Opening day preparation is upon us, but where do you start? In the first of a new series of articles, John Quinn lays out a failsafe plan for getting the green ready for the big day.
Author: John
Master Greenkeeper John Quinn is the author of Performance Bowling Greens, and several other titles on Greenkeeping, Club and Business Management.
Opening Day Preparation: Getting the mower ready.
Getting the mower ready is often seen as someone else's responsibility during the close season, but great care should be taken to make sure you are not falling foul of tradition again. Relief grinding and back lapping have become an unfortunate norm in cylinder mower set up, but can be more damaging to the turf and the mower than you might expect. John Quinn explains the theory and suggests a solution that will ensure your mower gives you trouble free service and impressive results all season long.
Unlocking Consistency: How Liquid N Slow Release Supports Superior Bowling Green Performance
Nitrogen is essential to turfgrass performance—it drives growth, colour, and density. But too much or too little, applied at the wrong time or in the wrong form, can do more harm than good. Spikes of growth followed by periods of stress are all too common with traditional nitrogen sources, especially on fine turf where consistency is king.
Mair Sand
"Mair sand" was the call from Tom Morris the most famous and respected greenkeeper of them all, but have we misunderstood him? In reply to an article about fine, firm golf greens John Quinn highlights the similarities between the plight of golf and bowls greens and clears up the apparent contradiction between modern day problems with inert greens and the Tom Morris philosophy.
Greenkeeping Advice Leads to Disaster
I normally pick out the most popular search terms to try to answer the underlying question, but this was a single and very different search term and I thought it was very interesting.
The title tells the story. Someone is of the opinion that the greenkeeping advice they received from an adviser caused the opposite result from the one they expected.