Poa Annua greens at Bandon

[Stuart Hallett]

Stuart,

to keep the fescue the height of cut would have to be 4.5mm or above.

Jon

Jon
I agree with you, but I was referring specifically to Bandon and asking if the HOC has been constant, and if the HOC has been influenced by green speeds over the years. Also, does anyone know how much bent they used in the mix ?
To sum up, I would like to know if the fescues have been given a fair chance.

[John Kirk]

Jon
I agree with you, but I was referring specifically to Bandon and asking if the HOC has been constant, and if the HOC has been influenced by green speeds over the years. Also, does anyone know how much bent they used in the mix ?
To sum up, I would like to know if the fescues have been given a fair chance.

I believe the answer is:

Bandon Dunes was seeded with about 8% bentgrass.
Pacific Dunes was seeded with about 4% bentgrass.
Bandon Trails and Old Macdonald were seeded with 0% bentgrass, only fescue grasses.

Don't quote me.  All serious inquiries should be made to the people involved.

[Brett Hochstein]

Poa that manages to gain a foothold while the maintenance regime favors fescue deserves the space it occupies. There is nothing inherently wrong with poa, as long as the maintenance isn't geared towards it when fescues or bents or bluegrasses are the desired sward. Maintain for what you want, and whatever survives that should be just dandy to play golf from.

Joe

Great quote, Joe.  This is really what I've absorbed in talking with greenskeepers in the UK (and NLE mom and pop courses in Grand Rapids).  At Kingarrock, the hickory course near St Andrews, the greenskeeper (yes there is only one) was showing us around the greens, and someone identified some take-all patch.  He simply replied, "nae problem, it will just come back with fescue in it and play fine." 

The attitude about maintaining a character of surface is much more important than worrying about the exact components that make it up.

[Scott Weersing]

So when will it be time to redo the greens at Bandon Dunes? What is the life of the greens?

So maybe they should regress the greens at Bandon Dunes in the next couple of years back with fescue. Or is there another type of grass that will be better?

I don't think the courses are going to change or decline because the greens are poa annua. Rustic's greens are poa annua and they are great.

Do you have to have fescue greens to be a links course? (i know, more questions than answers)

[Bill Brightly]

I believe that poa was probably brought to Bandon on the shoes of visiting golfers. Can anyone tell me why Bandon did not insist upon a strict shoe cleanng program before players teed off? Might that have delayed, if not prevented, poa taking over?

[David_Tepper]

Bill B. -

Did you read Steve Okula's post on page 1? Poa travels on more than just golfers' shoes.

"Poa annua will be flowering everywhere around the fescue sown areas, in between fairways, in the roughs, around the perimeters. The seed are tiny, something like 2-3 million to the pound, and can be carried by the wind and runoff, or tracked by a lot more than golf shoes; animals, carts, mowers. If you're pumping irrigation water from an open source such as a lake or river then there is probably Poa being effectively hydro-seeded through he sprinklers. Poa is the only weed I've seen infesting artificial turf. "

DT

[Jon Wiggett]

Scott,

your reply above and Bill B's go to the root of the problem which is one of perception. It is clear to me that many even well educated people push the idea of a monoculture as some sort of utopic ideal that needs to be pursued to the exclusion of all other ideas. To be a links green the sward does not need to be purely fescue but it should be predominately made up of fescue and browntop bent but will also have a good proportion of poa and other grasses in it. It is this diversity that gives it the resilience required to stay decent on a low input regime of true links maintenance. Poa is not a weed but a highly successful and useful turfgrass that has its place.

Jon

[MClutterbuck]

It seems many on this thread advocate not fighting Poa on fairways or greens, fescue or bent. Quick question to you, focused less on agronomy and more on what a greeens committee should do focusing on playability. On an 8 year old course with really good bent greens, 17 greens are mostly free of any Poa contamination. One green is 20% covered with Poa. This was the last seeded green, it was done late in the season, and density entering winter was poor.

Treatment with weekly spraying for now 2 summerers has only stopped Poa from advancing, but it has not killed any of it. Which of the following would you suggest:

a. do nothing and allow Poa to advance
b. continue to spray trying out new products
c. kill the green entirely and re seed bent

[Jon Wiggett]

It seems many on this thread advocate not fighting Poa on fairways or greens, fescue or bent. Quick question to you, focused less on agronomy and more on what a greeens committee should do focusing on playability. On an 8 year old course with really good bent greens, 17 greens are mostly free of any Poa contamination. One green is 20% covered with Poa. This was the last seeded green, it was done late in the season, and density entering winter was poor.

