Turf from a turf student's perspective

The first year turfgrass management students at the University of Guelph hosted their annual symposium at the Cutten Club in Guelph yesterday.  The student run symposium attracted a number of industry professionals and sponsorship came from such companies as John Deere Golf, Turf Care and GC Duke Equipment.  Our three keynote speakers Dr. Tom Hsiang, Ron Shiedel – President, Greenhorizons Sod Farms and Keith Bartlett – Superintendent, St Georges Golf and Country Club spoke to the attendees.

Our three speakers all provided their thoughts on how we can be doing more with less and get through these current economic times and tough times in the turfgrass industry.  Some of the turfgrass students participated in a “Beat the Clock” session and provided some next-generation tips for turf management such as hiring interns or switching to electric equipment.  Rob Witherspoon- Director of the program and the GTI said “the Beat the Clock feature was a great addition”.

The planning of a whole semester into one day and throwing of a big hit.  It was great to see the event come together even though we experienced many challenges throughout the semester in regards to the event.  Thank you to all of our sponsors and all of the attendees it was great to see your support for the turfgrass management program at Guelph.  I personally would like to thank our communications class instructors of Owen Roberts, Anne Douglas & Andrew Douglas for their teachings and assistance with the event execution.  Going into next year and the years to come I hope to be able to use the skills I have learned and to be in attendance of the annual turfgrass management symposium.

The 2009 golf course season has winded down pretty fast and superintendents and assistants are preparing their course for the winter season.  Due to the extended amount of warmth this fall, some courses have extended their closing date but they will still have to prepare very fast for the winter.  You need to winterize your equipment, your irrigation system needs to be blown out and you need to prepare your greens as well as the rest of the golf course.

The winterizing of equipment for the winter includes going through it’s components including the engines, ignition systems, cooling systems, transmissions, hydraulic systems & carburetors.  The irrigation blow out is the blowing out of the water lines, so that no water is frozen in the pipes over the winter.  Some superintendents like to cover their greens for the winter and some like the leave them be.  It all depends on where your are located and the type of winter you experience.  Ideally you want to prevent your greens and turf in general from low-temperature kill as well as  ice damage and traffic on the frozen and slushy turf.

Going into the winter I can see turfgrass professionals being very concerned about their course making it through the winter season and how it will come out of it.  I believe that if certain steps are taking such as tarping of greens & winter overseeding then their are ways to make sure that your course will sustain the winter.  I am looking forward to the experience and challenge in the future preparing turfgrass for the harsh Canadian winters.

This is ice debris from last winter at Mississauga Golf & Country Club. This is what will be considered ice damage

It seems like now, more than ever there is lots of training and education opportunities for turfgrass professionals.  The Canadian Golf Superintendents Association will be hosting their annual Canadian International Turfgrass Conference & Trade Show this coming February.  The five day conference & trade show will take place February 26, 2010 – March 2, 2010 at the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel in downtown Toronto.  The trade show & conference will feature a number of education programs and seminars as well as a number of banquets and social events.

With the trade show expected to attract over 1800 professionals in the industry a number of key industry partners will be speaking.  The keynote speaker for the event is Peter Mansbridge, the chief corespondent of CBC Television News.  Some other speakers to name a few  include, Scott Bowman- Superintendent: Glen Abbey Golf Club, Dr John Kaminski- Assistant Professor: Penn State University & Dr. Eric Lyons- Assistant Professor: University of Guelph.  These education & seminars vary in topics from Golf Course Analytics to Effective Use of Water on Golf Courses.

So the question I would like to ask turfgrass professionals, is whats your excuse not go?  There is so much more education outside of the post secondary institution, and this is an example of an event.  Our program is putting on a symposium ourselves on November 27,2009 as well, the Ontario Turfgrass Symposium is also happening this February at the University of Guelph.  This shows that there are ample amounts of learning opportunities.  So turfgrass professionals get out there, interact and learn some new techniques and practices.

The 2010 RBC Canadian Open will be hosted at St Georges Golf and Country Club in Toronto, Ontario.  The PGA event will take place July 19-25 2010.  St Georges is a Stanley Thompson design built in 1928 and currently ranked #3 in Canada according to Score Golf.  Keith Bartlett, St Georges superintendent and his crew are actively preparing for the course for the open and the major controversy is the third green.  The problem is the slope of the green and the difficulty to find an ideal pin position.

This third green is will prove to be one of the most challenging projects leading up RBC Canadian Open.  Bartlett had this to say about the third green “the slope is about 4 per cent to 5 per cent, while 2 to 3 is ideal”.  Brad Klein an architecture editor for Golfweek magazine has studied green speeds for awhile and said “that when slope gets above 2.5 per cent, a green is essentially unpinnable”.  This isn’t the first time a golf course has had problem green speeds, the 2001 PGA Championship had troubles with the 18th green.

Green speeds are one thing that PGA officials normally insist on being as fast as they can.  What will St Georges do to fix the third green and satisfy PGA tour officials?  One off the suggestions I read was raising the green height so it’s a different height than all the others.  One of the thoughts that I had but it may be to time consuming would be rebuilding the whole green.  This is an obstacle Keith Bartlett and his staff will have to over come in preperation for the open this coming July.

Some information from http://www.ontgolf.ca/

This week myself and other first year Guelph Turfgrass Management students were able to connect and listen to a golf industry professional not from the turf side of the business.  Our guest in our communications class was Tim O ‘ Connor,President of O ‘ Connor Golf Communications.  Tim, the owner of his own company has over 20 years of experience as a journalist and began working in the communications side of the golf business in 1998, as a Director of Communications for the Clublink Corporation.

Since starting his own business in 2000, Tim has written a few of books including, The Feeling of Greatness: The Moe Norman Story & The Ladies´ 1924-1999: A History of the Ladies´ Golf Club of Toronto.  O’Connor Golf Communications has a number of big clients including, Nike Golf Canada, Canadian PGA & Myrtle Beach Golf Holiday.  In his presentation Tim expressed the importance of communication and how phone calls is the best method of communication.  He suggested that we should all make phone calls regarding our symposium.

I learned that good communication is going to be a major step in the right direction moving forward in the turf industry.  One of the methods we are doing and learning in school is blogging and it has been successful allowing for industry professionals to read our blogs.  Based on Tim’s recommendations to make phone calls, I have done so regarding invites to our symposium and it has proven to be successful.

Now more than ever the turf industry is facing tough times due to the current economic recession and the limitations of the pesticide ban.  The first year turfgrass diploma students at the University of Guelph will be hosting the symposium as part of their communications class.  The symposium is on November 27, 2009 at the Cutten Club in Guelph, Ontario.  The theme for the symposium is “Doing more with less: Turf in tough times” which will cover the many issues facing the industry presently and in the future.

The turfgrass students are bringing in three important professionals from the industry to speak.  These three speakers include, Ron Scheidel – President of Green Horizons Group Farms Ltd; Keith Bartlett – Superintendent at St. George’s Golf and Country Club and Dr. Tom Hsiang – University of Guelph, an expert in Pathology.  The event is being actively advertised through social media and a number of invites have already been sent out to the industry.  With speaking with a number of students and guests they are excited for the event and are eager to listen to the speakers information.

If your given to opportunity to meet with other industry professionals, learn and discuss what strategies they are taking to cope with the current industry problems, why would you turn it down?  Interacting with others is a great way to learn new techniques and practices to improve your own operation.  Personally I am very excited to be running this event and being able to listen to what information the speakers have to give, as well as interacting with professionals for the future.

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