Industry News

EPA forms GreenScapes Alliance

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has launched the GreenScapes Alliance in an effort to broaden and enhance waste reduction efforts nationwide. The goal of the alliance is to combine industry and government initiatives into a unified program geared toward reduction, reuse and recycling of waste materials in large land-use applications. These land-use activities include four million miles of roadside landscaping, brownfields land revitalization and the beautification and maintenance of office complexes, golf courses and parks.

The alliance is just one component of the EPA’s Resource Conservation Challenge, which identifies innovative, flexible and protective ways to conserve natural resources and energy.

More than 100,000 businesses, including 73,000 landscape contractors and 16,000 golf facilities, are involved in these land-use activities and are potential alliance participants. To learn more, or for information on how to be a participant in the GreenScapes Alliance, visit www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/green.

Two golf tournaments were held simultaneously in the Eastern and Western regions of Pennsylvania last October to raise money for the turfgrass program at Penn State University. Sponsored by the Pennsylvania Turfgrass Council, the events included participants from more than 40 companies and golf clubs and had broad support from the turf industry.

The 29th Annual Western Pennsylvania Turfgrass Tournament was held in Pittsburgh, Pa., at the Pittsburgh Field Club. The 27th Annual Joseph Valentine Memorial Tournament took place the same day at Bent Creek Country Club in Lititz, Pa. Together, the tournaments raised $15,200 for Penn State.

Numerous companies and industry associations supported the tournaments as tee sponsors. Sponsors included, Blue Ridge Peat Farms, the Golf Association of Philadelphia, the Greater Pittsburgh Golf Course Superintendents Association, Lebanon Turf Products, Simplot Partners and Syngenta Professional Products.

Roundup Ready bentgrass is currently being reviewed by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) of the United States Department of Agriculture and is awaiting clearance for sale and distribution in the United States. As part of the review process, APHIS is accepting public comment on the product until March 4, 2004. 

The Scotts Co., Monsanto and their partners developed the new bentgrass by inserting a single gene characteristic that provides tolerance to the active ingredient in Roundup PRO herbicide.  Field research demonstrates that this technology can give golf course superintendents a simple, effective control method for Poa annua, Poa trivialis and a number of other troublesome weeds on greens and fairways.  The new system takes advantage of the environmental characteristics of the active ingredient in Roundup PRO, which rapidly inactivates in soil because it tightly binds to soil particles, and over time degrades into naturally occurring compounds by microbes in the soil.

To facilitate public comment, a new section of the Scotts Seed Web site has been designed to allow submission of comments directly to APHIS. The Scotts Co.’s Roundup Ready bentgrass site is located at www.scottsproseed.com, and Roundup Ready bentgrass information is located at www.scottsproseed.com/products/turf.cfm.

The new addition to the Scotts Seed Web site also includes background on the concept of Roundup Ready bentgrass, technical issues surrounding it, answers to frequently asked questions, research results, and approval process information.  In addition to helping the public become educated about the product, the site will facilitate public discussion. 

"We are very pleased with the progress of our submission to APHIS to deregulate the new bentgrass," said Wayne Horman, director of seed sales and marketing, The Scotts Co. "The new section of scottsproseed.com will not only help people become completely informed about this new turf variety, but it will allow them to participate in the process."