Soil and course design

[Tommy Williamsen]

      We all know that sandy soil makes for the best courses. Root systems are deep, they drain well, can play fast and firm, and can survive with minimal watering.
[/color]Unfortunately, not every course is located in such ideal places.
[/color]How does the soil affect the design and building of a course? How does it affect bunker construction? I have belonged to courses on a variety of soils. Clay is pervasive but what the specific needs of silty, peaty, chalky, and loamy soils?
 

[John Emerson]

      We all know that sandy soil makes for the best courses. Root systems are deep, they drain well, can play fast and firm, and can survive with minimal watering.
Unfortunately, not every course is located in such ideal places.
How does the soil affect the design and building of a course? How does it affect bunker construction? I have belonged to courses on a variety of soils. Clay is pervasive but what the specific needs of silty, peaty, chalky, and loamy soils?

Sandy soils require significantly more water than clay soils or silt soils.  Maybe 10x or more.  There’s pros and cons for both, but just to list a couple...Sandy soils leach quickly, not only water but nutrients as well.  As opposed to silty or clay soils will hold onto water and nutrients longer, but this has downsides also.  This answer could go ridiculously in depth.  My soils book in college was by far the thickest, most in-depth book I’ve ever owned.  Sand is super easy to manipulate/dig/move with any type of digging equipment.  From a shovel to a dozer.  Clay soils can really slow a project down due to rainfall.  If the soil get really wet during construction then you could potentially be at a standstill for days until it’s dry.  With sand, you can get a downpour and be working in a few hours.  I could go on and on.

[John Emerson]

There is only 3 types of parent soils.  Sand, silt or clay.  One more thing to add...ascending particle size goes........
Sand>silt>clay

[Greg Chambers]

Your assumptions are misguided.  Your questions are overly broad reaching.  You’re asking questions that could possibly require years to understand and even more experience to really “get”.  If cliffs notes were ever provided for soil science, I never found them.

[mike_beene]

Perhaps I am missing something, but these seem like great questions.

[John Emerson]

Perhaps I am missing something, but these seem like great questions.

It’s not a bad question at all, but the problem is that it’s just so in-depth and not a single person here has enough time to even remotely get close to answering it....much less getting someone to understand it

[Anthony_Nysse]

      We all know that sandy soil makes for the best courses. Root systems are deep, they drain well, can play fast and firm, and can survive with minimal watering.
Unfortunately, not every course is located in such ideal places.
How does the soil affect the design and building of a course? How does it affect bunker construction? I have belonged to courses on a variety of soils. Clay is pervasive but what the specific needs of silty, peaty, chalky, and loamy soils?

Sandy soils require significantly more water than clay soils or silt soils.  Maybe 10x or more.  There’s pros and cons for both, but just to list a couple...Sandy soils leach quickly, not only water but nutrients as well.  As opposed to silty or clay soils will hold onto water and nutrients longer, but this has downsides also.  This answer could go ridiculously in depth.  My soils book in college was by far the thickest, most in-depth book I’ve ever owned.  Sand is super easy to manipulate/dig/move with any type of digging equipment.  From a shovel to a dozer.  Clay soils can really slow a project down due to rainfall.  If the soil get really wet during construction then you could potentially be at a standstill for days until it’s dry.  With sand, you can get a downpour and be working in a few hours.  I could go on and on.

And this doesn't include when you have different soils types ON THE SAME PROPERTY! Or, in our case, have 3700 dump trucks of fill brought in and they are all slightly different-different water/nutrient holding capacities, different moisture needs. We are 3 years post renovation and are still amending areas.
But, without a some uniform soils, the turf isn't going to grow. I believe that part of the reason that zoysia is VERY successful in Georgia, Tennessee, and Texas is because the soils are heavy. They can hold nutrients. I cannot imagine zoysia grass here, especially after testing it. This is why Jordan's courses is very interesting to watch.

[Adrian_Stiff]

The main thing to focus on when designing a golf course on a heavier soil is "where is the water going". Drainage takes the major role not only in the routing but the walking off areas. When you create a feature you must always factor the water movement and when you factor the water movement you must factor the build ups behind that. As soon as possible you need to get that water into a drain, it does not matter if it is open water or sealed pipe.


Golf course design on heavier soil is far more technical that the sort of courses loved on here but it is a different art altogether than finding great holes among great sandy landscapes.

[Tommy Williamsen]

I didn't realize the question was so complicated. It makes design and build incredibly complicated. I live in the Virginia mts and we have a lot of shale on the property, which creates its own problems. As mentioned we have a couple kinds of soil on the property. The soil around the creek is a little different from the soil on higher ground. Thanks for your replies, it makes me want to learn more.


