bentgrass

Perspective. It’s funny how that works. When I first read this research report in 2011, I skimmed over some parts, and cherry-picked what I was looking for — that 15 to 20% surface area removal was required every year in order to keep soil organic matter under control.

There’s a new column on the Nichino Ryokka website. It’s a collaboration between ATC and Nichino Ryokka, with some selected content from the ATC site published in Japanese. The first column is here, and the topic is a 12 point checklist for dealing with creeping bentgrass heat stress (the original list is here).

A late July solid-tine spiking treatment of a creeping bentgrass green in Hokkaido, Japan. How’s this for a lede? “Hollow-tine coring and solid-tine spiking practices may not alleviate creeping bentgrass summer decline.

Last November I saw a creeping bentgrass nursery in Japan. The nursery had been fumigated to kill seeds in the soil before the bentgrass seeds were planted. I was surprised to see, scattered across the nursery, plants with big leaves that clearly were not creeping bentgrass.

The MLSN guideline for phosphorus (P) is 21 ppm. I usually recommend enough P fertilizer to keep soil P, as measured by the Mehlich 3 extractant, from dropping below 21 ppm.

I completely forgot a few great articles when I put together this list of articles that are specifically not about turfgrass. One of those I forgot is Evidence for the existence of three primary strategies in plants and its relevance to ecological and evolutionary theory.

As I say at the end of every year, it was another extraordinary year for studying grass around the world. In 2018 I took 107 flights for a total distance of 314,748 km (195,575 miles).

I’ve been writing a monthly column for Golf Course Seminar (ゴルフ場セミナー) since May of 2008. The articles are usually 2 pages. I wrote a couple 4 page articles when マイカの時間 The BOOK was published last year.

I had an open discussion today with a group of greenkeepers in Japan. We talked about a lot of things – bentgrass in summer, irrigation, fertilizer, organic matter management, roots, etc.

After last week’s post about the soil test levels where P deficiency symptoms were seen, Paul Johnson wrote to remind me about another experiment: “This is always a topic of interest to me, beginning with the study I did in the early 2000s.