Have turf fans become obsolete?

[Sean McCue]

To all fellow Superintendent's who are trying to educate our friend John, its a losing battle. This guy is all that is wrong with this site and no matter how strong the facts are to support any agronomic side it won't matter in his eyes. He is the member we all cringe at when we see on the course and nothing is ever good enough for him. I would love to see him sit in our shoes and see perform miracles with limited resources under environmentally hostile conditions and unrealistic member expectations that are to a degrees created by both the USGA and PGA Tour. Yes, some things are self inflicted by some less qualified Superintendent's out there, but as a whole the majority of us are a well trained and highly professional group of dedicated people.

Grass need four things to perform at a high level; water, air, light and nutrition if any of these are out of balance your turf system will begin to struggle and not perform as it should. We as Superintendent's have to mange a living breathing thing and often times manipulate things that are not in the best interest to the turf all to meet daily expectations. If we are not doing everything to create proper growing conditions by removing overgrown trees or as a last resort adding fans for air circulation, then we are not doing our job educating our memberships about cause and effect.  

Sean-To say that John is everything that is wrong with this site because of his position on this subject is both unfair and unwarranted. When you get to his level of contribution on GCA get back to us. I know you are marching in on 100 posts....


Tim,

Sorry but I have  been a little busy working my 80 hour weeks for my membership and haven't had time to meet you quota.

[Sean McCue]

Mr. McCue,

Great insight!

If Mr. Kavanaugh had simply stated that he did not like fans and thought tree removal and raising the height of cut was better option then fine, what superintendent wouldn't agree with that?? However blaming superintendents for fans and how we can't grow grass and how we are lazy and how he has no solutions that do not blame superintendents is why he gets himself in trouble.

Steve Blake

Spot on!

[Brent Hutto]

Believe me, if John's past forays into marital sex practices and other Too Much Information areas have not gotten him "in trouble" here then pissing off a couple of golf course supers is not going to cause him much agita.

[Tim Martin]

To all fellow Superintendent's who are trying to educate our friend John, its a losing battle. This guy is all that is wrong with this site and no matter how strong the facts are to support any agronomic side it won't matter in his eyes. He is the member we all cringe at when we see on the course and nothing is ever good enough for him. I would love to see him sit in our shoes and see perform miracles with limited resources under environmentally hostile conditions and unrealistic member expectations that are to a degrees created by both the USGA and PGA Tour. Yes, some things are self inflicted by some less qualified Superintendent's out there, but as a whole the majority of us are a well trained and highly professional group of dedicated people.

Grass need four things to perform at a high level; water, air, light and nutrition if any of these are out of balance your turf system will begin to struggle and not perform as it should. We as Superintendent's have to mange a living breathing thing and often times manipulate things that are not in the best interest to the turf all to meet daily expectations. If we are not doing everything to create proper growing conditions by removing overgrown trees or as a last resort adding fans for air circulation, then we are not doing our job educating our memberships about cause and effect.  

Sean-To say that John is everything that is wrong with this site because of his position on this subject is both unfair and unwarranted. When you get to his level of contribution on GCA get back to us. I know you are marching in on 100 posts....


Tim,

Sorry but I have  been a little busy working my 80 hour weeks for my membership and haven't had time to meet you quota.

Sean- Maybe if some of your members give you an assist and get you down from the cross that can change.

[JESII]

Guys, you will not find someone more supportive of the efforts of superintendents than me...but your argument here with John is ridiculous.

To summarize it, he wants you to figure out a better solution than fans and you tell him he's not qualified to judge your job. The problem is, your rationale for using the fans is that your members want them and they're no more qualified to comment than John.

You must know the message is accurate, you just have a problem with the messenger and his style.

[JR Potts]

Hate to dip my toe into this shit show of a thread, but my club got fans a few years ago - and we're like the club that Tom Doak mentioned on page 1 for our newly renovated course.

Count me on the side of those who hate these things.  That said, if they keep grass on the greens and allows us to maintain the level of play and playability that we're used to, it is a minor inconvenience that I'll live with and the membership will live with.

I have noticed a tangible difference in the turf health of the greens since the installation of these horrible things.

[Steven Blake]

Mr. Sullivan,

If is message is he perfers higher height of cut and mowing down trees then fine.  Saying fans are superintendent driven ... not fine.
 

Steve Blake

[Aaron McMaster]

Guys, you will not find someone more supportive of the efforts of superintendents than me...but your argument here with John is ridiculous.

