Fast Firm and Green?

[Dave Falkner]

Was talking with the super at my club (St. Georges, NY) yesterday about conditioning. He spoke about the divergent opinions within the membership, there are those who dont mind brown as they want fast and firm but there is a larger group who sees brown and gets their collective panties in a knot.

My question is to what extent can a super get a course fast and firm while keeping it green.  short of a dye job that is

[JMEvensky]

You'll want to refer questions to Mr. T E Paul,care of this website.Mention his "maintenance meld" and his fairway "sheen".

[Scott Warren]

Dave,

Royal St George's last September was very firm, and this colour.

I don't imagine it's easy or cheap:

[Davis Wildman]

Check out Ian Larson's reply:     
Re: Chemical-Free Courses?
« Reply #112 on: Yesterday at 10:35:13 AM »

While it is more about irrigation and soil pathogens generally, he talks about why a dry green is a healthy green...which may not necessarily be a brown green.

[Bob Jenkins]

I thought you may be interested in the link below which is an article from yesterday's Vancouver Sun on Sagebrush's policies on watering, firm and fast, etc.


http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Firmer+faster+greener+cheaper/3072149/story.html

Bob Jenkins

[TEPaul]

Dave Falkner:

I'm no superintendent and actually agronomy scares me but I sure have seen a lot and talked to a ton of supers over about the last ten years on things like firm and fast, color, the maintenance meld etc.

It seems to me basically if a club has a low to medium maintenance budget to produce real firm and fast conditions the grass does tend to brown to various degrees in certain circumstances.

However, on the big budget clubs like Merion, Oakmont, PV, maybe even NGLA they can produce real firm and fast conditions and not brown-out. That's because they have huge crews and a lot of money to constantly syringe which is not technically irrigating; it's more like just cooling. Consequently on those courses they can produce really firm and fast conditions with what I call "the light green sheen."

But I have run across the occasional course like Hyannisport in the Lesley Cup that was very green and still really firm and fast. I can't explain that one though and for more specific details you'd have to ask the superintendents.

And I was speaking with Bradley Anderson the other day and he says he knows of a product or process where you can really acheive it but unfortunately it has some dye in it that makes the course look almost ridiculously artifically green. I think he should tell them to just go find a dye that has the same color as that "light green sheen" of those big-time big budget clubs that can produce real firm and fast without the browing out.

[Harris Nepon]

Does the soil underneath have a lot to do with it? Does certain types yeild better results? I believe my course is all clay underneath and is relatively firm, fast and green.

I don't have much to input on this topic, but I'm interested, so just trying to throw something out there.

[Jeff Goldman]

Does the soil underneath have a lot to do with it? Does certain types yeild better results? I believe my course is all clay underneath and is relatively firm, fast and green.

I don't have much to input on this topic, but I'm interested, so just trying to throw something out there.

That may be exactly right.  At the Grounds and Greens section of this years CDGA Officer's and Director's meeting, led as always by Shelly Solow, the virtues of brown and beautiful came up, and the CDGA's chief agronomist, Dr. Derek Settle, made a nice point about the difficulty of keeping a course brown and dry in a fairly rainy and humid climate as we have in Chicago, especially with the lousy clay soils most of us have.  What I took out of it was that it ain't easy to brown out a course where it rains a lot and poa quickly invades, because, as Sam MacKenzie has told me, brown poa is dead poa.   As we have learned, in summer heat water may need to be applied just to keep the stuff alive.  I understand that folks are experimenting with stuff like Velocity to see how much it helps to keep the poa off, but at times expectations of beautiful and brown may be unrealistic.

[Bart Bradley]

I played Wild Horse on Monday. The course was in wonderful shape: very green in color but remarkably firm and fast. I don't know what the secret the superintendant knows, but I wish he would share it.

Bart

[Randy Thompson]

Sand is the ideal medium, you can grow long roots with most grass species and allow them to look for the water deeply, allowing for the surface to dry out. The grass remains green but the surface firm, if watering practices are done correctly(deep and infrequent). Keeping the thatch under control is also important. Most players have trouble stopping the ball on new sand greens the first year because of a lack of thatch formation. Obviously clay will when dried out will be even firmer but to the point of down right hard and your root system will be shallower, leading to browning out becuase the majority of the roots are near the surface or maintaininng a light green through frequent misting like previously mentioned. If you have a high percentage of annual bluegrass on any soil base and want fast, firm and green look for a good dye.

