World Amateur, the team from Sweden
captured the Esprito Santos Trophy by 12 strokes over Spain, and
14 over the USA. On the men’s side, Scotland claimed its first
Eisenhower Trophy with a 9-shot victory over team USA; and
Sweden finished third to take the bronze medal.
While there are naturally differences in Australia, there are
also similarities to Florida as far as turfgrass and golf course
management. Bermudagrass or ‘couchgrass’ as it is known in
Australia, is the base turf used on tees as well as through
fairway and rough areas at the vast majority of courses.
Seashore paspalum is beginning to be utilized because of water
quality concerns. Even though extremely hot temperatures of more
than 100 degrees can occur during the summer in the Adelaide,
Melbourne, and Sydney areas, bentgrass putting surfaces, as well
as collars and surround areas, are being maintained. While there
are definitely challenges with growing bentgrass in the summer
in Australia, they have very low humidity, and thus reduced
disease pressure. And yes, Poa annua is truly a universal weed
problem that also is being battled down under.
With regard to course conditions and presentation, the key words
in Australia are dry, firm, and fast. This is true whether a
course is being maintained for daily member play or a
tournament. In many respects, this simplified preparations.
Maintaining a consistent character and avoiding the development
of extremely firm and fast putting green conditions was actually
more of a concern at times.
In Australia, golfers of all ages prefer to walk rather than
ride in buggies (golf carts). While most clubs have a few golf
carts, they are greatly out numbered by pull carts. Furthermore,
Australian golfers are not overly color conscious; and thus very
judicious irrigation and nitrogen fertilization can be practiced
to produce the desired dry, firm, and fast bermudagrass
fairways.
A couple of other interesting differences with the Australian
courses, and specifically the couch fairways, were the dominant
varieties or cultivars being utilized and the heights of cut
routinely maintained. At The Grange Golf Club, Santa Anna
bermuda was maintained, while across the street at Royal
Adelaide, common bermudagrass was the base turf on the fairways
as well as through the roughs and on the tees. These
bermudagrasses have a coarser leaf blade compared to Tifway
(419), but still produced a very dense turf cover and excellent
ball lies. This is especially true at The Grange Golf Club,
where the fairways were maintained at a height of cut of 10 mm,
or approximately 0.375-inch, and mowed twice daily for the World
Amateur. The only difference between routine fairway maintenance
for daily member play and hosting the championships was the
increased mowing frequency at The Grange.
In consideration of the skyrocketing course maintenance costs,
the Australian approach to bermuda/couchgrass fairway management
and not over-fertilizing and watering has merit here in Florida.
Average to high handicap golfers especially would benefit from
increased distance with tee shots on dry, firm and fast
fairways. However, before this can happen, we will have to
overcome the major obstacle of having to provide lush green turf
through every square foot of the fairways and roughs.
Source: John Foy, jfoy@usga.org or 772-546-2620 |
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