Turf's most important challenge

In a recent visit with my 4-year-old granddaughter, Ella, she introduced me to her new neighbor and playmate, Lucy.

“This is my grandpa,” Ella said, adding, “He makes a lot of funny noises!”

Clearly, Ella thinks I am firmly settled in geezer land! She might be right. After all, I’ve been involved in the golf turf industry for nearly 50 years. What changes I have seen in those five decades.

Today’s equipment barely resembles those used in the 60s. A strong argument could be made that turf irrigation has experienced more change and progress than anything else a superintendent manages.

My first working experience on a golf course was at a very nice private club. It was in the middle 60s and the fairways were not irrigated, except for a few areas we tried to water with a Rain Train traveling sprinkler. The course was bordered on three sides by the University of Wisconsin Arboretum, and during dry periods we worried about a grass fire that could move into the wooded arboretum. We kept the John Bean sprayer filled with water and ready to go.

The club decided to make a major improvement and invest in an automatic irrigation system with electro-mechanical controllers, the first in our state. We had green fairways! The installation was so impressive that we hosted a WGCSA meeting and the afternoon was spent with demonstrations and education about this watering system marvel.

I interned at a nice club that had center row quick couplers valves for fairway irrigation. The valves were about 80 feet apart – too close and the result was chronic wet areas in the middle of fairways. Greens and tees were watered from a sod cup in the center of each. It was quite a sight to see a John Deere 310 backhoe parked on the 18th green one day, digging up a leaky steel pipe in the middle of the green! Obviously, uneven distribution was a problem with all systems like this one, and the use of Cushmans and a night employee created issues, too.

I was hired to manage a private course that had the first irrigated fairways in Wisconsin. The system I inherited was installed by the famed irrigation engineer Scott Stewart in ’38 and we were still using it in ’73. Greens and tees were still watered with hose and roller base sprinklers. We quickly updated to provide perimeter irrigation, but we still had to wrestle with finding and training someone to do the watering at night. The fairway valves were 100 feet apart and we did a lot of hand watering to even out distribution.

We got caught up in ’88 with a Toro Network 8000 system. A good investment, yet long before I retired it was becoming outdated. Since then, the club has replaced controllers and heads, working toward every superintendent’s goal of uniform coverage.

And so it has been all across golf. For me, at least sourcing water wasn’t an overwhelming problem; after all, we get 34.5 inches of precipitation per year and the course is on the shores of a lake. We have riparian rights and although we have to filter the water, it is reliable and the cost is basically the cost of electricity to pump it up and onto the course. Not so in other parts of the country. Water shortages have forced new technologies, acceptance of recycled water and changes in areas irrigated. The limits of water sources have initiated breeding programs in search for drought tolerant grasses suitable for golf.

Pump stations have undergone substantial engineering improvements. I started with a small building, a huge pressure tank and water probe, and left a top-notch poured concrete building with variable frequency controls. It was reliable and efficient.

I have witnessed huge improvements in turf cultivation equipment and the positive effects those machines have had on turf rooting and the resultant decrease in water requirements. Also, superintendents have taken advantage of the wide range of surfactant products available, which have made our use of water more efficient. They aid with infiltration and retention and are key components of many water management programs on golf courses.

Our golf course was built in 1920, and I have always marveled at the careful grading that was done to move surface water around the course. Today we see civil engineers designing grading projects for golf courses to divert and capture storm water and urban runoff for use in irrigation.

Let’s not forget how much weather forecasting has improved in recent years. Every superintendent now has access to forecasting not even imagined a few years ago. Those forecasts have a tremendous influence on irrigation decisions – we water smarter.

We tend to focus on applying water to golf courses to even out precipitation. But in a year like this, drainage systems can be important to good golf turf. During this year’s Memorial Tournament, Jack Nicklaus was discussing a drainage project and concluded with, “Drier golf courses are more fun to play.” He’s right.

Water is obviously the most important factor in managing a golf course. Turf cannot live with either too little or too much. And water has become a national concern in the most recent decades. When I look back to watching my grandfather use a forked stick to dowse for spring water on his farm, to contemporary golf course irrigation considerations, I really do feel my age. That perspective, however, leads me to have a lot of confidence that our golf turf industry will continue the innovation needed to carefully use this precious national resource. GCI