PROCEEDINGS
of

1951 TURF

CONFERENCE

Sponsored by the

and

PURDUE UNIVERSITY
LAFAYETTE, INDIANA

March 5, 6, 7 and 8, 1951

T a b l e of C o n t e n t s
Attendance..•.••••...•.•.•...•..••••••..•••..•...I-XII
W e l c o m e to P u r d u e U n i v e r s i t y . . . . . . . . . . F . L . H o v d e

5

P r o b l e m s in T u r f T o d a y . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . F r e d V . G r a u

7

Turf Maintenance in W a r t i m e , .....

.0. J. Noer

12

R e c o r d s and L a b o r M a n a g e m e n t , . . . .

Don Strand

19

L a b o r M a n a g e m e n t on M y C o u r s e . . . . . . . . W . Ii. G l o v e r

22

Superintendents

1

Relations•.....,....Frank Dunlap

28

Roadsides and Airports...............H. B . Musser

33

Athletic Fields

M. E . F a r n h a m

IlO

Shade Tree Care

Carl Fenner

l\$

R e c o g n i z i n g a n d C o m b a t i n g D i s e a s e s . . . J* C . C a r t e r

If. 9

Tree Habitat....

.T. E . S h a w

56

Athletic Field Turf Management......M. E . Farnham

59

P l a n t F o o d S u p p l i e s for 1 9 5 1 .

6I4,

.A. H . B o w e r s

C h e m i c a l Outlook for Turf Fertilizers
.«...•...•.•...•..

J. L. Marzak

65

.....G-. E . L e h k e r

69

C o n t r o l of T u r f D i s e a s e s in M i c h i g a n . J . R . V a u g h n

72

The 1950 Turf Fungicide Trials....E. G . Sharvollè

75

PMAS on T e e s , My Experience.........M. M . Parsons
S u m m a r y of C h e m i c a l C o n t r o l M e a s u r e s f o r C r a b g r a s s
..........B. H . Grigsby

J8

T e s t i n g f o r B e t t e r G r a s s e s . . . . . . . . . . .Fred V . G r a u

81+

G o l f G r e e n s , G o o d and B a d . . . .

...R. H . Davis

85

Experiences with U~3 Bermuda.

.Al L i n k o g e l

87

Testing F a i r w a y Grasses..........t...,D. E . Likes

89

C h i o k w e e d C o n t r o l in L o u i s v i l l e . . . . . . . P a t R u s s e l l

91

I n s e c t s of Tutff.....

80

C h i c k w e e d and C l o v e r C o n t r o l on O u r F a i r w a y s at
L a n s i n g C o u n t r y C l u b . . • • . . • . . » • . . . • • • • . L e r o y Jones

92

Chemical Control, A Summary.............0. J. Noer

93

Breeding Turf Grasses.................H. B . Musser

99

C o m p i l e d C o u r t e s y of
WEST POINT LAWN PRODUCTS
West Point, Pa.

ATTENDANCE
MIDWEST REGIONAL TURF FOUNDATION CONFERENCE
March
¿fame
1.

Adams, George E .

2.

Allen, Joe

3.

Appleberry, Elbert

U.

Arcand, George J.

5.

Bailey, H. S.

6.

Baker, A . S.

7.

Becker, Richard

8.

Beckstrom, Carl

9.

Bell, C. A .

10. Bennett, Wayne F .
11. Benson, Arthur
12. Bertucci, Adolph
13. Bertucci, Elmor
1U. Bild, Peter
15. Bishop, Lester L.
16. Bockoski, Chester
17. Boone, Howard
18. Borchart, Gordon
19. Borgj Gus
20. Borgmeier, C. 0 .
21. Born, Willard
22. Bowden, G. L .

6, 7 and 8 , 1951
Address and Country Club or Company
R . 2«,1 Fulton Rd., E St., Canton, Ohio
Tarn 0 Shanter Country Club
50 Ferndale St., Cincinnati 15, Ohio
Cincinnati Municipal G C
lokh Buena Vesta Cir., Chicago Heights
Bloom Township High School
111.
2721 W . 38th Place, Chicago 32, 111.
Chicago Park District
2015 Colfax Street, Evanston, Illinois
George A . Davis, Inc.
2529 Catalpa Drive, Dayton, Ohio
Jacobson Mfg. Company
Wolworth, Wisconsin
Big Foot C C
R.l, Box 62 E , St. Charles, 111.
St. Charles C C
1508 High Street, Logansport, Indiana
Dickenyan
R . R . 6, Box 39, Kokomo, Indiana
Kokomo C C
Aurora, Illinois
Aurora C C
1825 S. Telegraph, Lake Forest, 111.
Lake Shore C C
3^5 Highwood Avenue, Highwood, 111.
Old Elm G C
Box 103, Lisle9 Illinois
Woodridge G C
R . R . 2, North Canton, Ohio
Edgewood G C
61*33 Broadway, Indianapolis 20, -4id.
Willow Brook G C
Cincinnati, Ohio
Hamilton County Park District
Camp Atterbury, Indiana
U . S. Army
Springfield, Illinois
Illini C C
1126 N . Grove Ave., Oak Park, 111.
George A . Davis Company
28U1 Consaul St., Toledo, Ohio
City of Toledo
Wilford, Ohio
Terrnra Park C C

23.

Bowman, Oscar W .

2k.

Bowers, A , H .

25.

Boyd, Taylor

26.

Boyer, Harry C .

27. Brandt, James W .
28.

Bretzlaff, Carl

29. Brinkworth, W . H .
30. Brown, Agar M .
31. Buckles, Clinton
32.

Budin, Danny

33. Buettner, Valentin
3h.

Burdette, Paul E .

35.

Bush, Edwin F .

36. Butler, Albert
37.

Butz, E . L .

CO

Cagle, J. C.

39.

Cahill, Jim

ho.

Canale, Joseph

hi.

Carter, J.C.

h2.

Cassier, E . W .

U3.

Chamberlin, Robert L .

uu.

Chamber, Ardy H .

U5.

Chaplin, R . C .
Chord, Edward K .

1*7. Clarke, William
U8.

Clauss, Walter L .

U9.

Coble, Clem

7 Algonquin Lane, Webster Grove 19, Mo.
Algonguin G C
Chicago, Illinois
Swift & Co., Plant Food Division
Box 21, Sta. M . , Cincinnati 27, 0 .
Camargo Club
Cincinnati, Ohio
Losantiville C C
101 E . 27th St., Indianapolis, Ind.
Indianapolis % n i . Golf Courses
R # 16, Box 6I4I, Indianapolis hh> ^nd.
Meridian Hills C C
Minneapolis, Minne sota
Toro Mfg. Company
St. 1 Charles, Illinois
!
N a t 1 Greenkeeping Supt. A s s n .
E . R . 2, Champaign, Illinois
University of Illinois
12805 Shaker Blvd., Cleveland, 0 .
Hawthorne Valley C C
20782 Murwood, Detroit 19, Mich.
Plum Hollow G C
Lombard, Illinois
Seed, Fertilizer & G C Supply
903 N . Jefferson St., Hartford City, Ind.
Blackford C C
R . 1, Michigan City, Indiana
Pottawattomie C C
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University, Dept. of Ag. Econ.
Indianapolis, Indiana
Speedway G C
Covington, Kentucky
Summit Hills
k22 E . Walnut St., Oglesby, 111.
Deer Park G C
Urbana, Illinois
State Natural History Survey Division
Box 1^22, Sycamore, Illinois
Sycamore G C
1169 S. Schuyler, Kankakee, 111.
Kankakee C C
736 S. Humphrey, Oak Park, Illinois
O'Hare Field, Park Ridge, Illinois
R . 2, LaGrange, Illinois
Edgewood Valley C C
lOltOO S . Christiana Ave., Chicago U3, •
Chicago Park District
111.
251*1 Prospect Avenue, Evanston, 111.
Northwestern G C
529 Marquette Ave., Peoria, 111.
Madison Park
New Augusta, Indiana
Broadmoor C C

50.

Coghill, John E .

51.

Cornwell, Ward

52.

Covai, Pete

53.

Dalman, George

5k.

Daniel, William H.

55-

Darrah, John

56.

Davis, Raymond C.

57.

Davis, R

58.

Dearie, Gerald M .

59.

Dettling, T. J.

60.

Didier, Ray

61

Dienhart, A . P.

62.

Dinelli, Frank J.

63.

Donat, J. Donald

6k.

Doud, Don A .

65.

Dowell, Earl

66.

Drachman, P. E .

67.

Dryfoos, Sidney L .

66.

Duehr, Edward J.

69.

Duguid, Robert

70.

Dunlap, Frank

71.

Dunn, Andrew C.

72.

Engelhardt, Peter

73.

Eichar, William G .

7k.

Eley, Ernest

75.

Enfi eld, Ge or ge

R.