Treatment with weekly spraying for now 2 summerers has only stopped Poa from advancing, but it has not killed any of it. Which of the following would you suggest:

a. do nothing and allow Poa to advance
b. continue to spray trying out new products
c. kill the green entirely and re seed bent

Maybe none of the above. How about re-turfing?

[John Kirk]

It seems many on this thread advocate not fighting Poa on fairways or greens, fescue or bent. Quick question to you, focused less on agronomy and more on what a greeens committee should do focusing on playability. On an 8 year old course with really good bent greens, 17 greens are mostly free of any Poa contamination. One green is 20% covered with Poa. This was the last seeded green, it was done late in the season, and density entering winter was poor.

Treatment with weekly spraying for now 2 summerers has only stopped Poa from advancing, but it has not killed any of it. Which of the following would you suggest:

a. do nothing and allow Poa to advance
b. continue to spray trying out new products
c. kill the green entirely and re seed bent

Maybe none of the above. How about re-turfing?

Once again, I am not a professional, but I did sleep in my own bed last night.

I think the answer to this question is somewhat dependent on location.

Poa annua is so dominant in the Pacific Northwest, I think it would be foolish to start over.  At Pumpkin Ridge, fairways and greens are now 80-90% Poa annua, so replanting the greens with bentgrass would last 6-8 years maximum, before another painful transition period to Poa.  Besides, our greens are really nice now.  They are evolving into a tight smooth stand of grass which can be rolled several times a week during high season.  Typically, our greens roll at 10.5-11.5 feet during the summer weekends, which makes our subtly contoured greens come alive.  They are even pretty firm in the afternoons, and poorly struck shots will not hold.

Unless you are willing to replant an entire golf course at Bandon Dunes, it makes no sense to fight nature.  Without knowing their thoughts on the matter, it seems they are best served by allowing the dominant grass to thrive, once it begins to take over.  It's cool in the summer, so the Poa should stay healthy and firm year round.

I've spent a significant amount of time at three modern courses around the country: Kinloch in Virginia, Kingsley in Michigan, and Ballyneal in Colorado.  These courses in different areas of the U.S. have all managed to keep the Poa out pretty well.  In each case I estimate the Poa population is somewhere between 2-10%.  All of these courses have hot summers, and they get the majority of their rain in the warmer months, though Ballyneal's climate is quite arid.  In Oregon the rain falls in the cooler months.

[Dane Hawker]

I believe that poa was probably brought to Bandon on the shoes of visiting golfers. Can anyone tell me why Bandon did not insist upon a strict shoe cleanng program before players teed off? Might that have delayed, if not prevented, poa taking over?

Is most of the Poa on the putting green and 1st tee? Or has the poa seed hung on and dropped on all greens as a golfer went around the course?

[MClutterbuck]

Jon,

I think my option c is same as re turfing? I meant killing 100% of poa and bet with gas, and starting over with bent.

John,

This is only 1 green in the entire course. The rest have practically no poa and we are removing by hand any small growth of it they might have.

[John Kirk]

Hi MClutterbuck,

I'm sorry.  I quoted two posts that were irrelevant to my comments.

In your case, it sounds very worthwhile to eliminate the Poa from the one green.  Depending on the location, the best answer may be C., start over.

[Bill Brightly]

Bill B. -

Did you read Steve Okula's post on page 1? Poa travels on more than just golfers' shoes.

"Poa annua will be flowering everywhere around the fescue sown areas, in between fairways, in the roughs, around the perimeters. The seed are tiny, something like 2-3 million to the pound, and can be carried by the wind and runoff, or tracked by a lot more than golf shoes; animals, carts, mowers. If you're pumping irrigation water from an open source such as a lake or river then there is probably Poa being effectively hydro-seeded through he sprinklers. Poa is the only weed I've seen infesting artificial turf. "

DT

Yes, I read his post. And I happen to love a good poa green. I think it is an excellent surface. But my question is if you have a 100% fescue green, which is rather rare in the US and the best possible surface for a links course, why not take the simple step of cleaning peoples shoes before they play? Even if poa is prevelant in the region, I still think it would have made sense to delay the inevitable. Just my uneducated opinion.

[Ken Moum]

Scott,

your reply above and Bill B's go to the root of the problem which is one of perception. It is clear to me that many even well educated people push the idea of a monoculture as some sort of utopic ideal that needs to be pursued to the exclusion of all other ideas.

Well, there's this:

I have an old friend who is perhaps the greatest authority on public parks in America, who is frequently expressing his preference for grass that is green. The best golfing grasses vary in color. They may be red, brown, blue, dark green, light green, yellow, and at times even white and gray. A golf course that is consisted entirely of one shade of green would be merely ugly.  --  Alister Mackenzie