Greg Chambers, we are allowed to ask questions. That is why GCA exists and I have not seen many soil threads.

[Adam Clayman]

Sandy soil requires 10x the water to obtain what thump? Mush?

[John Emerson]

Sandy soil requires 10x the water to obtain what thump? Mush?

If you take yearly water requirements (for turf) on a clay soil and compare them to yearly water requirements on sandy soil the difference is huge.

[Randy Thompson]

Sandy soil requires 10x the water to obtain what thump? Mush?

If you take yearly water requirements (for turf) on a clay soil and compare them to yearly water requirements on sandy soil the difference is huge.

Don´t get caught up in generalizations. Give me two feet of fescue roots on a fine sand base with some good organic contents and I will give you poa on a clay base and lets see who uses more water!

[James Bennett]

The main thing to focus on when designing a golf course on a heavier soil is "where is the water going". Drainage takes the major role not only in the routing but the walking off areas. When you create a feature you must always factor the water movement and when you factor the water movement you must factor the build ups behind that. As soon as possible you need to get that water into a drain, it does not matter if it is open water or sealed pipe.

Well done Adrian - you have distilled clay soils into four sentences.If readers understand each sentence, they will understand why clay soil golf is different to sandy links.They might also ask themselves about the brilliance of Merion East - the best clay course I have seen.
James B

[Tom_Doak]

Soils are very important to golf course design.  Much of my career success has been in finding so many sandy sites to work on.

After a summer of construction work with Pete Dye at Long Cove, having the importance of drainage drilled into my head - even though Long Cove was a sandy site - I went and spent my year in the U.K. and noticed how many of the coolest features on the old courses were features that did not surface drain!  In the U.K. you have lots of surface drainage going into bunkers, and many many pockets where drainage collects [some of them tiny, and others fairly large], even on greens.  Which makes perfect sense, because those courses were built before irrigation was common to golf courses, and collecting a little more water onto a green surface was actually a good thing, as long as it didn't stand on the surface for long.

So then I got back to America, and started noticing how many cool features on famous courses don't surface drain, either.  Those great surrounds at Pinehurst No. 2 are full of little pockets that don't drain.  NGLA has about 20 drainage pockets in its greens [I noticed because one spring they were all dead from ice damage].  Sand Hills and Ballyneal and Pacific Dunes are nothing but interconnected bowls that don't surface drain.  It's way easier to design a course [or do finish work] when a drainage pocket isn't an existential problem.

In heavier soils, yes, you do have to be keenly aware of surface drainage issues, on both the micro scale [around features you are building] and the macro scale [how water drains across the site and off the site].  And after seven months of construction in Houston, you don't have to tell me how much more the weather can affect one's construction schedule when you're on heavy soils.  Other than that, though, it's not like you have to take twenty different approaches to construction for twenty different kinds of soils.  You either have to worry a lot about surface drainage, or you don't.

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[Tim_Weiman]

Tom,


Forgive my ignorance, but can you give us a definition of “surface drainage”?


Is it basically the shape and elevation of the surface?

[Adam Clayman]

Sandy soil requires 10x the water to obtain what thump? Mush?

If you take yearly water requirements (for turf) on a clay soil and compare them to yearly water requirements on sandy soil the difference is huge.

Smells like Anti-Data.


What sand based courses make up that list? Mostly Desert courses that are iridescent green, with soft conditions, day-in, day-out, in regions it rarely rains?


I find it hard to believe that All sand based courses require more water. The fact that "they" use more, is another matter.


Low inputs should be the pride of every super. Not just the one's with sophisticated bosses.


Bayside Golf is starting to prove just how little run times are needed on a mostly sand based course, in a semi-arid region, to maintain proper color with the added benefit of core principled playability.










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[Adrian_Stiff]

Tom,


Forgive my ignorance, but can you give us a definition of “surface drainage”?


Is it basically the shape and elevation of the surface?

Image a surfaced car park. The water is shed to various points with slight tilts. Sometimes you cant really see the fall, but it is important that good surface drainage TILTS speed the water away.

[John Emerson]

Sandy soil requires 10x the water to obtain what thump? Mush?

If you take yearly water requirements (for turf) on a clay soil and compare them to yearly water requirements on sandy soil the difference is huge.

Smells like Anti-Data.


What sand based courses make up that list? Mostly Desert courses that are iridescent green, with soft conditions, day-in, day-out, in regions it rarely rains?


I find it hard to believe that All sand based courses require more water. The fact that "they" use more, is another matter.


Low inputs should be the pride of every super. Not just the one's with sophisticated bosses.


