J Premier Delivers At Bournemouth

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J Premier Delivers At Bournemouth: If it ain’t broken, then why fix it?! That’s certainly the motto of Ian Lucas, Head of Grounds at AFC Bournemouth, when it comes to the choice of grass seed across both the Vitality Stadium and two pitches at King’s Park training ground. When Ian joined the club 18 months ago, Johnsons J Premier Pitch mixture was the seed of choice across the two first-team facilities, and having delivered reliable coverage, colour and wear tolerance, it looks to be a decision that’s set to stay.

Supported by a grounds team of seven, Ian is now into his third season of using J Premier Pitch. “I had obviously heard of the mixture but had not used it previously so when I inherited the seeding programme of my predecessor, it was my first real experience of the Johnsons Sports Seed mixture. It hasn’t disappointed!” Ian oversows with J Premier Pitch at a rate of 45g/m2 during renovations in April and at a lower rate of 15g/m2 in October, depending on the weather conditions and how the pitch is wearing.

J Premier Delivers At Bournemouth

Through the season, they adopt a ‘pre-germinated seed’ strategy for ongoing recovery and repair of high wear areas. “It’s a well-known-tactic but not one that seems to be frequently employed in the industry” he explains. “We fill a bucket ¾ full of Premier Pitch, then top it up with water and place it in a heated container for three to four days until it pops, before applying it to areas such as goal mouths and corner spots. This method shaves up to two weeks off germination, giving us a real advantage especially during the colder months.”

“We’ve achieved good wear tolerance, disease resistance and the germination we need throughout the year. The colour is one of the main things for us, and the J Premier Pitch is unbeatable for this, backed up by the respective cultivar ratings in the STRI listings.” Ian will discuss requirements with his local DLF technical support advisor Ian Barnett, who keeps him up to date on new developments and provides guidance on seed selection. “He’ll always pop in at key times, such as renovations, and advise us on current supply to ensure we get delivery in time – vital to keeping us on track.”

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Rain Bird’s New Irrigation Controller

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Rain Bird’s New Irrigation Controller: Rain Bird’s new Wi-Fi ready ESP-TM2 irrigation controller has been designed for both residential and commercial applications. It is simple to use, offers highly flexible watering schedules and water saving features. End users and contractors can select exactly the right controller to tailor irrigation to the varying needs of different areas, zones and plant types within a landscape.

The ESP-TM2 will be attractive to both users and contractors alike. Filling a gap between Rain Bird’s proven ESP-RZX 4/6/8 zone controller and the ESP-ME controller with up to 22 stations, the new ESP-TM2 models are available with four, six, eight and twelve stations. There are three individual programs for each controller and up to four independent start times for each program in order to offer users highly flexible irrigation scheduling.

Rain Bird's New Irrigation Controller

The controller’s large back-lit LCD display gives good visibility in low light or bright sun. Quick programming can be undertaken in just three steps for ease of set-up. The turn dial is easy to navigate and simple to set for automatic and manual irrigation, date/time, run times and seasonal adjustment which allows easy reduction or increase of watering.

Advanced programming features include Permanent Days Off to postpone watering schedules when maintenance is planned or alternatively this facility can be used to set odd/even or cyclical irrigation schedules. Watering can be delayed up to 14 days and automatically resumed after the set delay has elapsed. Furthermore, a Contractor Default™ setting allows the user to save and restore a custom irrigation schedule easily.

There is an option to add a Rain Bird WR2 or RSD-BEX rain sensor to shut off irrigation in the event of rainfall, but a by-pass is also available for any station, giving the user or contractor the ability to customise which stations react to the sensor. There is also a one-touch manual watering facility.

For off-site management and programming, real-time alerts and the use of other advanced water management tools, ESP-TM2 controllers can be enabled for Wi-Fi remote control by iOS and Android mobile devices. This is achieved by simply plugging in Rain Bird’s separate LNK WiFi module into the controller’s accessory port. The readily available Rain Bird App can then be used for all remote programming and irrigation scheduling – particularly useful for contractors who manage installations and can save significantly on site visits.