Orland Park, Illinois
Silver i*ake G C
1358 Anita, Grosse Pointe 30, Mich.
Lochmoor Country Club
3158 N . Layman Ave, Indianapolis, Ind.
Country Club of Indianapolis
Lemont, Illinois
Coghill Country Club
Dept. of Agronomy, Lafayette, Ind.
Purdue University
R . 1, Matteson, 111.
Turf Development Co., Inc.
Medinah, Illinois
Medinah C C
Wooster, Ohio
Ohio Experiment Station
20U5 Pratt Blvd., Chicago, 111.
Edgewater G C
k3 E . Market St., Akron, Ohio
Dettling Brothers Seed Store
6780 Howard
Ave., Niles, 111.
1
Tam 0 Shanter C C
R . R . #10, Lafayette, Indiana
Elks C C
1302 Clavey Rd., Highland Park, 111.
Northmoor C C
R . D . 2, ^orth Canton, Ohio
Edgewood G C
3lj.02 Blvd. Place, Indianapolis, Ind.
Crown Hill Cemetery
lllil State St., Lafayette, Ind.
Lafayette C C
Evansville, Indiana
Evansville C C
3108 Mayfield Rd., Cleveland 18, Ohio
Oakwood Club
Midlothian, Illinois
Midlothian C C
Skokie, Illinois
Evanston G C
902 Caledonia, Cleveland 12, Ohio
The Country Club
389 N . Delaplaine, Riverside, Illinois
Catholic Ceineteries
Box 273, Worth, Illinois
Westgate Valley G C
30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York 20, il.Y.
American Cyanamid Company
Greenville, Ohio
Greenville C C
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University

76. Esterline, Walter
77. Fannin, Howard
78. Farnham, Marshall E .
79. Fenner, Carl
80. Ferguson, Ken
81. Ferreiro, Angelo
82. Fifield, E .
83. Fix, Harold ¥ .
81*. Fontaine, L . L .
85. Ford, 0. C.
86. Forste, Clifford
87. Foster, D . A .
88. Futerer, Jack
89. Gabriel, Sam. J.
90. Genovese, Vince
91.

Gerber, Raymond

92. Gilley, Angus
93. Gillie, David
9k.

Glissmann, Harold W .

95. Glover, W . H .
96. Gräffis, Joe
97. Grant, Gilmore
98. Grau, Fred V .
99»

Graves, Stan

100.

Green, D . C .

101. Greenwald, Taylor C .

R . I,. 5* Kuncie, Indiana
Delaware C C
Cleveland 21, Ohio
Mayfield C C
West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia C C
Lansing, Michigan
City Forester
Eau Claire, Michigan
Ferguson & Sons
1312 Cedar, Kent, Ohio
Twin Lakes C C
1236 Rutledge St., Gary, Indiana
Gary Parks
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University
Box 636, Cherokee Sta., Louisville 5,
Big Spring G C
Ky.
Fowler, Indiana
Cincinnati, Ohio
Losantiville C C
215 Stewart St., Rossville, H i .
Hubbard Trail C C
Solon, Ohio
Hawthorne Valley C C
Harlem Ave. & Lake Ave., River Forest,
Cook County Forest Preserve
111.
309 South 21st, Murphysboro, 111,
Jackson C C
Glen Ellyn, Illinois
Glen Oak C C
K . R . 6, Connersville, Indiana
Connersville C C
Fort Wayne, Indiana
Fort Wayne Park Dept.
Boys Town, Nebraska
1
Father Flanagan s Eoys
Fairfax, Virginia
Fairfax C C
b07 S. Dearborn St., Chicago 5, 111.
Golf dora
3265 Robin Rd., Louisville 13, Ky.
Audubon C C
Plant Industry Sta., Beltsville, Md.
U . S. G, A . Green Section
Clevelans, Ohio
Westwood C C
R.R. 1, Hoopeston, Illinois
Hubbard Trail C C
Wyoming, Ohio
Wyoming, G C

102. Griener, Clarence
103. Griesenauer, Gregory J
lOii. Grigsby, H . B.
105. Grotti, Dominic
106. Gruber, Calvin
107. Habenicht, Carl B .
108. Hall, F . R .
109. Hall, Ray
110. Hamblen, Floyd
111. HammerSchmidt, T. F .
112. Hannemann, H . R .
113. Hanson, Harry H.
lilt. Harasty, Louis
115. Hardy, Percy
116. Hasbargen, Harry II.
117. Harter, Charles E .
118. Hayes, Thomas V .
119. Helmbold, George
120. Herbstreit, Harold G.
121. Hewitt, Edwin
122. Hinz, Alvin
123. Hjort, Carl H .
I2ii. Hoover, James
125. Hosfeld 3 A .
126. Hoyt, Walter
127. Hovde, F. L .

k3 S. Delaware St., Indianapolis, Ind.
C. E . Griener Co,, Inc.
Room 330, Muni. Courts Bldg., St. Louis,
City of St. Louis
Mo.
East Lansing, Michigan
Michigan State College
Winnetka, Illinois
Sunset Ridge C C
Cincinnati, Ohio
Hamilton County Park District
Box 258, Tinley Park, Illinois
H & E Sod Nursery
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University
Pekin, Illinois
Pekin C C
Tipton, Indiana
Tipton G C
Lisle, Illinois
Woodridge G C
Menesha, Wisconsin
North Shore G C
R . 2, Benton, Illinois
Benton C C
Cleveland 22, Ohio
Canterbury Golf Club
River Grove, Illinois
Indian Boundry G C
2000 Coff Blvd, Kankakee, Illinois
Kankakee C C
Logansport, Indiana
Dykeman Park G C
Overland, Missouri
Meadow Brook C C
McArthur Ave., Dayton, Ohio
Madden G C
Cleves & Warsaw Pike, Cincinnati
0.
Western Hills C C
Cincinnati 31, Ohio
Hamilton County Park District
Church Rd., Bensenville, 111.
White Pines
Michigan City, Indiana
Long Beach C C
Pontiac, Luinois
Elks C C
813 N. Main St., Rockford, Illinois
Sinn'issippi G C
LaGrange, Illinois
Timber Trails C C
Lafayette, Indiana
Pres., Purdue University

128. Huber, Lawrence
129. Jackiewic z , J0 seph
130.

Jackson, Wallace

131. Janssen, Eimer
132.

Johnsen, John M .

133. Johnson, E . F .
13h.

Jones, Fred G.

135.

Jones, LeRoy

136. Jury, Ira W .
137. Kavanaugh, Marty
138. Kingsley, Duane G.
139. Kirchdorfer, Joe,Jr.
1U0. Klauke, Fred
IUI. Kramer, Francis J.
11*2. Kramer, Michael J.
11*3. Kramer, John F .
11*1*. Kramer, Norman W .
11*5. Kurek, William E .
11*6. Lamboley, H . T.
11*7. Lammert, Joseph F .
11*8. Lange, Henry
11*9. Lapp, Arnos
150. Lawson, Charles C .
151. Lawson, Jimmie S.
152. Lee, 0. C.
153. Leonard, Herman 0.

2605 Tremont Rd., Columbus, Ohio
Ohio State G C
5900 Leader Ave., Chicago, Illinois
Billy Caldwell G C
Rockford Park Dist., Rockford, ill.
Ingersoll G C
Rock Falls, 111.
Rock River C C
Chicago ^eights, 111.
Bloom Township High School
Winetka, Illinois
Indian Hill C C
6025 Guilford Ave., Indianapolis 20,
Sarah Shank G C
Ind.
190U W . Kt. Hope, Lansing, Michigan
Lansing C C
Rockford, Illinois
Forest Hills C C
Cincinnati 32, Ohio
Hamilton Park District
Box 3^2, Arlington ^eights, 111.
922 Baxter Ave., Louisville i|, Ky.
Dixie Lawn Supply Co.
Hillside, Illinois
The Catholic Cemeteries of Chicago
1008 Sherman, Evanston, 111.
Kramer & Co., Inc.
1008 Sherman, Evanston, 111.
Kramer oc Co., Inc.
1008 Sherman, Evanston, 111.
Kramer & Co., Inc.
1)47 St & 82 Ave., °rland Park, 111.
Silver Lake G C
U12 W . McClure, Peoria, ¿11.
Worthmoor G C
Fort Wayne, Indiana
Fort W a yne Park Board
Normandy 21, Missouri
Norwood Hills C C
Golf, Illinois
Glen View Club
Elgin, Illinois
St. Andrews C C
Rushville, Indiana
Elks C C
LaPorte, Indiana
Elks C C
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University
Bedford, Indiana
Otis Park

155. Likes, Don
156. Lindenschmidt, Robert L #

£CO

157. Linkogel, Albert
Longheinrich, Fred

159. Logan, Ralph G.
160. Lundblad, ^els
161. Lyle, Samuel
162. Lyons, Don
163. Lyons, William E .
16U. MacGregor, John
165. Malpede, William E .
166. Marchi, Gene
167. Marczinski, Lawrence
168. Marzak, J. L .
169. Mascaro, Tom
170. Maschmidt, Fred W .
171. Mashie, Emil
172. McCoy, John S.
173. HcDermott, Joseph
nh.

