Its Learning Time

Not all of our time is spent out on the golf course, we do take advantage of educational opportunities that present themselves at many times of the year.  One of these times was last week.

The Ozark Turf Association (OTA) routinely puts on educational events for our members, but typically just one speaker for an hour on one topic, but last week we were able to put together speakers for a four hour session.  And this one wasn't just turf related, it happen to deal more with equipment, which is somewhat near and dear to me from my background attending Lake City Community College.  That program was a 3 year program that earned us an Associates of Science degree in Golf Course Operations.  Our first year was dedicated to a couple of core classes such as College English and Algebra, along with typing and accounting.  But we also had a lot of class time learning the basics of equipment repair and maintenance along with running our shops.  I will dive more into my time at Lake City in an upcoming blog.  I have to have something to talk about during the slower winter months. 

For the event we held last week, our first speaker was Stan Woodfin who is the Technical Sales Manager for Crader Distribution which distributes Stihl equipment. 

Stan presented some of the new updates that Stihl and other companies are making to their two-cycle engines.  While it was EPA emission regulations that lead to many of the updates, manufactures are finding that there are benefits for operators with these new regulations.  Engines are burning cleaner and burning less fuel as well.  This is actually saving golf courses and landscape companies money.

Stan did talk about different troubleshooting techniques that can help us diagnosis problems just by looking at different parts of the engine.



Our second speaker was John Daniels from the USGA who spoke about Optimizing Mower Setup.  At first it seemed like an odd topic from the USGA Green Section who deals with course prep/set up and turf health.  But upon hearing his presentation it made perfect sense.

There are a lot of factors that go into setting up cutting units for fine turf such as putting greens.  We have gone from mowing at fractions to mowing in metric measurements.  We did this though in my opinion so we can tweak heights of cuts for more precision to meet the demands of the golfers for smooth and fast surfaces.  It has been made easier with dial gauges such as the "Accu Gauge"  Instead of 5/32" we will set reels to .155, 9/64' becomes .140, 1/8" becomes .125.  Or courses mow even lower, it is not uncommon for tournament greens to be mowed at .100 or lower.  I was reminded, John said it is best to invest in a Prism Gauge to find out what the true height of cut is compared to a bench setting.  Bench settings can be one height but cutting height could be different depending on the weight of the cutting unit, and also the condition of the turf.  Thatch and moisture can always play a part in how the cutting units sit in the turf.         

I worked at an university golf course with some fair college players, and we would not mow below .155 with our walking greens mowers.  What led me to that height of cut was research done at Kansas State by current Rutgers turf researcher, Bingru Huang.  She looked at root length over the summers on greens mowed at 5/32" and 1/8".  Greens mowed at 5/32" did not loose a lot of root mass compared to greens mowed at 1/8".  I have since stuck to mowing greens at my course at 5/31" or .156 (5) since.  Our greens were fast enough for those players and they did like the smoothness that that amount of turf provided.  We were able to push greens speeds a little with moisture control in the greens, plus with the slope some greens had, we didn't want them too fast, to where the ball would not stop near the hole, (given the shot played into the green was in the correct location).

The main point was to keep mowers sharp and properly adjusted in order to achieve the best playing conditions. 

Our last speaker was Matt Giese from Sygenta who had a presentation on choosing the best spray nozzles for the best performance of our products we spray.  There are many factors when choosing nozzles, which provide the best pattern for the type of product that is being used.  Also a factor can be weather patterns, mainly wind.  Also one has to find which nozzle provides the best volume of water for the product we are using. 

Usually herbicide will use the lowest volume of water providing a more concentrated spray droplet.  Of course this is for a contact herbicide that we want to stay on the plant.  Contact fungicides will want a higher volume of water to coat more of the grass plant to protect it from pathogens or to kill already existing disease. 

Droplet size also plays a part is spray drift management.  We certainly don't want pesticides to be drifting off our target plants.  With the cost of some of our products maximizing their effectiveness is very important, which is why it is so important to choose the right nozzles.  Also the right nozzle choice allows us to cover more acreage when needed, using less tanks and taking less man-hours to make some applications. 

I did have to wonder and it would be interesting to see if the different nozzles produce better results when using systemic products on a preventative basis.  But I'm sure weather and other factors play more in the process of a product lasting longer than what the spray pattern might be.  On contact products or active disease, it probably matters more on the spray pattern to coat the plant better. 

As always the more I learn in educational events, the more I think about my current programs and I evaluate what I am doing, I do find myself knowing less, it seems. 

Would love to hear comments from everyone else on educational events that you have been able to attend. 

Thanks for reading!

Mel