Bayside Golf is starting to prove just how little run times are needed on a mostly sand based course, in a semi-arid region, to maintain proper color with the added benefit of core principled playability.

If you take 3 plots all the same...grass species, height of cut, inputs, etc and plant each one in sand, silt, and clay you will be watering the sand plot first, and most often.  You don’t want to believe science that’s up to you.

[Tom_Doak]

If you take 3 plots all the same...grass species, height of cut, inputs, etc and plant each one in sand, silt, and clay you will be watering the sand plot first, and most often.  You don’t want to believe science that’s up to you.

Yes, but ten times more?  Your statistic from earlier is very questionable.


In grow-in, it could be that big a difference.  On established turf, you should name a couple of courses which require 10x more water than average.

[Tommy Williamsen]

 own the book SAND AND GOLF, by George Waters. https://www.amazon.com/Sand-Golf-Terrain-Shapes-Game/dp/1939621038/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=sand+and+golf&qid=1564934285&s=gateway&sr=8-1


In it he writes, "{Sandy terrain} provide{s} great golf in spite of tight budgets, water restrictions, and many other issues confronting the golf industry today." (Prologue)  "The bent grasses and fescues native to the links require less water and feeding than other turf species and drier firmer ground means more bounce and roll. Surprisingly "linksy" conditions can also be achieved on sandy sites in in hotter climates with deep-rooted warm season grasses." (P 31)
Unless I have completely misread these sentences Waters seems to imply that you can get away with little water. I remember speaking with the super at Ballyliffen and asked him about sandy soil. He said, "On sandy soil the roots system can be measured in feet. On clay it is measured in inches."

Do sand based courses really required "10x" more water than clay?

[Tom_Doak]

Forgive my ignorance, but can you give us a definition of “surface drainage”?

Is it basically the shape and elevation of the surface?

Surface drainage is the question of where the water runs to when it rains, if it doesn't soak directly into the soil.  Even sand can be saturated by previous rains, to the point that all the rain water runs off.


On heavier soils, water runs downhill and collects in valleys and eventually into ponds or streams.  Any pocket in the topography which doesn't have a natural outlet becomes a pond or a wetland, and if there's enough water running off, the water erodes the land to create an outlet for itself, over generations.


In sand dunes, most of the water percolates down into the soil after a while, so although people's attention tends to be drawn to the high points, the landforms are also a series of small bowls of all shapes and sizes.  When you look at a topo map of a sandy site, it's very hard to tell whether the concentric shapes you are looking at are dunes or bowls . . . you have to read the numbers to see.  The only places you'll have drainage issues are where there are bigger bowls that collect drainage from a larger watershed, and the lowest spots where the water table may rise up into them during wet years.  The little isolated pockets don't collect much water, so they don't take long to percolate.


When we are designing a course we look at where the water is draining, and try to avoid having the main drainage channels affect landing areas or greens.  That's why a lot of golf holes hit over a bit of a valley from one shot to the next; it's not just for visibility, but so your ball doesn't splash when it lands.  If the surface drainage runs down the fairway rather than around it, we are likely to intercept it with artificial drainage, so the playing surface isn't too wet when it rains.

[Randy Thompson]

Sandy soil requires 10x the water to obtain what thump? Mush?

If you take yearly water requirements (for turf) on a clay soil and compare them to yearly water requirements on sandy soil the difference is huge.

Smells like Anti-Data.


What sand based courses make up that list? Mostly Desert courses that are iridescent green, with soft conditions, day-in, day-out, in regions it rarely rains?


I find it hard to believe that All sand based courses require more water. The fact that "they" use more, is another matter.


Low inputs should be the pride of every super. Not just the one's with sophisticated bosses.


Bayside Golf is starting to prove just how little run times are needed on a mostly sand based course, in a semi-arid region, to maintain proper color with the added benefit of core principled playability.

If you take 3 plots all the same...grass species, height of cut, inputs, etc and plant each one in sand, silt, and clay you will be watering the sand plot first, and most often.  You don’t want to believe science that’s up to you.

Your first post was well written but now your trying to defend something as a generalization that just ain´t so. Take your plots and put poa on one and fescue on the other. As the fescue matures into a deep rooted plant and the poa with its one to two inch root system will remain one or two inches. The fescue will use less water compared to the poa. The same will hold true when you compare a rye grass 4 to 6 inch roots system compared to a couple feet of fescue.

[John Emerson]

Sandy soil requires 10x the water to obtain what thump? Mush?

If you take yearly water requirements (for turf) on a clay soil and compare them to yearly water requirements on sandy soil the difference is huge.