[Sean_A]

Just to give you an idea; Burnham & Berrow is nearly completely dormant already and has been for two weeks.  All it took was little rain and several days of temps around 25.  No matter what anybody says, this isn't ideal conditions on a more natural course because it becomes difficult to control weeds etc and of course divots can become an issue.  The course is fine as is and I wouldn't advocate changing the maintenance regime because I think it important that weather dictates the playing conditions, but I think a more optimal "setting" will be when the course gets a few days of rain and growth occurs again.  Then the staff can sort of tidy the place up.  Where I come from, the midwest, and where I have traveled in the States, it is impossible to let a course go brown like Burnham is.  As someone above said - brown is dead - not dormant.  I don't envy supers who are caught in the middle, but I think in the long run, for the vast majority of courses, the more supers can stay on the right side of the edge (and the edge is different for every course depending on budget, grass, climate etc) the healthier a course is and the easier/cheaper it is to take care of.  So for me, the bottom line can't be about the colour of the turf and has to be about health and playing characteristics of the turf.

Ciao

[Bradley Anderson]

Just to give you an idea; Burnham & Berrow is nearly completely dormant already and has been for two weeks.  All it took was little rain and several days of temps around 25.  No matter what anybody says, this isn't ideal conditions on a more natural course because it becomes difficult to control weeds etc and of course divots can become an issue.  The course is fine as is and I wouldn't advocate changing the maintenance regime because I think it important that weather dictates the playing conditions, but I think a more optimal "setting" will be when the course gets a few days of rain and growth occurs again.  Then the staff can sort of tidy the place up.  Where I come from, the midwest, and where I have traveled in the States, it is impossible to let a course go brown like Burnham is.  As someone above said - brown is dead - not dormant.  I don't envy supers who are caught in the middle, but I think in the long run, for the vast majority of courses, the more supers can stay on the right side of the edge (and the edge is different for every course depending on budget, grass, climate etc) the healthier a course is and the easier/cheaper it is to take care of.  So for me, the bottom line can't be about the colour of the turf and has to be about health and playing characteristics of the turf.

Ciao

Sean,

This is a really sensible post.

The only thing I would add is that a lot of American courses draw their water from wells that are high in minerals. In many cases those minerals have the effect of neutralizing certain nutrients in soil. Where Iron, Magnesium, and Mangenese get tied up by the mineral water, the superintendent will often apply those nutrients, very lightly, as a supplement – those nutrients are vital to healthy plant growth, and when they are kept in balance you just have a healthier and less needy plant.  Well it just so happens that those nutrients also stimulate chlorophyll. Subsequently those golf courses will appear very lush when in fact they may be playing fast and firm. My point is you can’t always judge how a course is playing by its color.

[Rick Sides]

Tom P.  nailed it right on the head.  It is not difficult to make a course fast and firm yet retain some of its green, however, it takes  lot of time and man-power.  There is a fine line between letting grass wilt ( the grass curls up, turns brown and dies)   and keeping the grass firm enough to allow balls to run.  The key ingredient is syringing the grass and allowing the grass to cool.  Too much water slows down the ball, but does green-up the course.  With a lot of man power and hours, a super can get the course playing almost perfect.

[Chris Shaida]

This is a very interesting and useful thread.  Thanks for sharing your expertise.  Because of my interest in course architecture and history I'm already getting asked at my club about this whole topic ('brown as the new green' etc.) and it is quite difficult to talk about--some people think it is about 'global warming' so immediately reject (or accept) the basic idea, some people want the ball to roll farther so think they want a 'brown' course and meanwhile our poor superintendent is stuck in the middle! So for those of us actually trying to learn something this is great.  Thanks again.

[TEPaul]

"Where I come from, the midwest, and where I have traveled in the States, it is impossible to let a course go brown like Burnham is.  As someone above said - brown is dead - not dormant."



That statement may be far too general.

It might lead people to think whenever grass goes brown it's dead. While that could be true in some circumstances (such as a course conditioned to regular irrigation) it isn't in other circumstances (such as a course (fairways) conditioned to low irrigation or no irrigation).

As I've said on this thread before I'm certainly no superintendent and actually the subject of agronomy scares me but what I said above is just from observation as well as asking these questions of many scores of superintendents over the years.