McLaren, Malcolm

175. McMullen, Malcolm H .
176. McNabb, Dean E ,
177. Meetz, Ted
178. Mendenhall, Chester
179. Mendenhall, Marion
180. Meyer, Frederick G.

Cincinnati 8, Ohio
Hyde Park C C
1513 Dana Ave., Cincinnati, Ohio
Hartwell Club
R . 1, Conway Fed., Clayton 5 , Mo.
Westwood C C
R . 6, Sappington 23, Missouri
Sunset C C
53 S. Perry St., Hagerstovn, m d .
Hartley Kills C C
Wheaton, Illinois
Chicago G C
Normandy 21, Missouri
Glen Echo C C
Brook, Indiana
Hazeldon C C
1200 Firestone Parkway, Akron 17, 0.
Firestone Tire & Rubber Co.
Chicago, Illinois
Chicago Fence & Equipment Co.
R . R , 1, McHenry, Illinois
Pistakee G C
Dayton, Ohio
Miami Valley G C
Arlington Heights, Illinois
Rolling Green C C
St. Louis, Missouri
Mallenckrodt Chemical Co.
West Point, Pennsylvania
West Point Lawn Products
St. Louis lit, Mo.
Normandie G C
Lake Forest, Illinois
Onwentsia C C
Cincinnati 8, Ohio
Cincinnati C C
Louisville, Kentucky
Seneca G C
Cleveland 21, Ohio
Oakwood C C
Columbus, Indiana
Harrison Lake C C
Wilmington, Delaware
Du Pont Company
Michigan City, Indiana
Michigan City G C
5301 State Line, Kansas City 2, Mo.
Mission Hills C C
Sta. M , Madisonville P.O., Cincinnati 27
Kenwood C C
Ohio
Clifton, New Jersey
0. E . Linde Company

181. Michaud, H. 11.
182. Miller, Charles E .
183. Miller, Congress
181*. Miller, Robert
185. Mitchell, Vertus
186. Midlin, Frank J.
18?. Monier, C. F .
188. Mueller, H . W . , Jr.
189 o Musser, H . B .
190. Muzik, E . J„
191. Needham, A . A .
192. Newkirk, Edward
193. Newton, W . Creighton
19U. Noer, 0. J .
195. Nuessle, Fred
196. Nugent, W . C.
197. Oyer, E . B .
198. Parsons, M . M., Sr.
199. Payne, Kenyon T.
200. Peck, Harold
201. Peck, Roy
202. Pelcher, Fred
203. Petersen, C, A .
201*. Peterson, J. B.
205. Phillips, Raymond
206. Pieper, Walter

Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University
Carmel, Indiana
W . H. Diddel
Pekin, Illinois
Park View G C
Fort Wayne, Indiana
Fort Wayne Park Board
West Frankfort, 111.
Franklin Country Club
Toledo, Ohio
Bayview G C
Charleston, Illinois
Eastern 111. State College
Box 217, Montgomery, Ohio
Gate of Heaven Cemetery
State College, Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania ^tate College
31*12 Harlem, Riverside, Illinois
Armour Fertilizer Division
2500 Oxford Street, Rockford, 111.
Rockford C C
3235 Sutherland, Indianapolis, Ind.
Coffin G C
6623 Estele Ave., Louisville, Ky.
Swift & Company, Plant Foods Div.
P. 0. Box 2079, Milwaukee, Wise.
Sewerage Commission
Flossmoor, Illinois
Flossmoor C C
Brook, Indiana
Hazelden C C
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University
Indianapolis, Indiana
Highland G Sr. C C
Lafayette,
Indiana
u
Purdue niversity
Battle C r eok, Michigan
Battle Creek C C
Kalamazoo, Michigan
Kalamazoo C C
Burnham, Illinois
Burnham Woods G C
7059 S. Shore Drive, Chicago, 111.
South Shore C C
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University, Agron. Dept. Head
Louisville 6, Kentucky
Louisville C C
Maiteson, Illinois
Flossmoor C C

207. Plein, Clarence
208. Polillo, George
209. Quarandillo, Louis
210. Ragan, Walter
211. Ray, Robert C.
212. Reat, William A.
213. Reed, H. E .
21U. Rees, James D., Jr.
215. Reynolds, A . J.
216. Reynolds, George II.
217. Riley, William F.
218. Riddle, James B.
219. Roach, W . J.
220. Roby, Lewis
221. Rohmann, Carl A .
222. Roseman, Warren J.
223-

Rosset, Gabriel

22ii. Rost, Bert
225. Rowe, D. A .
226. Runyan, C. R .
227. Russell, George P.
228. Ryan, John
229. Sartoretto, Paul
230. Schacht, Robert
231. Schmatzmeyer, August E.
232. Schneider, E .

8901 Page, Overland, Mo.
Lakeside G C
Galesburg, Illinois
Soagetaha C C
Logansport, Indiana
Logansport C C
West Big Bend Rd., Kirkwood, Mo*
Green Brior Hills C C
Michigan City, Indiana
Michigan City G C
Charleston, Illinois
Charleston C C
6601 W . Gunnison, Chicago 31, H I .
Ridgemoor C C
1*701 N . Keystone Ave., Indianapolis,
Willowbrook G C, Inc.
Indiana
Dayton, Ohio
Miami Valley G C
Dayton Ohio
City of Dayton
2121 Madison Ave., Indianapolis, Ind.
Riley Lawn & Golf Equipment
Columbus 15, Ohio
State of Ohio, Dept. of Highways
Cincinnati 15, Ohio
Wyoming G C
Anderson, Indiana
Edgewood C C
1000 Mile Rd., Greenhills 18, Ohio
Hamilton County Park District
2610 Ridge Road, Evanston, 111.
Sunset Ridge Rd., North Brook, ill.
Green Acres C C
Park Ridge, Illinois
Park Ridge C C
601 W . Jackson Blvd., Chicago, 111.
Vaughan's Seed Company
Sta. W . , Cincinnati 32, Ohio
Cemetery of Spring Grove
Louisville, 'Kentucky
Big Spring G C
Columbiana, Ohio
Valley G C
l$9h Met. iive., New York 62, -.X.
W . A . Cleary Corporation
Terre Haute, Indiana
Country Club of Terre Haute
Normandy, Mo.
Bellerive C C
Stringtown Rd., Evansville, Ind.
Evansville C C

233. Schneider, R. J.
23h*

Schroeder, Clarence J,

235. Schultz, W . J.
236. Seaney, William L.
237. Sellers, Everett
238. Sharvelle, Eric
239. Shaw, T. E .
2k0.

Shock, Earl

2l|l. Shryack, Lawson G.
2k2.

Simmons, Howard E-

2U3. Simon, E . J.
2hh*

Skinner, John R .

216.

Smith, Colin

2i*6. Smith, William
2kl.

Smith, William R .

2]|8. Snyder, D. E .
2h9.

Sopko, Mike

250. Soutar, Jim
251. Sprenger, Fred
252. Stafford, Dwight E .
253-

Stampfl, John J.

25k»

Staten, Earl

255. Staudt, Albert J.
256. Stewart, Edward N .
257. Stewart, Peter
258. Stitz, Adrian P.

1725 S. Washington, Peoria, 111.
L. R. Nelson Mfg. Co.
R. 1, Meenah, Wisconsin
Graybrook Lane, New Albany, Ind.
New Albany C C
809 Fairview Ave., Crawfordsville, Ind.
Swift & Co.
Glenview, Illinois
North Shore C C
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University
Lafaye tte, Indiana
Purdue University
Dayton, Ohio
Community C C
Macomb, Illinois
Western 111. State College
Cleveland 22, Ohio
Highland Park G C
Rockford, Illinois
Rockford Park District
6929 Carnegie, Cleveland, Ohio
Jacobsen Power Lawn ^ower Company
19512 Kings Highway, Warrensville
Heights 22, Ohio
Shaker Heights C C
Box 1109, Royal Oak, Michigan
Red Run G C
1127 Miller Ave., Oak Park, 111,
George A . Davis, Inc.
910 S. Mich. Ave., Chicago, 111.
Standard Oil Company
29007 Euclid Ave., Wickliffe, Ohio
Pineridge C C
Bloomington, Indiana
National Greenkeepers
709 Bigelow St., Peoria, Illinois
Peoria Park Board
376 N. Holmes Ave., Indianapolis 22,
South Grove G C
Ind.
810 N . Rangeline Rd., Milwaukee 9,
Milwaukee C C
Wise.
Lafayette, Indiana
Purdue University
20i£ W . Pratt Ave., Chicago 1|5, 111.
Edgewater G C
R . R . 2, LaGrange, Illinois
Acacia C C
Hinsdale, Illinois
Butterfield C C
R. R . #1, Canton, °hio
Shady Hollow C C

259.

