UNITED STATES GOLF ASSOCIATION GREEN SECTION

Issued By The

ROOM 307. SOUTH BUILDING 

PLANT INDUSTRY STATION 
BELTSVILLE, MD.

TIMELY FAIRWAY RENOVATION PROGRAMS PAY DIVIDENDS

FIELD DAYS: Pennsylvania Experiment Station will have its Field Day at State College 
on September 15 and 16. The Annual G.S.A. Tournament will be held on the same days, 
with golf in the forenoons and study of plot work in the afternoons. Professor H. B. 
Musser is in. charge. Room assignments will be made through the College. The USGA 
Green Section will offer a plaque for Low Medal.

Rhode Island Experiment Station has planned Field Days for September 9 and 10. 

The first day will be devoted largely to golf turf and the second day to lawns, parks, 
cemeteries and associated turf interests. Doctor J. A. De France is in charge.

COOPERATIVE RESEARCH IN FLORIDA: Agreements have been completed to establish a USGA 
Green Section research grant at the University of Florida for the purpose of establish­
ing and maintaining a turf garden for the introduction, testing, increase and distribu­
tion of superior turf grasses. The garden will be maintained at the Everglades Experi­
ment Station, Belle Glade, Florida, under the direction and supervision of Dr. R. V. 
Allison, Director, and Dr. Roy A. Bair, Agronomist. Plans were completed through Dr. 
Harold A. Mowry, Director of the Florida Experiment Stations, Gainesville. Three 
hundred dollars a year will be made available on this grant until such time as circum­
stances permit an increase.

COOPERATIVE RESEARCH IN MICHIGAN: The memorandum of agreement has been signed 
establishing a three-year $4500-research fellowship in Turf Management at the Michigan 
State College, East Lansing, Michigan. The fellowship is supported jointly by the

Detroit District Golf Association........  $2250
USGA Green Section........................  1125
Midwest Regional Turf Foundation..........  1125

The work will be under the joint supervision of Dr. James Tyson, Soils Department, and 
Dr. Carter M. Harrison, Crops Department. The fellow has not been selected. A study 
of fairway management problems will be the basis of the project selected, integrated 
through the Green Section with similar work in progress at the Pennsylvania State 
College.

CHANGES IN GREEN SECTION STAFF: George E. Harrington, Assistant Director, left the 
Green Section on July 16, 1947, to rejoin the Army Air Forces as a regular Army 
officer. George returns to the Army as a Lieut. Colonel, which was his rank at the 
time he was separated from the Service in March, 1946. His first assignment in the 
Army will be in Headquarters Army Air Forces, Washington, D. C. We will miss George 
in this work and we wish him all success in his chosen profession.

Marvin H. Ferguson, formerly with the Green Section, and more recently with 

the Division of Forage Crops and Diseases, Beltsville, rejoins the Green Section staff 
as Agronomist, effective August 16.

Ian Forbes, Jr.., who rejoined the Green Section in November, 1945, as Re­
search Assistant, leaves the Green Section August 15 to take the position with the 
Division of Forage Crops and Diseases, Beltsville, which was vacated by Marvin Ferguson.

SUGGESTED READING: The Greenkeepers’ Reporter, Vol. 15, No. 3, May-June 1947 p 
13, col. 2.

August, 1947

Timely Turf Topics, 1

FAIRWAY RENOVATION WITH WEED CONTROL PRACTICES

M. E. Farnham and Charles K. Hallowell*

Fairway renovation is considered necessary when the plant population of 

existing turf is unsatisfactory. Such conditions usually require reseeding in addition 
to a sound maintenance program.

Before reseeding fairways, it is essential to determine correctly the reason 

why the existing turf is unsatisfactory. After determining the cause, the program to 
establish a satisfactory turf is developed. The program usually includes the materials, 
the equipment, and the season, to insure good results.

If turf is poor due to grub injury, before the reseeding program is started, 
grubs are controlled either with arsenate of lead or with DDT. Wet areas which have 
poor turf are tile drained. Weedy fairway areas, due to neglect through the war period 
or other reasons, are analyzed carefully to determine the kind and type of weeds. After 
knowing the kind of weed, the correct chemical may be selected for treating the weeds 
before seeding the fairways.

The materials to use include lime (if soil test shows a need), fertilizer, 

herbicide, and seed. The equipment includes proper distributors for applying lime, 
fertilizer, chemicals, and seed.

Some sort of tool is necessary to scarify the soil in the preparation of the 
seed bed. To date a spike-disc and the soil Aerifier are the two that assist in culti­
vating, loosening the soil, and assisting in establishing the proper seed bed.

Chemicals which have been used in renovating the weeds in fairways prior to 

or during the renovation procedure are sodium chlorate, sodium arsenite, and 2,4-D.

If the weeds which predominate are of the broad-leaf type, such as plantain 

and dandelion, 2,4-D is the chemical to use. It is important to apply it well in ad­
vance of seeding as there is evidence that seeding immediately following the applica­
tion of 2,4-D will retard seriously both seed germination and growth of new seedlings.

Heavy coverings of crabgrass may be effectively removed just as seed heads 
are formed, by applying sodium chlorate. An application of two and-a-half pounds of 
this material to each 1,000 square feet, applied either in spray or dry form, has 
checked this undesirable grass on Pennsylvania fairways and enabled the reseeding 
program to be started in two weeks after the application of the chemical.

