Grass health recovery sweeps across UK

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Grass health recovery sweeps across UK: This month’s Grass Health Watch, using latest satellite results of just under 50 sports turf sites across the country, has seen a major step forward for sports turf health,

“It’s amazing! At the end of March it was looking as if the rest of the year would involve trying to catch up on lost ground when, in fact, the outcome for sports turf health in April has been well beyond anything we could have expected. In the space of one month we are right back on track for the year,” revealed Mike Heisig, from FairWay Awards.

Grass health recovery sweeps across UK

Grass health recovery sweeps across UK

Was that because of good weather? Maybe, but a large part of the recovery was surely because of the fantastic efforts of greenkeepers up and done the country getting our golf courses in shape in the few weeks after lockdown. What a turnaround!”

“At a regional level, with the exception of the South East, the latest results are no less amazing. Some sports turf in the South West and in the North East are racing ahead notching up vitality scores over 90%. Now beat that if you can!” said Mike.

“These results are very encouraging and there is every expectation that sports turf health will continue to develop into May and June and we may even set some records. From an exceptionally slow start it could be an extraordinary year for sports grass!”

Register for a free 3-month trial of satellite biomass data for your club at:  https://fairwayawards.com/your-free-precision-sport-turf-trial/ and send us your best score.

Grass health recovery sweeps across UK

Grass health recovery sweeps across UK

Get the benefits of the Precision Sports Turf Revolution:

  • Spot grass health problems before they are visible
  • Save money on inputs where they are not required
  • Apply inputs according the needs of the grass
  • Make better environmental decisions

Regular updates on grass health through 2021 at www.fairwayawards.com or follow @FairWayAwards on twitter

Join the Sports Turf Revolution contact Mike Heisig: Mike-Heisig@btconnect.com

For the latest industry news visit turfmatters.co.uk/news

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EcoBunker’s new business development manager

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EcoBunker’s new business development manager: Synthetic bunker edging specialist EcoBunker has made a significant expansion by appointing Hamish Crichton as its new business development manager. Crichton joined EcoBunker at the start of May, from soil surfectant and wetting agent provider Aquatrols.

“I come from a corporate background, but a few years ago I decided I wanted to follow my passion, and work in the golf business,” said Crichton. “Although I don’t have a background in golf, while at Aquatrols I took the Fertiliser Adviser Certification and Training Scheme (FACTS) qualification. It was quite a challenge to go back to school for the first time in years, but it did me a lot of good. I found that I love the science in soil and grass. It’s one of the first jobs where I’ve found myself reading books or watching videos at one in the morning and my wife has nudged me saying ‘Go to sleep’. The thing that astonished me was the number of times I read ‘The answer is not yet known’. It’s almost like a frontier science.”

EcoBunker's new business development manager

EcoBunker’s new business development manager

“I have a lot of sympathy for greenkeepers. On top of dealing with Mother Nature and the curve balls she throws at them, they have members to worry about! For me, I’m keen to expand my knowledge of the whole arena of golf. I got to know about the greenkeeping side of things, but I wanted to expand my knowledge of architecture and construction, and understand the world of the general manager. My previous experience in marketing and business development trained mehow to present a proposition to a general manager or a greens chairman, who are usually from a similar sort of background and that’s going to be a very important part of my role.

“I had a number of different opportunities, but I chose to join EcoBunker because I believe it is a company that has almost limitless potential. When Richard Allen first conceived synthetic revetting, it was to provide a new solution to the erosion of low edge parkland bunkers. He wanted to give golf courses the option of building aesthetically pleasing, more architecturally interesting bunker shapes without the worry of introducing an increased maintenance burden. As it turned out, the product quickly became popular on higher faced links pot bunkers and our challenge now is to change perceptions, demonstrating that the product translates extremely well to all golf course styles. It helps that we now have a wonderful portfolio from the tropics to the tundra, Major venues to municipals, featuring parkland, heathland and desert courses. EcoBunker allows greenkeeping staff to spend less time on their bunkers and get on with maintaining the surfaces that really matter.”

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The Naturelle effect

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The Naturelle effect: Agrovista Amenity has announced the launch of Evolution Naturelle – a unique range of fertilisers which replaces the popular Marathon portfolio of products.

For a number of years, turf managers reaped the benefits of the Marathon range of fertilisers – and they can certainly expect no less when it comes to the improved Evolution Naturelle range.

The Naturelle effect

The Naturelle effect

Evolution Naturelle is a premium range of organo-mineral fertilisers designed with a unique mode of action. Poultry based Evolution Naturelle contains essential nutritional elements such as phosphorus (P), potassium (K), magnesium oxide (MgO), sulphur (S) and iron (Fe) which are compounded to the advanced granulation making them available for plant uptake.