Smells like Anti-Data.


What sand based courses make up that list? Mostly Desert courses that are iridescent green, with soft conditions, day-in, day-out, in regions it rarely rains?


I find it hard to believe that All sand based courses require more water. The fact that "they" use more, is another matter.


Low inputs should be the pride of every super. Not just the one's with sophisticated bosses.


Bayside Golf is starting to prove just how little run times are needed on a mostly sand based course, in a semi-arid region, to maintain proper color with the added benefit of core principled playability.

If you take 3 plots all the same...grass species, height of cut, inputs, etc and plant each one in sand, silt, and clay you will be watering the sand plot first, and most often.  You don’t want to believe science that’s up to you.

Your first post was well written but now your trying to defend something as a generalization that just ain´t so. Take your plots and put poa on one and fescue on the other. As the fescue matures into a deep rooted plant and the poa with its one to two inch root system will remain one or two inches. The fescue will use less water compared to the poa. The same will hold true when you compare a rye grass 4 to 6 inch roots system compared to a couple feet of fescue.

You’re totally comparing apples to oranges here.  This is a bad comparison.  Since you forgot many things here I’ll fill in the blanks. The height at which the grass is cut will dictate how far/deep roots grow.  Some species roots can grow deeper than others yes, but if you left a poa (or any grass plant)  unmowed it will have similar depth of roots as a fescue.  “Root to shoot ratio” states that the shorter a plant(mowing height), the shorter the roots or vice versa. Comparing a poa plant to anything else, you might as well said an oak tree.

[John Emerson]

If you take 3 plots all the same...grass species, height of cut, inputs, etc and plant each one in sand, silt, and clay you will be watering the sand plot first, and most often.  You don’t want to believe science that’s up to you.

Yes, but ten times more?  Your statistic from earlier is very questionable.


In grow-in, it could be that big a difference.  On established turf, you should name a couple of courses which require 10x more water than average.

Well since I don’t have access to water logs of 10 courses I can’t do that.  But I will give some examples.


Take 3 plots sand silt and clay all with unknown particle size.  This happens to matter but it won’t for this example.
Apply X amount of water (lets say .75”) evenly over each.  It needs to be enough water to wet the entire profile though.  At approximately 35 min time the water in the sand will have reached a depth of approx 24” where the clay plot took 4 hours...what’s that like 6-7x’s more.  If the particle size of sand was the largest possible we would be closer to 10x. Here’s where it gets interesting... Analyze the the water at a depth of 36” and it took the water in the sand plot approximately 45 minutes where it took the clay 24 hours...I’m not a mathematician but that’s a huge number more.  My original point was that the water requirements for sand and many times greater than silt or clay soils. 

[Tom_Doak]

Well since I don’t have access to water logs of 10 courses I can’t do that.  But I will give some examples.

Take 3 plots sand silt and clay all with unknown particle size.  This happens to matter but it won’t for this example.

Apply X amount of water (lets say .75”) evenly over each.  It needs to be enough water to wet the entire profile though.  At approximately 35 min time the water in the sand will have reached a depth of approx 24” where the clay plot took 4 hours...what’s that like 6-7x’s more.  If the particle size of sand was the largest possible we would be closer to 10x. Here’s where it gets interesting... Analyze the the water at a depth of 36” and it took the water in the sand plot approximately 45 minutes where it took the clay 24 hours...I’m not a mathematician but that’s a huge number more.  My original point was that the water requirements for sand and many times greater than silt or clay soils.

This is straying pretty far from the topic of the post, but I've got to respond to this.


Since you don't have any data to support your argument, you are trying to reduce things to a hypothetical experiment that you are doing in your head.  Science!


But golf courses are not trying to grow grass in a lab, and in nature, the buildup of organic material and root systems over time drastically alters how the water percolates through the soil, and how much is available to the plant.


The grass plants in each instance require x amount of water per day or per week to offset evapotranspiration and provide nourishment to the plant.  That x amount of water, according to most textbooks at least, seems surprisingly similar for nearly all the grass species that are used on golf courses.


If you're on sand, instead of clay, you irrigate differently to provide that x amount of water to the plant.  If you're in sand, you don't pour on ten times as much water and let most of it go through the profile and be wasted . . . if you've developed deep root systems for the grass, you can water deeply and less frequently, if not, you spoon-feed the water so the grass will use it all in that day.  [The latter method does not encourage the grass to develop deep roots, and leaves you vulnerable during times of real drought stress.]


Do you really think that the links courses in the UK, built on sand, use 5x or 10x more water than Augusta National does?  Hint:  which one has the multi-million dollar irrigation system?