Let's work together for a successful 2019!
Carbon-Based Turf Programs Provide Benefits
Posted in Best Turf Management Practices by Curtis Williams
By DALE MILLER, Corporate Agronomist
Many are glad 2018 is over, as there were lots of crazy conditions across the country.
Rain in excess, heat in excess, dry in excess, cool in excess, and all we can say is it was just another year in Turf Management.
Some may have felt it was an unusual year but for those around as long as I have been, it was not unusual at all. It was just another year where Mother Nature seldom gave you a break or the conditions you were looking for.
The key things this industry will teach you is to be proactive, to plan to prepare. With that, experience is helpful and being able to predict some things as well….maybe even a little luck now and then.
We make our core the solid daily practices of irrigation and cutting, walking the course and evaluating all aspects, the weekly to monthly inputs we make, the planned cultural practices and the responses to events that were not predictable.
Good turf managers will always be successful as the programs and practices in place are built for the things that remain the same but work with the things that are different. The successful turf managers in 2018 were those who took soils and water samples early and built a solid fertility, management program from them.
They planned cultural events but performed them when conditions were best for those events, often having to change dates to perform the practice when conditions allowed speedy recovery and minimized damaging impact, which maximized the practice.
Too often these days, cultural events and applications are performed by strict calendar days. Too often these “set dates” are not best for the practice performed, and too often the event is then lost. The reality of this is that these events are critical to the long term success of any program.
Fertility programs built on solid foundation of soil and water analysis that worked with existing biology continue to be the best chance of success.
It has become common knowledge that carbon is critical to fertility programs these days. Carbon in usable formats and targeted to specific plant responses and microbial activity are becoming more and more common place in successful programs.
Turfgrass management programs in which improved, carbon based nutritional program are employed and based on soil and water analysis can provide benefits such as:
• Stimulate antioxidant production
• Root initiation
• Physical strength
• Resistance to disease
• Improve wear tolerance
• Improve heat and cold tolerance
• Improve density
• Improved ball speed
• Clipping reduction
• Recovery
• Thatch management
AmeriTurf works hard to assure the best possible solutions are available to managers in products and solutions.
Products cover a vast range of options that are built by industry leading manufacturers and use carbon sources unique in the ability to maximize performance and response.
When pesticides are required they are equally as important but they do not replace the overall benefit of fertility.
As a great professor used to tell me, it starts with the plant. The best weed control is a dense surface. The best disease control is a healthy plant. The best conditions come from putting these things together is starting with the soil, water and plant nutrition as the plant has been here a long time and is very capable when properly cared for.
AmeriTurf support for these programs guarantees success where planning and testing determine the products used, and a relationship between manager and sales consultant are in place, which builds a much deeper knowledge base and greater chance of success.
We hope that everyone in 2019 has a great year but to improve the chance of success, let’s get those soil and water samples in, let’s build those programs, let’s work together to plan for the predictable and not so predictable in 2019, so we can look back and say that was another tough year but we made it and look forward to 2020.