January 20, 2022 - Turf Matters

Oakland Hills highlights role of Bernhard: Oakland Hills Country Club’s South Course has made a meteoric rise in Golf Magazine’s (Golf.com) World Top 100 Golf Courses rankings list, as it celebrates the completion of an extraordinary restoration project and improved course conditioning, through the support of Bernhard and Company.

The South Course at Oakland Hills has played host to 17 major golf championships in its illustrious history, including six US Opens, three PGA Championships and the 35^th Ryder Cup in 2004. The restoration project has allowed the course, once again, to offer its originally intended playing style, with larger fairway landing areas and greens. That, coupled with pristine conditioning, has enabled the famous course – nicknamed ‘The Monster’ – to rise a phenomenal and unmatched 41 places in the new rankings list, moving into 31^stposition.

Oakland Hills highlights role of Bernhard

Following the renovation work carried out by renowned course architects, Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner, Directory of Agronomy, Phil Cuffare, and his team of turf professionals were tasked with elevating the conditioning on the South Course to its highest ever level. With industry-leading grinding equipment and educational support provided by Bernhard and Company, the team was able to work with profound efficiency in delivering attention to detail mirroring that of the very best courses in the world.

Cuffare said: “We are very excited about the recognition that our famed South Course is receiving after the completion of its extensive restoration. To bring back to life something that had been lost for so long is a great feeling and we are continuing to express that through our conditioning efforts.

“The ultimate compliment to great golf course architecture is great conditioning. As such, the most important aspect of our agronomic programmes is turf health, and the cornerstone of achieving that is using our reel and bedknife grinding machinery to sharpen mowing equipment used to maintain our fine turf areas.

“The ability to achieve the perfect cut in an efficient and precise manner is what separates Bernhard and Company from others. We have very high expectations that need to be met and Bernhard is the partner that helps us to achieve those goals.”

The project involved the course being largely stripped back to the bare soil, to make way for a total revamp. When managing the growth and health of the new turf, it was more important than ever to ensure that all grass cutting was carried out with perfectly sharp blades to prevent any damage to the young plants.

What’s more, each hole was covered with sand in traditional USGA specification, meaning that mower blades were constantly subjected to sand damage. However, with the Bernhard and Company Express Dual 4250 Reel Grinder and Anglemaster 4500 Bedknife Grinder machines in the workshop, the maintenance teams were able to sharpen blades as regularly as necessary to ensure that they were operating at maximum efficiency as the course began to blossom.

The latest Golf Magazine Top 100 ranking reaffirms Bernhard and Company as the dominant grinder supplier to the world’s best courses. In addition to Oakland Hills, Bernhard and Company are also the official grinding machine provider for over half of the courses named in the list, including major championship venues all around the globe. Impressively, Bernhard and Company machinery is used by 13 of the world’s top 20 courses and seven of the top 10.

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MM seed making waves: Newquay Golf Club is reaping the rewards from using three mixtures belonging to the market-leading MM grass seed portfolio.

Newquay may well be known more for its surfing and sandy beaches, but it also boasts a truly superb golf course. Located in the heart of the town, the picturesque 18-hole Newquay Golf Club is a challenging yet rewarding links course.

MM seed making waves

Dan Kendle, who has been a greenkeeper for the entirety of his career, moved to the Southwest seven years ago to take on the head greenkeeper role at Newquay Golf Club. It was his first managerial position in golf, and with a thriving membership and renowned for having some of the best greens in the county, it’s safe to say that Dan has made his mark.

His attention to detail and his insistence on using only the best products certainly has helped Dan to maximise results.

“I’ve never insisted on using one particular brand or manufacturer,” he said. “The most important thing is to use the products that work best on the course.”

Dan understands the importance of having a grass seed he can rely on and for the past two years he has been impressed with a range of MM grass seed mixtures.

“David Bevan from Agrovista Amenity recommended the MM brand to me, and I’m glad he did,” said Dan. “I started by using MM13 on fairways and tees, and a little bit of MM50 on some high-wear areas, such as walkways. They have performed really well. It is a small compact course, so the tees and walkways tend to get a lot of wear, and these mixtures have given us a lot more wear tolerance.”

As Dan says, MM13 is a high-quality traditional mixture for overseeding or renovating fine dense tees, fairways and roughs, particularly where maintenance and input levels are low. It has good winter colour and high disease resistance. MM50, one of the UK’s biggest selling grass mixtures, is also ideal for use on extreme wear areas and is fast establishing and resilient.

Dan and the team overseed the fairways and tees with these two mixtures twice a year in the spring and autumn but will also target specific areas as and when needed.

Based on the success of those mixtures, David decided to investigate which MM mixture would be beneficial to his greens. After consultation with Matt Gresty from MM Seeds and David Bevan from Agrovista Amenity, he decided that the all-new MM Coastal mixture would be the way forward.

“We actually did some trial plots with the MM Coastal mixture and based on the results we decided to overseed the greens with it,” he said. “It is a 100% slender creeping red fescue mixture which has a high salt tolerance. This is perfect for us because we are very exposed here. It is a dry site too so the fact that MM Coastal is drought tolerant, works very well for us.

“My plan is to start overseeding the greens and surrounds with MM Coastal on a more regular basis now,” continued Dan. “I’ll probably apply it at a lower rate every 5-6 weeks just to keep pumping the fescues into them to try and out-compete the areas of less desirable species such as Poa.”

“Germination is excellent and that is across all three seed varieties. You also get great colour from the mixtures all year round. On top of that, I get good support and backup from both Matt and David. I can always bounce ideas around with them and we enjoy discussing different overseeding techniques.

“With MM – it’s the whole package.”

For further information, please contact MM Sports Seed on 01386 791102 or visit the company’s new website www.mm-seeds.co.uk. You can also follow the company on Twitter: @MM_Seed