To summarize it, he wants you to figure out a better solution than fans and you tell him he's not qualified to judge your job. The problem is, your rationale for using the fans is that your members want them and they're no more qualified to comment than John.  I missed where the rational was members want fans.  Members want fast smooth greens, in some, NOT ALL areas of the world you need fans right now to get the job done as another tool in the tool box or slow the greens down.  Jesus were not curing cancer here, this shouldn't be that hard to understand.


You must know the message is accurate, you just have a problem with the messenger and his style. His message of fans = lazy and dumb is well dumb not accurate.

[JESII]

He wants optimal playing conditions and he sees fans as a detractor of that. It seems unanimous on that front.

So what's the solution? That's where he wants the conversation to go...

is he close to correct in saying a superintendent has never recommended removing fans once they're in place?

[Brent Hutto]

Just spitballing here...

Has anyone heard of a club contemplating fan installation at least trying the alternative of slowing the greens down a bit?

Do we collectively know of any clubs who backed off on the cutting high a smidge and decided that was more livable than installing fans?

Or are we talking about 1/4" long grass interspersed with dead patches here? Is that the actual, reasonable expectation if one of the clubs were talking about were to forego fans?

[Aaron McMaster]

He wants optimal playing conditions and he sees fans as a detractor of that. It seems unanimous on that front.

So what's the solution? That's where he wants the conversation to go...Jim I'm just trying to get him to understand first that not all courses are the same nor memberships or golfer expectations.  You deal with the setting your in.  A climate can differ on a single golf course not to mention say 30 miles away so what I might get away with at one course does not automatically translate to the place down the street.  I don't need fans but my course is in Detroit, does that mean that all courses don't need fans??

There are always trade offs in life.....your club or membership decides those not the super.  His job is to deliver, as it stands right now if you want bentgrass greens in high temp, high humidity areas for the stressful period of time you more than likely need fans.  There are a number of things that effect this though....are you a low round or high round club, what type of water do you get to use, are you limited govt wise on pesticides and tree removal.  Our local township has a ridiculous tree ordinance that we must deal with.  It's just not black and white like John would love it to be.

IMO your solution is find the grass that works in your area best and don't exceed it's limits.  I don't know if John Doe's membership is willing to do that.  If they are not, then you are forced to manipulate the environment.

is he close to correct in saying a superintendent has never recommended removing fans once they're in place?  No clue, but I think most of my peers are always trying to improve things and I give them the benefit of the doubt that if fans are not needed they would remove them.

[Steven Blake]

Mr. Sullivan,

If thats where he wants it to go then why didnt he just say so??

No superintendent wants to put or keep a fan on course if it is not needed. There are many solutions and every situation has a different set of solutions.  There is not a cure all to desribe every sceniero where fans are used or where greens are failing.  Each situation is site specific, region specific, grass specific, club specific, and not to mention the politics that are invovled in the situation.

The best idea is to consult your superintendent because he/she can give you the best solutions and if that is not satisfatory have a USGA site visit to help determine what are the best solutions for your specifc problem.  

Steve Blake

[Aaron McMaster]

Just spitballing here...

Has anyone heard of a club contemplating fan installation at least trying the alternative of slowing the greens down a bit?

Do we collectively know of any clubs who backed off on the cutting high a smidge and decided that was more livable than installing fans?

Or are we talking about 1/4" long grass interspersed with dead patches here? Is that the actual, reasonable expectation if one of the clubs were talking about were to forego fans?

Brent this would be interesting to hear if anyone on GCA had a club slow greens intentionally to forgo fans.  Maybe someone will chime in.

[Brent Hutto]

Let's interrogate a slightly different scenario...

Consider a club in one of the climate zones you guys are talking about. A club with bent greens, located in a area that at certain times is far from ideal for the health of the grass and maybe some greens have trees blocking the air flow. So when maintained to a Stimp of 11 or whatever the typical target might be, they're either losing greens are coming close to it occasionally.

One solution might be fans around the most problematic (in terms of airflow) greens. What if the club just simply does not have the financial resources to run half a mile or electrical cabling, buy the fans and maintain and use them from this point forward?

What would be the first recourse other than fans? If for no other reason purely due to lack of financial resources.

[Thomas Dai]

Have there been any attempts made to disguise fans or blend them into the background in some manner (other than with paint colours)?

Also, is there an optimum fan installation height?