Key features

  • Low carbon to nitrogen ratio
  • Provides healthy balanced growth due to phased release of nutrients
  • Complexed potassium for slow release
  • Promotes stimulation of bacterial soil life helping reduce thatch build
  • Hardens turf due to cell division and cell extension as a result of ammonium take up
  • No scorch risk due to low salt index when applied at the correct rates
  • Increased tillering for a denser sward
  • Ammonium produces large volumes of root hairs which ensure active up take of micronutrients

No matter what the time of year, or the requirement, the Evolution Naturelle range offers a solution, and below is just a snapshot of what customers can expect.

The Evolution Naturelle Micro range consists of Spring – to optimise consistent grass plant response at the start of the growing season; NK – which produces a consistent plant response during the growing season; Summer – for phased release and a steady growth response throughout the core of the growing season; Renovate – to support sports turf surfaces post renovation with the aim of promoting rapid recovery back to expected playing conditions; and Autumn – for steady resilient growth at the end of the growing season.

The Evolution Naturelle Sport range: Spring – which contains three nitrogen sources blended to optimise consistent grass plant response; Summer – a zero-phosphate analysis for phased release; Autumn – for consistent growth and healthy natural colour; and Allsport – designed for application throughout the growing season with a balanced formulation of plant essential elements.

The Naturelle effect

The Naturelle effect

The Evolution Naturelle Base range: 4-3-2 – designed to be used across a range of horticultural applications including turf surfaces, landscape constructions, amenity and ornamental plant borders; 7-6-14 which contains slow release, organic components to provide consistent nutrition for reliable growth; and Preseed 8-12-8 – a balanced analysis of primary and secondary macronutrients designed to support strong and consistent rooting.

The result of following an Evolution Naturelle fertiliser programme is a sward with firm, shorter leaf blades brought about by the increase in tillering and improvement in leaf cell structure.

The new Evolution Naturelle range of fertilisers are available with immediate effect. Contact your local technical advisor for more information on setting up your programme.

For more information about Agrovista Amenity, visit www.agrovista.co.uk/amenity

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Turf Tank makes its mark at Nottingham Forest

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Turf Tank makes its mark at Nottingham Forest: Since their Turf Tank One arrived at the Nigel Doughty Academy, Nottingham Forest Football Club has marked every pitch and grid they have with the GPS line marking robot.

The club’s interest in the Turf Tank One began at the end of a hectic 2019/20 Championship season when a high volume of games were played before a short renovation window led straight into the 2020/21 season. With initially marking the pitches taking two or three days, the Turf Tank was brought in to mark everything comfortably within one. And after seeing it in action, it was difficult for Grounds Manager Ewan Hunter and Academy Head Groundsman Matt Tietjen to let it leave the site.

Turf Tank makes its mark at Nottingham Forest

Turf Tank makes its mark at Nottingham Forest

“I was very, very impressed. Obviously, I had never seen it before, and as soon as it started marking out, I was like, wow, this is brilliant,” Matt begins. “It’s very, very accurate, and every time it goes out, it’s spot on.

“It saves us a hell of a lot of time. To mark one pitch, it would take myself or two of my staff an hour, an hour and a half to two hours. But obviously, with the Turf Tank to mark one pitch alone, it takes 20 to 25 minutes. Another factor for us is it allows our staff to carry on with the other jobs that need to be done, and the machine can basically look after itself. Generally, we’d use five to six litres of paint to mark a pitch, but with the Turf Tank, we probably use four litres.

“If you are able to use a tablet or are reasonably good with technology, it’s very, very simple to use, and the programme is very straight forward. I’m not particularly brilliant with technology, but it takes five minutes to set it up, and then you can go and do other jobs while it marks out.

Adding the Turf Tank One to their team initially relieved pressure during a busy time, but the benefits of saving time, being able to work while the robot marks and the accuracy of the lines have all been vital during another packed season.

Using the Turf Tank tablet, custom grids are regularly overmarked within pitches, as well as custom goalkeeping areas and other pitch markings. This is just another reason why the robot has worked so well at Forest, but for Ewan, it’s the accuracy that really impresses.

“We have got some really good staff, and they can do some really good marking. And the lines looked straight, and they looked to be in the right place,” Ewan explains.

“It wasn’t until we used the GPS machine that it highlighted the fact that when you come to mark a line freehand, they creep a bit. And then they creep a little bit more. And then they creep a little bit more, and you don’t really notice the little bit of creeping until you get a GPS line marker overmarking the pitches that were already there. You realise that they’ve moved a considerable amount of distance, and it kind of highlights that the lines were actually in the wrong place.

“They managed to plot it with all of the additional markings on top of the pitches. So we’ve got dashes and little grids and five-a-side pitches and full-size pitches, and it can basically do whatever you plot it to do, and it takes care of all the markings on the whole site now.”

For more information on the Turf Tank One or to have a demonstration contact alex@turftank.co.uk (southern UK) or matt@turftank.co.uk (northern UK).

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