Internet-based weather information can also be used, allowing daily adjustments to be made to the irrigation schedule in accordance with forecasts, potentially offering 30% water savings.

The ESP-TM2 controller can be installed indoors or outside and operates at 230 VAC @ 50/60 Hz.  Operating temperature is up to 65°C.

For more information contact: Peter Longman, Rain Bird Europe, Northern Europe Landscape Area Manager, plongman@rainbird.eu Tel: +44 7575 626600  www.rainbird.eu

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Barenbrug Grow Business In Ireland

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Barenbrug Grow Business In Ireland: Barenbrug’s plan to further expand its business in Ireland has been given an additional boost with the appointment of new distributor, Cropcare, based in Co. Wicklow.

Cropcare will be selling Barenbrug’s Sport and Essential range of grass seed to the amenity market across Ireland. Thanks to a new investment in storage, Cropcare will be stocking most Barenbrug seed mixtures in Ireland, further enhancing their already excellent customer service.

Barenbrug Grow Business In Ireland

 

Cropcare has been trading for over 28 years and employs 10 staff. The company provides a wide range of amenity products including grass seed, chemicals and specialist fertilisers to the golf, sport and landscaping market. They pride themselves on having technically focused and well-trained staff that work closely with their customers to help them find solutions for their needs. This trait is also a high priority of Barenbrug making the decision to appoint Cropcare even easier.

The relationship between Barenbrug’s North England and Ireland Account Manager, Phil Logan, and Cropcare has been on-going for a number of years, Áine said: “We have known Phil for three years now and it’s good to be working with him more closely. We are confident that this new partnership will bring real success for both companies.”

Áine Daly, Director of Cropcare, said, “We are delighted to be working with Barenbrug. They have been a high-profile seed supplier for many years and their quality is well known. We are very impressed with their strong sales and marketing approach and their move to invest in Ireland with a dedicated Account Manager means support for us and our customers is unrivalled.”

Commenting on the appointment, Barenbrug UK’s Managing Director, Paul Johnson said: “I am delighted to announce the appointment of Cropcare as a distributor in Ireland.

Based in County Wicklow, Cropcare has particular expertise in the professional amenity market.  The experience and commitment of its salespeople are clearly evident. Cropcare has a proven track record in sourcing high-quality products for amenity professionals within its market place”.

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Terrain Aeration At Cambridge Uni

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Terrain Aeration At Cambridge Uni: Cambridge University Botanic Garden welcomes 300,000 visitors a year, making it the most visited university botanic garden in the UK. Situated in the centre of Cambridge, the Grade II listed Heritage Garden covers 40 acres and is home to a collection of over 8,000 plant species to facilitate teaching and research.

Equally, since its foundation it has provided a beautiful and tranquil place for everyone to enjoy. The Garden boasts four show lawns and the combination of foot traffic, marquee trucks and ride-on mowers leads to compaction. The Garden has been using Terrain Aeration’s decompaction services since as far back as 2013 and chose the deep aeration treatment for the high-profile area of the Main Lawn in front of the majestic glasshouses.

Terrain Aeration Visit Cambridge University

“We know Terrain Aeration’s work from years ago when development had been done at the Station Road Entrance and the lawn at the back of Cory Lodge,” says Adrian Holmes, Landscape and Machinery Supervisor at the Garden. “The lawns had been re-built after the work but were found to be compacted and the soil was not good. We had a waterlogging issue for a couple of years. The Terrain Aeration treatment rectified the problem and we know from experience it’s a long-term solution.”