ATB

[Steven Blake]

Mr Hutto,

I can say for a particular situation of mine that our 13th green in 2010 we received a record amount of rainfall, high temperatures and high humidity that mowing greens at .180" and .200" twice a week did very little.  This green has a long history of losing significant grass both in the winter months and summer stress periods. Raising the height of cut, lessening the amount of rolling and cutting has not prevented turf loss. In fact this green has always been mowed and rolled differently than the rest despite weather.  However some other greens that I have tried raising the height of cut has worked very well.  It just depends.  

The 13th green I mentioned where we cut at .180" has since had several hundred trees and underbrush removed. The green is much better but not like the others because we also have drainage issues and the green is 2,800 square feet and sits in a small bowl that makes it impossible sometimes for westerly winds to hit its surface.  Also the green is directly against our eastern property line which means the neighbors trees cast a shadow over the surface in the first half of the morning. If greens renovation or intensive drainage is not installed then adding a fan is a possibly if we want the putting surface here to be consistent with the others on the course.

My recommendation is to renovate the green for several reasons: 1) its very small 2) it has both surface and subsurface drainage issues that are not easy to remedy without significant work 3) we cannot do much about the trees not on our property 4) Because of the geography of the situation little more can be done to improve air movement but to use a fan..  We have contacted Mr. Nuzzo to see what options are available to us in the department of renovating the green so that we solve our inherent drainage issues and increase the number of hole locations.  At this time I would not recommend using a fan unless issues arise and all other avenues have been exhausted.  

But the go ahead to renovate the green or take other measures is not in my control, its up to the members to decide.  That being said even if we renovate the green I cannot say with 100% certainty that we will not have to use a fan.  But in my expert opinion with a smartly done renovation we should be able to produce a putting surface that is as good as the rest.  If not, the only other option besides blowing up the entire hole(which is not an option) is putting in a fan that would only be used during stressful periods and can be hidden quite nicely in this scenario.

I will not comment on other courses unique situations because I am not privy to all of the information that only the superintendent or turfgrass professional with knowledge of the site and circumstances can provide. But I hope my scenario that I have encountered will help…

Steve Blake

[Brent Hutto]

Thanks for sharing those details, Steve. It's an interesting situation. And I mean "interesting" in the sense of the old curse, "May you live in interesting times".  

[JESII]

Does anyone really believe that a better solution than turf fans will not evolve?

[Steven Blake]

Mr. Hutto,

You’re welcome. But it’s what superintendents get paid to do.

I do not believe for a minute that superintendents push fans on the golfing public. Does that mean a few might, sure, but overall superintendents evaluate the situation, provide solutions with alternative scenarios, give there expert opinion, perhaps ask for the opinion of another expert like a USGA agronomist or architect and leave it in the hands of the members to decide.  

Steve Blake

[Steven Blake]

Mr. Sullivan,

Yes, improved turf varieties, better drainage systems, increased awareness of the benefits of tree removals and other unknown tools will all be better options.  

But if the people who make decisions about whether to re-grass, install drainage, or remove trees decide they don't want those options then you are back to fans.

Steve Blake  

[John Kavanaugh]

Here is a fact.  In every town with a high budget course using fans there is a low budget course not using fans.  There is no guarantee on which course has the larger number of happy golfers.

[Steven Blake]

Isn't happy golfer an oxymoron? 

[Sean_A]

I wish the stimpmeter was never invented.  I wish turfgrass joints were shut down.  Supers can grow what grows locally just fine and make it work for golf just fine.  I am always perplexed by the seeming need to create complex issues and problems when trying to grow grass for a game.  When exactly did golfers become such a lot of knuckleheads?  Folks shaving greens then installing fans and god knows what else to keep the grass alive have far more money than good sense.

Ciao  

[John Kavanaugh]

Isn't happy golfer an oxymoron? 

Today more than any other time in my 45 yr golfing history happiness of a golfer is firmly tied to budget.  The idea that golfers demand Augusta like conditions is no more.  In a chicken/egg paradox the worst conditioned courses get the most play.

[Matt Wharton]

Here is a fact.  In every town with a high budget course using fans there is a low budget course not using fans.  There is no guarantee on which course has the larger number of happy golfers.

There you go again Mr. K...blindly assuming what makes one happy makes everyone happy!  Yes, high budget courses use fans.  Some low budget courses use fans too...and yes, there are some courses that do not use fans at all... but what makes the golfers "happy" at one course does not necessarily correlate to the "happiness" of golfers at other courses.

To each his own...and time to put this horse out to pasture before it's too late