Strand, Donald G.

2.60.

Strauss, Robert J.

261.

Stupple, William H.

262.

Sylvester, E . J.

263. Tait, Dave
26U. Teuber, Robert
265. Thalheimer, Wilfred
266. Thode, Reuben, H.
26?. Thompson, Jack
268. Uebele, Herman
269. Updegraff, W . E .
270. Urzzlinski, Frank
271. Valandingham, Robert L.
272. Valandingham, Rube
273. Vaughn, J. H.
27U. Vaughn, J. R .
275. Verhaalen, Lester
276. Vial, R . G.
277. 'Warren, 3. 0.
278. Weitzel, Cpl. James E .
279. Wells, R. Lee
280. Wessel, Arnold
281. Wheeler, J. A.
282. Whitcomb, James E .
283. White, LeRoy H .
28U. White, Maurice

U5U0 Harrison St., Skokie, 111.
Westmoreland C C
Cincinnati, Ohio
Public Recreation Commission
Highland Park, Illinois
Exmoor C C
Box 133, R . R . 2, Piqua, Ohio
City -of Piqua
Paris, Illinois
Elks C C
756 Elizabeth St., Flint h, Michigan
Flint G C
k05 Western Ave., Batesville, Indiana
Hillcrest G & CC
Chicago, Illinois
Chicago Park District
R. 2, Tippecanoe Rd., Canfield, 0.
Tippecanoe C C
1708 Michigan Ave., LaPorte, Ind.
Beechwood G C
1022 N . Roosevelt, Wichita, Kansas
Wichita C C
Toledo, Ohio
City of Toledo
Hammond, Indiana
Woodmar C C
Hammond, Indiana
Woodmar C C
1016 Parker Ave., Indianapolis, Ind.
Riverside G C
East Lansing, Michigan
Michigan State College
6800 W . Good Hope Rd., Milwaukee 9,
Brynwood C C
Wise.
Rt. 2, LaGrange, Illinois
Timber Trails G C
Palos Park, Illinois
Warren Turf Nursery
Camp Atterbury, Indiana
U . S. Army
6729 Lovett Ave., Dallas, Texas
Worthington Mower Company
R . 2, Thiensville, Wisconsin
Ozaukee C C
$$6k Bartmer, St. Louis 12, Mo.
Lakeside G C
R . R . 15, Box 7h3, Indianapolis, Ind.
Riverside G C
33k B Street, Charleston, Illinois
Charleston C C
1906 Indiana Ave., Peoria, Illinois
C C of Peoria

285. Whittle, J- D .
286. Wingo, Wilbur
287. Woehrle, Herman
288. Wolfe, Larry
289. Wolfrom, Clarence
2900

Wood, Howard T.

291. Wright, Alph
292. Wright, Leland
293. Wyman, Allan
29U. Wymer, Ralph R., Jr.
295. Yanaway, John F .
296. Young, 0. W .
297.

Zeliner, Charles F.

East River lid., Batavia, Illinois
Fox Valley C C
Macomb, Illinois
Macomb C C
R . 3> St. Anne, Illinois
Hieland Lodge G & C C
R . D . 7, Akron, Ohio
Rosemont C C
II3I1I Chicago Rd., Warren, Mich.
Maple Lane G C
Indianapolis, Indiana
Crown Hill Cemetery
R. R.
Sharonville, Ohio
Hamilton County Park District
New Castle, Indiana
Westwood C C
R . R . 2, Danville, Illinois
Danville C C
123rd & Bell Rd., Lemont, Illinois
Glen Eagles C C
Charleston, Illinois
Landscaping
[¿075 Southern Blvd., Dayton, Ohio
Moraine C C
Cincinnati 25, Ohio
California G C
1

WELCOME TO PURDUE U N I V E R S I T Y
F . Lo Hovde
It's always nice to have one of your staff
introduce
y o u because they m u s t say nice things about y o u . I
would first like to express to a l l of y o u who are members of the Midwest R e g i o n a l Turf Conference the appreciation of the University and staff members of this
F o u n d a t i o n for the support y o u give generously to our
program of research investigation in the area of
grasses and better turfs. I, like most other a m a t e u r s ,
am keenly interested in t u r f , and as President of the
U n i v e r s i t y , am m o r e than normally interested because I
see in the investigations the patient attack upon the
problem of understanding w h a t goes on in the life
growing out of our s o i l s .
I am particularly interested in the pasture
improvem e n t p r o g r a m . For Indiana this m a y m e a n increased
wealth«
Increased w e a l t h means increased l e i s u r e . Increased leisure m e a n s a need for m o r e and better rec r e a t i o n a l f a c i l i t i e s , and particularly thoáe of the
kind a l l of y o u are interested i n . We appreciate the
cooperation that exists between an o r g a n i z a t i o n such
as yours and the U n i v e r s i t y . People out on the a c t u a l
working site in a l l the professions are inclined to
look d o w n their noses at the professors in the i v o r y
tower of the U n i v e r s i t y , y o u know what I mean«, But I
t h i n k from your meetings h e r e , y o u have
probably
arrived at a better understanding of the role of the
university scientist, of the w a y he attacks his problems; and certainly in your own p r o f e s s i o n a l ;ork y o u
do things now as a result of investigación not only
h e r e , but in m a n y other of our American
experiment
stations.
I have m y interest in your problems because of m y position at the University5 but w h e n I'm off d u t y , I
also have a keen interest
in the quality of the golf
f
g r e e n . I suppose I m like a l l other g o l f e r s . I've
probably cussed the greenkeeper just as m u c h as anybody e l s e , yet I've never done m u c h to help the poor
g u y . In some r e s p e c t s , being the university president
is similar to those of whom are responsible for golf
g r e e n s — y o u get a l l the h e l l and none of the
compliments o
We at the university are genuinely g r a t e f u l for the
o p p o r t u n i t y to w o r k w i t h y o u because I think m y staff
in every department of the university learns by being

in touch w i t h those who are out doing t h i n g s . This
university certainly is not an ivory t o w e r . There is
not a single department in this university in which
investigations are going on that w i l l not produce
something that sooner or later w i l l not be u s e f u l . D r .
O p p e n h e i m e r 9 the man. who directed the scientific staff
that produced the atomic b o m b , one of the
greatest
scientific jobs that's ever been d o n e , once said,
"Sooner or later a l l knowledge becomes useful".*
One of the problems of those of us engaged in investigation and research is to interpret i t , put it in form
for t r i a l and use by people who can try it and use i t .
And I think through the m e d i u m of these conferences w e
have the m e c h a n i s m by-which there is a rapid
transition from the laboratories of the university into the
hands of those who h a v e the r e s p o n s i b i l i t y for doing
the job where it i s , regardless of where it i s . And
so in a sense, y o u help us in a very concrete wnd
p r a c t i c a l w a y . I think w i t h o u t these conferences there
would be a much greater lag between the transformation
of knowledge from the experimental groups into use
than we h a v e .
It is a w o n d e r f u l situation w h e n y o u have support of
the people who w a n t to use and try new m e t h o d s of doing t h i n g s . This is one of the great things about our
c o u n t r y . E v e r y b o d y with any get-up and . gumption and
go has access to information e v e r y w h e r e , and a l l he
has to do is get i t , try it and use i t . Nobody is going to stop h i m unless it be the limitations of the
operating budget of your particular organization and
even that won't stop a resourceful and ingenious m a n .
Prom this point of v i e w , those of y o u who are citizens
of the m i d w e s t area and receive some benefit from coming here m a y know that your universities are vitally
concerned w i t h improving every aspect of our economic
and social l i f e , and I think there is not a single aspect even in our country that cannot be improved if w e
w i l l put our m i n d s , our best b r a i n s , our ability to
organize and our get-up and go into i t . I think this
is also the f u n d a m e n t a l w h i c h w i l l enable us to meet
the problems the nation faces in the f u t u r e . As far
as I have been able to d e t e r m i n e , there is not another
nation that has this requisite of intellectual and
economic freedom to go ahead w i t h the attack on probl e m s , not under orders from s o m e b o d y , but under
the
compulsion of individuals wanting to do a better job
as each day goes b y .
We're a h e a l t h y , friendly team here at the u n i v e r s i t y ,