Chickweed, crabgrass in the seed head formation stage, and other weeds 

unaffected by 2,4-D, may be removed by applications of sodium arsenite. Sodium 
arsenite will assist also in checking clover and Poa annua prior to and at the time 
of reseeding, so that the establishment of new seedings is accomplished successfully 
in areas where they would otherwise be smothered by clover or Poa annua . A most desir­
able factor in favor of sodium arsenite is that seeding may be done either at the time 
of application or immediately afterwards. Its effect on the weeds is quicker than that 
of 2,4-D, and it discolors the desired grasses less than does sodium chlorate.

After controlling the weeds and correcting all possible causes of poor turf, 

the reseeding program is started. The best time for seeding, and the choice of seed 
mixtures, are dependent on the locality. It should be kept in mind that q fairway turf 
is desired which can be cut closely without injury. [Italics are ours.]

Following the application of the necessary lime and fertilizer, the seed bed 

is prepared. Thoroughness is important; in fact, the disking or spiking must be such 
as would be rated as drastic on any existing good grasses. It is necessary to loosen 
hard-pan areas in order to allow lime and fertilizer to become mixed with the soil.

The finishing procedure is the preparation of a fine, firm, smooth seed bed. 

The seed can be covered by the use of a chain harrow or similar equipment.

The establishment and continuance of a sound maintenance program, including 
optimum fertilizer applications, are essential to develop fully the results of reseed­
ing and to insure the continuance of satisfactory fairway turf.

,. * President, Greenkeeping Superintendents Association, and also Superintendent, Philadelphia Country Club: and Philadel­

phia County Agent, Philadelphia, Pa., respectively.

August, 1947 

Timely Turf Topics, 2

2,4-D AIDS THE ESTABLISHMENT OF SOUTHERN TURF GRASSES 1

Glenn W. Burton2

Rapidly-growing southern weeds greatly retard the establishment and may cause 
the complete failure of turf grass plantings in*the Southeast. Many of these weeds are 
of the broadleafed type susceptible to the selective killing of 2,4-D. It was quite 
logical, therefore, to study the effect of 2,4-D upon the establishment of the grasses 
planted in the turf plots at Tifton, Georgia, in the spring of 1947. Rates and methods 
of application were studied on the principal turf grasses used in this area. The 
results of these studies may be summarized briefly as follows:

1. Dry 70 percent 2,4-D powder mixed with dry Uramon or complete fertilizer and 

applied with a fertilizer spreader was as effective as were similar rates of liquid 
2,4-D acid sprayed on in a water solution.

2. Applications of 2 pounds of 2,4-D acid to the acre (slightly more than the 

rate recommended by one manufacturer) killed pussley (Richardia scabra) but only stunted 
such broadleafed weeds as pigweed (Awaranthus sp.) and coffee-weed (Cassia sp.). Twice 
this rate was required to kill all broadleafed weeds occurring in the turf.

3. 2,4-D applied at a rate of 8 pounds of acid to the acre in an old lawn injured 
carpet grass turf severely. Centipede grass, Bermuda grass, Dallis grass, and perennial 
ryegrass growing in the same turf showed little, if any, injury.

4. Southern turf grasses were more susceptible to 2,4-D injury in the seedling 

stage than when growing in mature sods.

5. When 2,4-D acid was applied at rates of 2 and 4 pounds to the acre the injury 

to Bermuda grass due to 2,4-D was negligible.

6. 2,4-D was applied at the rate of 8 pounds of the acid to the acre to 100 dif­

ferent strains of Bermuda grass. The leaves of some strains were burned considerably 
by such applications while others showed no evidence of leaf discoloration, indicating 
marked differences due to strains.

7. The newly formed stolons on sprigged plots of such grasses as Bermuda grass, 

St. Augustine grass, centipede grass, and carpet grass failed to root well at the nodes 
for a month to six weeks after the application of 2,4-D. This resulted in many loose 
runners which tended to pile up and give the newly-formed turf an unsightly appearance. 
It also caused a somewhat slower establishment than might have resulted had the stolons 
been able to put down active roots at each node. This injury was more pronounced at 
the heavier rates of application but also was observed where 2,4-D was applied at 2 and 
4 pounds of acid to the acre. Stolons developed six weeks after the application of 
2,4-D seemed to develop normal roots. In spite of this undesirable effect, 2,4-D appli­
cations ranging from 4 to 8 pounds of acid to the acre favored the establishment of 
sprigged plots of Bermuda grass. In these studies the untreated plots were not hand 
weeded, and the weed competition greatly retarded their spread. This phenomenon needs 
further study.

8. Applications of 2,4-D at rates up to 8 pounds of acid to the acre did not kill 
such weedy grasses as crabgrass (Digitaria, sp.), fingergrass (Dactyloctenium aegyptium), 
and goosegrass (Eleusine indica). it did, however, seem to kill many of their roots, 
greatly reducing the labor required to remove these grasses from the turf by hand 
weeding.

1 Cooperative investigations at Tifton, Georgia, of the Division of Forage Crops and Diseases, U. S. Department of Agricul­
ture, the Georgia Coastal Plain Experiment Station, the U. S. Golf Association Green Section, and a number of southern golf 
associations.

’Geneticist, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Tifton, Georgia.

August, 1947

Timely Turf Topics, 3