And the best examples I know of are Newport, Fishers Island and Maidstone, three premier courses that still have no fairway irrigation system. I've seen the fairways of those courses go all the way to a light burned out looking brown due to many weeks of no rain in the summer but once it rains again in about two days those fairways are green again.

I'm told this is the case because their grass has been conditioned over many years to have a very extended dormancy period----apparently the natural process of grass to inure itself to those kinds of extended dry conditions.

I'm also told that courses that are conditioned with constant irrigation just don't have grass that has that kind of extended dormancy period. Apparently the reason is the grass has just never been allowed to condition itself to an extended dormancy period and so if this kind of grass goes brown it tends to die quickly.

At least that is what I've been told by many scores of superintendents.

Is there more to it than just that?

I'm sure there probably is but I have no idea what it might be but I bet the other knowledgeable supers on this thread could tell us.

[Steve Curry]

Funny this topic came to my mind this morning.  With careful irrigation, fertility and cooperative weather Fast, Firm and green comes together like a golf dream come true.  Fast and firm people don't mind brown till its the dead sort which will come with cart traffic or heavy rain and cart traffic.  Regular heavy rain can undo nearly all level of preparation.

Cheers,
Steve

[Kyle Harris]

Another important point to note that goes along with keeping the plant cool.

Green is the presence of chlorophyll in the leaf. Cool-season turf can only really metabolize and "function" within a certain temperature range before it opens the stoma to cool itself, losing all the water required to generate carbohydrates.

Firm, fast and green is a function of keeping the plant within this temperature threshold and not using too much water to do it.

Simple as that.

[Joe Hancock]

So, theoretically, this picture shows about 50% dead grass, not drought dormant grass.

But, that's totally incorrect.

The plant structure changes, or adapts, to it's conditioning. And until that plant adapts to drier conditioning, then all the statements above about the grass dying suddenly when it is brown may well  be true.

Joe

[TEPaul]

Thanks Kyle and Joe:

I think the last two posts are very important inclusions that can serve to teach the layman on agronomy some important info and guidelines most all are not inherently aware of.

I think the thing that really needs to be underscored here, particularly for laymen in agronomy is that certain courses and their grass just has to be given the necessary time (call it a transition period) to adapt from some types of management processes to another. In other words if grass has become conditioned to over irrigation and various chemical dependencies it does seem to need 2-3 years minimum to transition over to something else like far less irrigation and far less chemical dependencies.

Just with reduced irrigation practices alone I think it took my course at least five years.

Obviously the danger is too many laymen think you can just shut off the water and whatever else their grass has becomed conditioned to and that's it.

That can be a prescription for total disaster unfortunately!

[Steve Okula]

Joe,

With all due respect, if I presented my course to look like that, the members would have my head.

Is it necessary t go to that extreme? Does firm and fast mean you never irrigate fairways?

[Bradley Anderson]

I have a different take on this issue.

There are limitations to how much some of the turfgrass plants may adapt to different management. I think it is more reasonable to expect the percentages of the stronger species within the sward to gradually out compete the weaker species and varieties - assuming of course that they are even there.

My first club had unirrigated Merion bluegrass fairways. They would go completely dormant during droughts and then come right back. There was no Poa in those fairways. Oh sure you would get some Poa to germinate during the rainy spells but as soon as the dry heat came along it was gone. Those fairways weren't conditioned into growing under those conditions, rather the weaker varieties were not capable of getting in there and ruining the mix.

I wouldn't advise anyone to expect their existing grasses to change genetic code in response to new management practices. Rather I would hope for the strong varieties within their turfgrass community to take over - assuming as I said that they are there in the first place. If they are not there now you're going to need an aggressive aeration and seeding program, or gas and grass. And seeding into Poa greens is a long long process because the Poa out competes the baby bentgrass seedlings.

If your greens were originally sprigged with one of the vegetative bents you probably will not get them to replace Poa in response to austere management. You will probably need to plant some new varieties of bent. The vegetative varieties only make 2 leaves per shoot at today's lower cutting heights, and none of the older bentgrasses can endure under those conditions.  Those were some great old bents, but they aren't going to suddenly changed their genetic code - they were basically cloned from the better varieties in the USDA gardens back in the 1920's and those varieties were selected when they used to mow at 3/8's of an inch. Now they are being mown at 1/8 or less.