and aside from teaching and research and s u c h , we do
enjoy working w i t h y o u who come here for a short period of t i m e — to b e , shall we s a y , students once again
on a university c a m p u s . Thank y o u v e r y m u c h , and I
hope y o u have a grand time at your c o n f e r e n c e .
- o P R O B L E M S IN TURF T O D A Y
Fred V . Grau
I think we are v e r y fortunate that the president of
Purdue University addressed us today»
These are in a
w a y breathless t i m e s . I was accused r e c e n t l y of conducting a rather breathless program in the Green Section
These turf conferences.are practically continuous now from November through March and then field
days start again in M a y .
This highlights and emphasizes one of the great problems in turf t o d a y . And that i s , everything is subservient to the m a n , to the individual• The m a n is the
uppermost thing in a l l m i n d s whenever we're dealing
with anything in our particular f i e l d .
T h B r e w e r e golf courses and playing fields
before
there was any research«. We're doing a better job tod a y , we're doing it m o r e easily with better
things,
better m a c h i n e s , better grasses and better
methods
thanks to the research and extension that has been
d o n e . But we still m u s t keep in mind that the m a n is
the important t h i n g . We m u s t recognize that y o u are
h e r e because y o u want to improve your m i n d , improve
yourself for the job at h a n d .
W h a t we need today is better training at various
l e v e l s . As the national coordinating agency in t u r f ,
we have stressed training at the highest l e v e l , and
that is at the graduate l e v e l . You know that we have
been solidly behind a program of developing funds so
that we could set up graduate f e l l o w s h i p s . W e . have
set them up at Penn S t a t e , at T i f t o n , G e o r g i a , at Purdue and at M i c h i g a n . D r . B i l l D a n i e l , of c o u r s e , is a
product of one of those f e l l o w s h i p s , joint between the
Green S e c t i o n , the Midwest R e g i o n a l Turf F o u n d a t i o n
and the Detroit District Golf A s s o c i a t i o n . That is
the l e v e l that we have been stressing because we realize that in order to develop training at the other

l e v e l s , f i r s t y o u have to h a v e your top l e v e l men«
T h e y h a v e to be in the p i c t u r e to do your t r a i n i n g of
other g r o u p s . T h e r e is a t r e m e n d o u s need for
college
t r a i n e d m e n , college g r a d u a t e s , in this field of turf
b e c a u s e , as we h a v e p o i n t e d out b e f o r e , t u r f is big
b u s i n e s s . It is t r e m e n d o u s w h e n y o u b e g i n to
review
it in the aggregate and find o u t w h a t is i n c l u d e d .
Golf courses and golf turf are o n l y a s m a l l part of
the t o t a l , a h i g h l y i m p o r t a n t part b e c a u s e the m e n int e r e s t e d and c o n c e r n e d w i t h golf turf h a v e led the
way°5 t h e y h a v e t a k e n the r o c k y r o a d , have smoothed it
o u t , improved i t , and t o d a y it is far easier for
turf
m e n to get the e d u c a t i o n , the t r a i n i n g that is needed
to h e l p t h e m .
W e n e e d , in a d d i t i o n to the top l e v e l t r a i n i n g of the
g r a d u a t e s t u d e n t , c o l l e g e g r a d u a t e s w h o w i l l devote
t h e m s e l v e s to the h i g h l y i m p o r t a n t job of doing pract i c a l w o r k . T h e n , we need some sort of a training
system for the i n - b e t w e e n , for the p r a c t i c a l m a n , w h o
has not had a c h a n c e to go to c o l l e g e . He should receive from h e r e on a g r e a t d e a l of a t t e n t i o n . A conf e r e n c e like this is! e x t r e m e l y v a l u a b l e as a r e f r e s h e r
but it s t i l l d o e s n t do the big job of e d u c a t i o n that
needs to be d o n e .
T a l k i n g about the challenge t h a t exists in t u r f , I am
quite sure that m a n y of y o u are in the p o s i t i o n in
w h i c h y o u find y o u r s e l f by r e a s o n of your love for
turfo
You p r o b a b l y could go out and g e t m o r e m o n e y at
other j o b s , but the w o r k y o u are doing p r e s e! n t s
a
c h a l l e n g e to y o u that y o u m u s t m e e t and y o u c a n t t u r n
it d o w n . T h a t challenge is encouraging some of your
sons to enter into the w o r k .
1

W e r e c o n t i n u a l l y broadening the h o r i z o n , b r o a d e n i n g
the o p p o r t u n i t i e s for young m e n in the f i e l d of t u r f .
T h e r e are o! p p o r t u n i t i e s t o d a y in the field of
turf
that d i d n t exist t e n or f i f t e e n years a g o . P r o b a b l y
o n e of the g r e a t e s t t h i n g s that has h a p p e n e d in the
f i e l d of turf has been the o f f i c i a l r e c o g n i t i o n by the
A m e r i c a n S o c i e t y of A g r o n o m y — setting up two
turf
sections w h i c h are an i n t e g r a l part of the affairs of
the A m e r i c a n Society of Agronomy<> T u r f is a g r i c u l t u r e .
T h a t is h o w w e sold it to a l l of the a d m i n i s t r a t o r s of
the e x p e r i m e n t stations and c o l l e g e s in the
country.
And that one thing has m a d e it easier for us to gain
the c o o p e r a t i o n of the e x p e r i m e n t s t a t i o n s . R e s e a r c h
has c o m e a long w a y since w e started 3 0 years a g o . 0 n
F e b r u a r y 1 0 t h , just a m o n t h p a s t , the G r e e n Section
attained its t h i r t i e t h b i r t h d a y .

1

Last year we published "Turf Research Review' , 1950
i s s u e , the first o n e , listing the w o r k e r s , the proj e c t s , some of the financing and some of the publications of turf all over the United S t a t e s . The
second
i s s u e , the 1 9 5 1 i s s u e , is almost r e a d y for the printe r . W e had w o n d e r f u l cooperation from some 27 experim e n t stations w h i c h includes A l a s k a . In 19*+0, just 10
years a g o , there w e r e less than 12 workers in turf research in the United S t a t e s . In 1950 there w e r e over
76 workers spending all or part time on turf !r e s e a r c h .
W e t h i n k that is a remarkable number and i t s one of
the reasons w h y y o u have better things today for turfbetter i n s e c t i c i d e s , better f u n g i c i d e s , better
weed
k i l l e r s , better m a c h i n e r y , better grasses and better
m e t h o d s . A l l in a l l , there are 1 6 1 specific turf projects in progress at 2 1 experiment s t a t i o n s .
S e v e r a l hundred turf publications have been w r i t t e n
and1 m o s t of y o u m a y have a few in your l i b r a r y . What
w e r e trying to do is o r g a n i z e , coordinate and docum e n t a l l that information w h i c h is scattered in these
hundreds of publications and bring it together into a
condensed v e r s i o n for y o u . That was attempted in this
book Turf Management w h i c h the United States Golf
A s s o c i a t i o n s u p p o r t e d . Burt Musser was the editor with
h e £ p from 0 . J . N o e r , M a r s h a l l F a r n h a m , Herb Graffis
and o t h e r s .
S o m e of the recent outstanding
results in turf recent1
ly have been Richard D a v i s thesis on p h y s i c a l characteristics of putting green s o i l s , B i l l Daniel's
f a i r w a y s t u d i e s , Jim W a t s o n ' s irrigation and compaction s t u d i e s , B o b H a g e n , D a v i s , C a l i f o r n i a , summary of
irrigation practices as it applies to t u r f , and Ferguson's nutrition studies of Z - 5 2 Z o y s i a . Seven m e n received advanced degrees in turf in 1 9 5 0 , and so m u c h
of this has been accomplished on a shoe s t r i n g . The
finances to operate the turf research program have
been v e r y meager as m o s t of y o u k n o w . But more people
and firms are becoming so deeply interested that it is
no longer a r e a l problem to finance a w o r t h while project, We h a v e been r e m a r k a b l y w e l l pleased by the dev e l o p m e n t of our Green Section's service
subscrip-'.
t i o n s . F o r m e r l y we were faced with a complete lack of
funds to support cooperative research and the developm e n t of G r e e n Section's service subscriptions
among
Industry and organizations has provided funds w h i c h
have been the backbone of cooperative turf r e s e a r c h .
Now just a listing of a few of the problems that are
being attacked a l l over the c o u n t r y . There are seven
stations working on c o o l - s e a s o n , w a r m - s e a s o n
grass