This year, the Garden’s Main Lawn area was cordoned off, the machine operation creating considerable interest amongst students and visitors, and Terrain Aeration’s Terralift set to work. The weather was very good and dry, and the ground was worked easily without the need to use the Terralift’s JCB hammer drill. The machine’s probe is driven down a metre deep and highly compressed air released up to a maximum of 20Bar (280psi) to fracture the soil, opening it up for aeration, drainage and to get oxygen to the roots of the plant. On the tail end of the air blast, dried seaweed is incorporated which sticks to the walls of the fractures and fissures created by the main air blast. As pressure drops, the seaweed is mixed in the hopper unit where it swirls around with the remaining air and is then released. The seaweed swells in wet weather and keeps the fissures open. On the Main Lawn the same process was repeated in two-metre spacings, so the underground fracturing is thoroughly linked. In some extreme cases this is demonstrated by water fountains appearing from previous probe holes. In this instance the ground was found to be not as compacted as expected and the 2,500sq metre area was completed in two days, not the original three as had been expected.

“The Terrain Aeration guys were very good, prompt and efficient and quite knowledgeable,” says Adrian, “they backfilled the probe holes with Lytag, lightweight aggregate and it was as if they had never been there. It was great to have everything back to normal so quickly.” The aeration treatment completed, the lawn area was immediately open for unrestricted access to the fountains, glasshouses and horticultural and National Plant Collections.

Terrain Aeration www.terrainaeration.co.uk  01449 673783

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Ransomes’ Nigel Church Retires

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Ransomes’ Nigel Church Retires: One of the UK’s most respected and valued members in the turf industry, Nigel Church, is retiring at the end of June after almost 50 years in the sector. We had the pleasure of working closely with Nigel for decades and his knowledge, technical ability, eloquence and downright likeability shone through in everything he did.

Nigel joined Ransomes Sims & Jeffries as an apprentice back in the 1970s along with other industry notables such as Bob Buckingham, Bob Bevan, Paul Watson, Richard Bishop, Richard Walne, Graham Dale, Jeff Anguige and Barry Beckitt.

Nigel Church Retires From Ransomes

Readers of a similar age will recognise many of these names demonstrating that this generation of apprentices were the base for the new Toro European distribution – all built on the Ransomes skills they had been taught by John Wilson, Ken Buckledee & Guy Catchpole. In its day, Ransomes was considered the ‘university’ for the UK turf industry.

Nigel fulfilled many roles within the Ransomes business and the industry in general. In his time, he has been a demonstrator, technical rep and area rep; had responsibility for export sales, national accounts, regional sales management and training.

Included in his impressive CV is an eight-year sojourn, when he left Ransomes to work for one of their dealers, Kingston House Mowers in a sales role. He was back at the company in 1998, when it was purchased by Textron, became Ransomes Jacobsen and played a significant part in providing continuity as the two businesses merged together.

Later in his career he joined the new Cutting Edge Training division at Ransomes Jacobsen with a remit to pass on his extensive knowledge and experience to the next generation of sales and technical professionals within the dealer network. This was another area where Nigel excelled and the quality of training delivered by him and his colleagues was arguably the most concise, detailed and effective across the entire industry.

In the past few years he has continued to expand this role travelling to all points of the globe delivering training in his enthusiastic, effervescent manner and has recently returned from his final visit to the Far East. Many of us will never forget the long days and short nights at exhibitions and shows, where we enjoyed the camaraderie of a close-knit team in which Churchy was often the pivotal point … with a beer or gin and tonic in hand.

Nigel has forgotten more than many people in this industry will ever know and he will be sorely missed as he rides off into the sunset (probably on a Ransomes Highway 3). It has been an absolute pleasure to work with a man of this calibre – kind, knowledgeable, dedicated, humorous, affable –  and who is instantly recognised across the industry. Just try walking with him across the halls at SALTEX, BTME, GIS and any other international event and see how long it takes to get from A to B!

The global turf industry’s sincere best wishes go out to you Nigel, to Sylvia, your family and grandchildren, for a very long and happy retirement. It is well deserved.

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