Now Poa on the other hand can adapt over time. One plant can produce hundreds of seeds in a year, and in that seed bank there are a small number of seeds that bare the recessive genes. If by chance some of the characteristics line up with what you are expecting of your greens, then those plants will grow up to prevail and make more of the same. Over many many years this phenomena can lead to some of the best greens of all. The greens at Oakmont are a prime example. But keep in mind that Poa needs more water, fertilizer, and fungicides to stay alive.

[Rick Sides]

Joe,
I have to agree with Steve about that picture.  Most members of private clubs would be very upset if the approaches looked liked that.  That is really not an example of fast and firm; that is more dead and gone.

[JSPayne]

Many here are on the right track.....I don't think firm and fast ALWAYS = brown grass.

Plant color is based on many variables, hydration by irrigation on being one of them; also proper nutrition (fertilization), plant genus/speicies, time of year, mowing (think striping...varying shades of green), etc.

The best ways to achieve fast and firm are through precision, efficient irrigation (the more handwatering the better), and proper drainage. Obviously climate area makes a difference, hard to be F&F when it rains all the time, but refer back to drainage. Those clubs looking to improve their F&F conditions should focus duely on proper irrigation and solving any and all drainage issues. Both will improve not only the playing surface, but the health of the plant.

The best way to achieve green color is by keeping the plant healthy. Proper hydration is only one part. Soil structure and mineralization, plant fertility, proper drainage to encourage deeper stronger rooting, reducing and realiving compaction and traffic, etc etc. all will increase health and cholorophyll in the plant resulting in green grass.

Bottom line: I firmly believe F&F can be achieved without significant loss in color. Many good things for turf right now can be found by going back to the basics and understanding the plant. At the end of the day, we're all really just grass farmers, and if the focus is on good, quality healthy productive turf, then green and F&F will follow naturally. If you get lost focusing on aesthetics, you'll end up creating more problems for yourself than solutions.

[Jeff_Brauer]

There are too many variables to make sweeping statements.  Depending on soils, turf type and irrigation, it would take some real fancy foot work to keep many courses just on the edge of firm and fast.  So, we can't paint all courses into the same scenario.

But in general, each combo of soil and grass has a certain amount of water availability, measured in inches. It is often in the range of about 3".  Plants wilt at about 33% of feild capacity/water availability, and I doubt many super would cut it that close, perhaps keeping grass at about 50-66% of field capacity at a minimum to avoid death.

In the NE and Midwest, you can water at less than the ET each night (usually either side of 0.2" daily in the summer on a hot day) Eventually your plant goes from 100% full to some fraction and you can count on rain to refill it to 100%.  If the drought lasts long enough, you eventually have to water to full ET or more to catch the soil/turf back up to its comfortable minimum field capactiy. This is often referred to as the checkbook method of irrigation, keeping just enough funds in the checkbook to pay the bills, and maybe a little more.

In the desert, it is obviously harder, as it is with some turf.  Some go dormant, others die when stressed. 

I guess my point is its hard to manage right on the edge all the time.  Most supers do it anyway because their irrigations systems don't allow full watering.  And some overwatering you see is because their older systems require them to grossly overwater some areas to get others moderately wet.

[Chris Tritabaugh]

Joe,
I have to agree with Steve about that picture.  Most members of private clubs would be very upset if the approaches looked liked that.  That is really not an example of fast and firm; that is more dead and gone.

This seems to be an unirrigated area of rough short of a "short" type par 3. IMHO this is a fantastic look. Our roughs are unirrigated and in the middle of the summer after a couple weeks without rain this is how they look. The alternative for us is the placement of hose sprinklers though out the rough, running day in and day out wasting a ton of water to evaporation and annoying members just the same. Even after all that the condition of the rough would only be marginally better.

IMHO, the state of golf would be far stronger if these conditions were regularly accepted by members and patrons. Believe me I am under no delusion this will be the case anytime soon. As Ian Larson so correctly stated on another thread, acceptance and appreciation of these conditions requires a paradigm shift. It requires communication and education, then when you think you could not possibly say anymore you double your efforts. Its tough, hard work that still results in a lot of people being unhappy at various points. However, if you quit or give up then nothing changes. Speaking from experience, the shift can be made but it takes time, thick skin and a strong stomach.