c o m b i n a t i o n s . There are four aerification
projects,
probably m o r e . There are quite a number continuing
height of cut experiments w h i c h are so v i t a l l y important because as new grasses are d e v e l o p e d , it is important to learn to which uses and to w h i c h heights of
cut are these grasses a d a p t e d . There are 16 different
studies on the nutrition of turf g r a s s e s . Now we are
bringing a lot of that nutrition w o r k into the laboratory w h e r e w e can get at it m o r e s c i e n t i f i c a l l y . There
are dates and time of fertilization w i t h relation to
w e e d s 9 poa a n n u a , best u s e . W e need m u c h m o r e
work,
basic r e s e a r c h , on the difference in feeding v a l u e of
the c o n v e n t i o n a l types of f e r t i l i z e r s , the organic and
the inorganic nitrogen carriers and the so-called liquid f e r t i l i z e r s . To d a t e , there has been no data subm i t t e d on the proper use or the use of the
so-called
liquid f e r t i l i z e r s . There have been in the past quite
a few lime and compost s t u d i e s , and they are
being
c o n t i n u e d . A few years ago we would not have been able
to list a single water m a n a g e m e n t study because it was
so difficult to c o n d u c t . It required so m u c h p l a n n i n g ,
preparation and d e t a i l that nobody tackled i t . Today
at least 3 water m a n a g e m e n t studies are contributing
to our k n o w l e d g e . At least six different stations are
working on p h y s i c a l soil c o n d i t i o n s . There are 62
separate
studies on grasses being c o n d u c t e d — w e l l ,
!
t h a t s the backbone of turf work«
Musser's w o r k at itenn State w i t h the bents and the
fescues and the recent information on the high quality
of turf produced by the F - 7 ^ and sister fescues
is
v e r y o u t s t a n d i n g . Burton*s w o r k with B e r m u d a , Centipede and Dallisgrass breeding program at T i f t o n ,
G e o r g i a , is one of the outstanding things that has
been done for S o u t h e r n t u r f . Other projects are the
bentgrass breeding here at P u r d u e , as w e l l as tall
fescue studies in K e n t u c k y and O r e g o n . Others include
freezing resistance studies of Zoysia japónica and
Z o y s i a m a t r e l l a seedlings here at Indiana and the
breeding of Zoysias at B e l t s v i l l e , I w i s h y o u could
see the literally acres of Z o y s i a seedlings there
at
Beltsville that are developing under various
condit i o n s . The bermudas and the Zoysias moving north and
the cool-season grasses moving south has been quite
r e m a r k a b l e . Probably one of the outstanding things in
the whole research picture has been the development of
Merion B-27 b l u e g r a s s .
There are 18 different weed c o n t r o l studies in 13 different states. The thing we are working on right now
is the possibility of national coordinated
crabgrass
t r i a l s , taking the outstanding chemicals and putting

them out at different stations under absolutely
uniform conditions of rate and m e t h o d of application and
evaluating r e s u l t s .
Today insect problems in turf are practically nonexistent if y o u use the available i n f o r m a t i o n . I've heard
people say t h i s — "What are your insect problems?"
"Well, we have n o n e . We use Chlordane." I m e a n words
like t h a t .
The disease c o n t r o l studies have m a d e
considerable
progress since the days of Monteith w h e n he m a d e an
everlasting name for himself in the field of disease
c o n t r o l in t u r f . The price of Mercury has jumped
practically out of s i g h t . W h a t the situation is going
to be on some of these other 5 m a t e r i a l s , I don't
know
but let's look for rough times a h e a d . Most of y o u
have seen or reported yellow-tufts on g r e e n s , especially in the f a l l . W e have found references in South
A f r i c a , Australia and E n g l a n d that the cause of these
y e l l o w tufts was n e m a t o d e s , and w o r k thatvwe have been
doing at Beltsville confirms t h i s . W e have not yet
w o r k e d out a c o n t r o l for i t , but it's interesting to
know that w e have the a s s o c i a t i o n .
A great m a n y of us today are not using the information
that is already a v a i l a b l e . If w e didn't do any m o r e
r e s e a r c h for another ten years but had a core of
trained extension m e n to go out and <*o a bang-up
job
of e x t e n s i o n , we'd be w a y ahead because there is just
a tremendous amount of undeveloped information that is
available to y o u , to u s , that we're not utilizing because we have not been able to set up the -extension
phase of the turf p r o g r a m B
E x t e n s i o n — we need it
w o r s e than we need anything e l s e . It's a s l o w , l o n g ,
d r a w n - o u t , u p h i l l b a t t l e . The big problem is m a n power and probably if we had had the extension program on
as strong a basis as m a n y other phases of a g r i c u l t u r e ,
we w o u l d not have some of the problems that are with
us today because in-the first p l a c e , those -problems
would have been brought b a c k into the college s o o n e r ,
t h e y would have been brought to the attention of the
research people s o o n e r , and something would have been
done about them,;
I w a n t to close w i t h the thought that it's about time
that w e got our heads together a little bit better and
know h o w to ask for the things that w e need because we
are entitled to t h e m . The Penn State program developed the w a y it did because the people learned early
that the squeaking w h e e l gets the g r e a s e . T h e y learned
h o w to ask for w h a t they wanted; and today whenever

t h e r e is a turf c o n f e r e n c e p r o g r a m on the c a m p u s
at
P e n n S t a t e , the l e a d e r s of the turf a d v i s o r y c o m m i t t e e
sit d o w n and v i s i t w i t h the t o p l e v e l a d m i n i s t r a t i v e
o f f i c e r s of the u n i v e r s i t y and t e l l t h e m h o w m u c h t h e y
a p p r e c i a t e w h a t has b e e n done and t h e n s u g g e s t
that
t h e y need this also»
A n d since t h e y ' v e l e a r n e d h o w to
a s k for i t , t h e y g e t i t . A l w a y s r e m e m b e r that t h e m a n
is above e v e r y t h i n g , and w e m u s t t r a i n t h e m i n d to do
a better j o b ,
- o TURF M A I N T E N A N C E IN W A R T I M E
0* J . Noer
T h i s s u b j e c t was a s s i g n e d , not c h o s e n . I p r e s u m e
the
t i t l e should be e m e r g e n c y m a i n t e n a n c e , r a t h e r t h a n
w a r t i m e m a i n t e n a n c e . At t h e s t a r t of W o r l d W a r '.II
m a n y r e m a r k s w e r e m a d e a b o u t w h a t w a s going to b e f a l l
t h e turf o n golf c o u r s e s . B y and l a r g e , t h e c o u r s e s
c a m e t h r o u g h in s u r p r i s i n g l y good shape w h i c h I bel i e v e is a t r i b u t e to the golf c o u r s e
superintendent.
It seems to m e t h a t labor s c a r c i t y w i l l be i n e v i t a b l e
this y e a r . T h o s e of y o u w h o u s e d c o l l e g e m e n
during
t h e summer are p r o b a b l y going to h a v e d i f f i c u l t y gett i n g t h e m b e c a u s e m o s t of t h e m w i l l be at the b e c k and
c a l l of Uncle S a m . S o m e of y o u m a y h a v e to t u r n to
h i g h s c h o o l b o y s , p r o v i d e d l o c a l state laws
permit
t h e m to w o r k . F a c e d w i t h this labor s c a r c i t y , y o u are
going to e m p h a s i z e m e c h a n i z a t i o n m o r e t h a n ever b e f o r e
if y o u h a v e n ' t d o n e so up to n o w .
So far as s u p p l i e s are c o n c e r n e d , some w i l l be critic a l . I n o t i c e t h a t f e r t i l i z e r s and c h e m i c a l s
are to
be d e a l t w i t h l a t e r . W e , for e x a m p l e , did not g e t any
e m p t y f r e i g h t cars w h i l e the r a i l r o a d m e n w e r e o u t o n
strike. Since they resumed work we have been
getting
one to t h r e e cars a d a y . I u n d e r s t a n d t h a t o t h e r s are
in a b o u t the same b o a t . And so it isn't always a
m a t t e r of h a v i n g the m a t e r i a l to ship but h a v i n g
a
m o d e of t r a n s p o r t f r o m t h e p l a n t to y o u . It l o o k s as
t h o u g h bags are going to be in c r i t i c a l s u p p l y ; howe v e r , as far as we are c o n c e r n e d , t h e y a r e n ' t going to
be c r i t i c a l unless w e get m o r e cars to l o a d . T h e fert i l i z e r p i c t u r e , b r i e f l y , looks as t h o u g h it is dep e n d e n t on s u l p h u r . So far as t h e c h e m i c a l f e r t i l i z e r
is c o n c e r n e d , it is the s u p e r - p h o s p h a t e s u p p l y that is
g o i n g to be c r i t i c a l , not b e c a u s e there i s n ' t enough
p h o s p h a t e but b e c a u s e t h e r e i s n ' t e n o u g h
sulfuric
a c i d . T h ^ r e is a fair s u p p l y of n i t r o g e n , but y o u

probably aren't going to be able to buy ammonium sulphate and nitrate of soda all the time because m a n y of
the manufacturers are going to utilize their supplies
to m a k e m i x e d fertilizers w h i c h is quite understanda b l e . In the fungicide picture I'm told that
there
should be enough cadmium compounds for this y e a r . With
some of the other materials it is a matter of sulphur
and c h l o r i n e . O n l y a few weeks ago Calo-Clor
was
priced at $2.25 and has now advanced to nearly $ 6 . 0 0 .
High price m a y have some effect upon supply and dem a n d . With the newer i n s e c t i c i d e s , again chlorine is
a problem and b e n z o l is also c r i t i c a l . I t h i n k that
those of y o u who are going to need fungicides and insecticides should m a k e provision to get o n l y w h a t y o u
need in order not to make a bad situation w o r s e . If
y o u need m a c h i n e r y , I understand that there is some
m a c h i n e r y a r o u n d , y o u , had better get your requirements.
The question is r a i s e d — "What is the thing w e can do
to simplify our m a i n t e n a n c e and take care of our golf
course with less h e l p , etc.?" When it comes to fairways the first thing that I hear mentioned is that we
can stop w a t e r i n g . T h a t , of c o u r s e , w i l l m e a n a saving
of labor. W h e r e fairways have been watered
rather
h e a v i l y in the past and m o s t of the turf is either poa
annua or creeping b e n t g r a s s , I shudder to t h i n k of
w h a t m i g h t happen if y o u suddenly stop watering
and
let nature take its c o u r s e . I think that the fairways
are going to be w o r s e before they get better again as
a result of doing t h a t . It seems to m e that the wiser
plan is to use enough water to keep grass alive and to
water c o n s e r v a t i v e l y . Where the outlets are along the
edge of f a i r w a y s , some of y o u m a y use the travel-type
sprinklers such as the A d a m s o n base sprinkler or the
Buckner walking-type s p r i n k l e r . They t r a v e l about four
hundred feet and cover the entire fairway or at least
half of it and with an automatic shutoff v a l v e , stop
operating w h e n they reach the end of the l i n e . This
m e t h o d saves labor and provides for a m o r e even distribution of w a t e r .
It seems to me that w e can't make a rigid rule about
height of cut on f a i r w a y s . Each one of y o u m u s t decide
w h a t is best for your own golf c o u r s e . The faster mowers are o p e r a t e d , the less time it takes to m o w the
f a i r w a y s . (Corrugations on m a n y fairways are the result of excessive speed.) Many have gone back to slow
speeds and cross-mow once a w e e k . These changes
are
steps in the right d i r e c t i o n . The w o r k at Pennsylvania
showed that f a l l is a better time to spray,broadleaf
weed crop form seed in the f a l l , sometimes even great-

er than in the s p r i n g . H o w e v e r , if fairways are y e l l o w
in June w i t h d a n d e l i o n s , y o u had better spray them to
satisfy the m e m b e r s . Then after the first y e a r , switch
to f a l l spraying (provided turf does not contain
creeping b e n t ) in order to k i l l both the old plants
and the new ones that come from s e e d . Unless something
is done to get grass in the voids left by the w e e d s ,
y o u are sure to have another c r o p of weeds w h i c h m a y
be a different k i n d . For e x a m p l e , 2,^-D did such a
fine job w h e n only plantain and dandelion were present
that club members thought 2,^-D was the sole
answer.
A couple years later they were confronted with a clover problem w h i c h was almost w o r s e than the
original
broad-leaved weed p r o b l e m . Fertilizer was needed along
with
to produce a dense t u r f .
So far as lime and fertilizer are concerned on fairw a y s , I suppose we can dispense with both if the supply and labor situation becomes extremely b a d . On the
other h a n d , where the soils are a c i d , lime is going to
help the grass on? those fairways during times of adv e r s i t y . It i s n t e x p e n s i v e , is available and can be
a p p l i e d . A l s o , fertilization ought not be stopped feecause where grass is properly fertilized it economizes
on the need for w a t e r .
Now just a few words about g r e e n s , roughs and t e e s .
During the last war m a n y clubs thought they were doing
the smart thing to reduce cutting on the greens to
twice a week« E v e n though the mowers were set to cut
at 3/16 i n c h , an excessive m a t d e v e l o p e d . W h e n w e came
into a bad year like 19*+9, there was plenty of trouble
on those g r e e n s . It seems to me that greens shcuild be
m o w e d at least four times a w e e k if at all p o s s i b l e .
The mower should be set to m o w properly and the
combs
or brushes should be used often to prevent m a t format i o n . So far as topdressing is c o n c e r n e d , the tendency
seems to be to top dress greens less and l e s s . Many
clubs are not topdressing at all? some top dress
spring and f a l l . I know m a n y of y o u have good greens
w i t h o u t t o p d r e s s i n g . Mowing in such a w a y as to prev e n t m a t formation is important w h e n greens are never
top d r e s s e d .
A e r a t i o n — I don't care w h a t kind of machine y o u use;
select the one w h i c h suits your fancy b e s t . Aeration
brings up soil for topdressing provided the soil in
the green is satisfactory from the p h y s i c a! l standp o i n t . As far as watering is c o n c e r n e d , d o n t use any
m o r e water than is needed to keep good g r a s s . The
tendency on m a n y courses is to o v e r w a t e r . Avoid
such
a rigid program that y o u do not permit watering when

the
the
the
ule

grass turns
fire out by
grass alive
which calls

blue and starts to w i l t . Better put
applying a T i t t l e bit of water to keep
and forget temporarily about a schedfor watering once or twice a w e e k .

Fertilization and d i s e a s e — You certainly should not
neglect the greens because there is going to be enough
fertilizer for them no matter how tough the situation
becomes. In m y opinion you can supply plenty of potash
particularly where manure isn't being used. In m y opinion you can supply plenty of potash and phosphate in
a good application of complete fertilizer in the
spring a n d . again in the fall. Then during the season
feeding becomes simply a matter of supplying nitrogen.
Of course, if preferred, you may use a little potash
and phosphate each month and apply nitrogen along with
them.
T e e s — I notice a trend toward using the three-gang
mowers on tees such as the Locke and the Professional.,
It is a step in the right direction. I think that
there is a tendency towards enlarging the tees, making
one big one rather than two or three small ones, and
to design them so that the fairway units w i l l cut the
sides and banks instead of having abrupt steep banks.
It is another step in the right direction. To repair
divots in tees I know one or two have been using ryegrass and bent seed mixed with soil. This practice
seems quite satisfactory. The soil mixture should
contain enough organic material to hold sufficient
moisture to insure germination and initial grcwth of
the grass.
With these brief introductory remarks, I propose to
call on the men who have been asked to speak briefly
about their plans for the coming year.
Carl Bretzlaff, Indianapolis, Indiana
The only thing that has me stumped is the labor situation; otherwise at Meridian Hills we have all our materials to run us this next season, that is, fungicides, insecticides, etc. We will have enough equipment so run for two years. I don't believe much in
hoarding. I have enough repairs for two years and
that is long enough. If the situation gets so tough
that we haven't any equipment, I doubt whether we will
have a job. At the present time I have four college
students. School boys which are young have had their
parents sign a slip permitting them to work on the
golf course. Vie aren't going to fertilize the fairways much this year but will take good care of the
greens.

B i l l G l o v e r , F a i r f a x , Virginia
I h a p p e n to be on a golf course where m y o p e r a t i o n is
tied e n t i r e l y to i n cf o m e . In other w o r d s , it is a d a i l y
f e e c o u r s e . We
c a n t spend any m o r e t h a n w e m a k e . In
!
f a c t , w e d o n t intend to spend as m u c h as w e make»
Set up your budgets to conform to w h a t your income is 5
b u y w h a t m a t e r i a l s are a v a i l a b l e . If y o u consider that
your greens are your m o s t expensive item c a p i t a l - w i s e ,
I would suggest that y o u take c a r e of them the best
w a y y o u know how and in an inverse w a y down the line
disregarding the parts of your golf c o u r s e w h i c h
are
the least expensive to r e n o v a t e and bring back into
p l a y . Most of the fellows h a v e r e p l e n i s h e d their inventories by buying in late f a l l and winter simply to
be protected next y e a r . As far as labor is c o n c e r n e d ,
I refuse to get s c a r e d . W e o p e r a t e on the idea that
the m a n is the t h i n g , as F r e d G r a u has s a i d . That the
education of the m a n w h o w o r k s for y o u is p r o b a b l y the
m o s t important thing in your labor o r g a n i z a t i o n . Make
him want to p r o d u c e , h e l p him to f e e l that he is a
part of your o r g a n i z a t i o n , pay him w e l l and I t h i n k
y o u w i l l be f a i r l y s u c c e s s f u l ,
Marshall Farnham, Philadelphia Country Club
I t h i n k it should be stressed that if and w h e n it becomes time for retrenchments that w e should be guided
by f sound judgment and not by a p a n i c k y feeling
that
w e v e got to do something in a h u r r y and t h e n end up
by being sorry about i t . A f e w years ago we developed
a v e r y fine i n f e s t a t i o n of v a r i o u s kinds of w e e d s in
our t r a p s , and one of the w o r s t infestations in the
traps was c r a b g r a s s . W e had been playing w i t h sodium
arsenite for a number of y e a r s , so we simply dumped k
or 5 pounds of sodium arsenite in a 50 gallon
sprayer,
l
put itx a couple of pounds of a c t u a l 2, f-D to make a
shotgun m i x t u r e . Any foliage w h i c h w a s present was
given a good drenching w i t h the m i x t u r e and our weed
problem was cleared up w i t h o u t any d i f f i c u l t y .
B i l l S t u p p l e , P r e s i d e n t , Midwest A s s o c i a t i o n
I t h i n k those of us who h a v e gone through the depression and
the last war on the golf course learned that
f
w e c a n t just let any part of t h e course go wild; we
have to keep the place u p . During the last war we
tried to cut the greens every other d a y or three times
a w e e k and w e made a big m i s t a k e . Greens should be
cut every d! a y or at least 6 times a w e e k , in m y opini o n . I d o n t believe w e w i l l topdr^ss v e r y m u c h this
year as it takes a lot of labor * W e should t r y to do

as much as we can while we have the labor and the materials to make the course playable and in better
shape to last through a restriction period. I expect
to be a little short of labor as everybody else i s , so
we intend to pay our labor w e l l . A man that has worked
for a golf course for a number of years is worth a lot
to the club, and he should be paid w e l l . We don't expect to lose any m e n through lack of salary. We found
that an economical way to keep a tee is to have a tee
large enough and just throw a little ryegrass and top
soil into the divot m a r k s . By the time that you are
back to the same spot, it is pretty w e l l healed u p . I
remember back in the old days when we had two men who
did nothing but plug t e e s . We have to keep watering
the fairways just enough to keep them g r e e n — not too
m u c h w a t e r i n g . We are going to go ahead with our program on the fairways and roughs to keep the weeds in
c h e c k . If we have to leave anything g o , w e w i l l probably start with the flower gardens and maybe the trees
for a year or t w o . We have winter sports at m y club,
so I am able to keep six men the year around which is
certainly a big h e l p . I get high school boys when they
are about sixteen or seventeen years old and break
them in, and I usually have them until they are
through college. By that time they are pretty good
men*
0 . J . Noer - When the last World War was imminent,I
recall attending a meeting with the chairman, his
committee and the greenkeeping superintendent of a
club in W i s c o n s ifln . He started out the meeting this
w a y . He said,
It looks as though we are going to be
fighting a w a r , but we've got at least a year to get
r e a d y . What I want to do is put this golf course in
shape so that if we have to skimp for several y e a r s ,
the grass is going to weather the storm." And I
thought that he was a sensible and levelheaded m a n .
And I think that is what each of y o u should d o .
Chet Msndenhall. Kansas City
F i r s t I would like to say something about working
b o y s . If you have to go down into the lower ages of
b o y s , I think that it would be a good idea to find out
about your labor laws. In our section, it is permissible to w o r k boys down in the younger ages providing
y o u get a permit from their schools. There are restrictions as to what they o p e r a t e , so I would find
out where I stood. We have made it a practice to use
a number of high school boys during the summer, and
!
I've been doing something that I've been told I v e
been stinking m y neck out f o r — I use quite a few sons

of m e m b e r s f r o m f a m i l i e s w h e r e I k n o w t h a t if I step
o n the b o y , h e c a n ' t r u n h o m e to d a d . I've f o u n d it
v e r y s u c c e s s f u l . O n e time I had nine w o m e n w o r k i n g on
t h e golf c o u r s e . O u t of t h a t g r o u p , I s t i l l h a v e t w o .
W o m e n are just as e f f i c i e n t as m e n and c a n p e r f o r m a
good m a n y jobs just as w e l l . T h e y are a l i t t l e m o r e
particular
t h a n a lot of y o u m e n . T h e r e is no r e a s o n
why a woman can't operate a tractor
just as w e l l as a
m a n . T h e y c a n o p e r a t e a . power m o w e r . I h a v e o n e
g i r l w h o c a m e to m e o u t of h i g h s c h o o l d u r i n g the w a r ,
y e t she is just as e f f i c i e n t h e l p as y o u c a n g e t . S h e
o p e r a t e s t h e s p r a y t a n k and h a n d l e s a l l the c h e m i c a l s .
Another source of labor t h a t y o u should not
overlook
is m e n w h o are h a n d i c a p p e d . S o m e of t h e s e f e l l o w s are
c o n s c i e n t i o u s and t h e y need o u t d o o r w o r k .
Clarence Wolfrom
W e h a v e a r a t h e r t o u g h labor s i t u a t i o n in D e t r o i t .
P r e p a r i n g for this d e f e n s e e m e r g e n c y , I t h i n k
started
at our c l u b d u r i n g the last war*
P r e v i o u s to t h a t ,
d u r i n g t h e w i n t e r t i m e , a l l of our m e n w e r e let out to
shift for t h e m s e l v e s . Our b o a r d of d i r e c t o r s l e a r n e d
it w a s n ' t t h e p r o f i t a b l e w a y to h a n d l e the labor situa t i o n . T h e y t r i e d to find jobs that c o u l d be d o n e in
the w i n t e r t i m e so t h a t w e could k e e p these m e n
on.
R i g h t at the p r e s e n t t i m e , our labor s i t u a t i o n isn't
too b a d . W e u s u a l l y c a r r y ten m e n and w i l l start t h e
s e a s o n w i t h s e v e n . S i x of t h e m w o r k e d over w i n t e r .
Some of y o u m a y be i n t e r e s t e d in one t h i n g I t e l l our
B o a r d a b o u t the b e n e f i t s of keeping labor t h r o u g h t h e
w i n t e r . Two e x p e r i e n c e d m e n are w o r t h three of
any
new m e n . B o t h w a y s , it's
still
m o n t h s p a y . Do
e v e r y t h i n g y o u can now and h o p e for the b e s t .
Taylor Boyd. Cincinnati, Ohio
D u r i n g the last w a r , m o s t m e m b e r s w e r e v e r y t o l e r a n t .
I t h i n k t h a t if y o u t e l l them t h a t t h e r e m a y be shortages and if there are s h o r t a g e s , t e l l them w h a t y o u
are up a g a i n s t , do the b e s t y o u c a n , and I d o n ' t t h i n k
y o u w i l l have any t r o u b l e ,
- o -

RECORDS AND LABOR MANAGEMENT
Don S t r a n d , Chairman
T h e s e are two of the m o s t important phases of any
s u p e r i n t e n d e n t s o p e r a t i o n . In the face of the-critical periods a h e a d , considerable emphasis should be
m a d e in keeping accurate records«
They are necessary
in the fulfillment of almost any anticipated p r o g r a m .
W i t h accurate records to w o r k f r o m , d e f i n i t e conclusions can be drawn and definite plans can be m a d e ,
provided your anticipated expenditures are based on an
accurate record of costs in the p a s t . The success or
f a i l u r e of any future operation is based on the past
records of such operation regardless of whether it is
custom cutting of g r a s s , building a g r e e n , controlling
b o n f i r e s , producing better g r a s s e s , killing
weeds,
killing b u g s , or even keeping better r e c o r d s . Science
and research are v e r y dependent on accurate r e c o r d s .
The scientist s a y s , "We did thus and s o , and this is
what happened." He k n o w s , because he kept accurate
records of his operations and w e profit by the success
or failure of that o p e r a t i o n .
H o w e v e r , m o s t records in our own cases are visualized
as figures pertaining to c o s t . We depend m o r e on
printed m a t e r i a l in the form of a r t i c l e s , b u l l e t i n s ,
m a n u s c r i p t s , and books for f a c t u a l records or depend
on our m e m o r i e s . In most c a s e s , m e m o r i e s are fairly
r e l i a b l e , but the m o r e successful executives prefer to
v e r i f y the facts and f i g u r e s . At this time» I would
like to introduce one such successful executive who
w i l l speak to y o u on Records on a C o u r s e , M r . Taylor
Boyd.
- o R E C O R D S O N A COURSE
Taylor Boyd
All that I am trying to do here is m e r e l y to bring out
the fact that w h e n you keep r e c o r d s , y o u find out
t h i n g s . I am not selling any particular kind of a
record; just so y o u have a r e c o r d , one that is easy to
k e e p , s h o r t , concise and one that the directors w i l l
read is the important t h i n g .
Labor today is the worst headache that any golf course
has because of the short labor • m a r k e t . Golf courses
cannot compete with
industry during war periods for

m a n y obvious r e a s o n s . Superintendents
should have a
definite program outlined and this should be discussed
w i t h the chairman to be sure that they are in a c c o r d .
There is another good reason for the chairman knowing
the plans as follows on this labor subject. H e , in all
p r o b a b i l i t y , has labor problems on his own m e n and has
to solve t h e m . He m a y not know about f e r t i l i z e r s ,
f u n g i c i d e s , soil aeration and a l l the other
things,
but this could be his one chance to really be v a l u a b l e
help to the s u p e r i n t e n d e n t . W h i l e discussing the labor
problem with your c h a i r m a n , it w i l l help to get him
interested if y o u w i l l present to him a c o s t - c o n t r o l
system, if y o u don't already have o n e . Any business
today has a v e r y rigid c o s t - c o n t r o l s y s t e m , and y o u
can safely bet that your chairman w i l l welcome such a
program« Clubs are faced with a v e r y r e a l problem with
younger members going iuto the service and rising
costs.
f

The facts are that y o u c a n t c o n t r o l labor without
some v e r y easily k e p t , s h o r t , concise record of c o s t s .
There is nothing new in the statement that
golf ma!
chinery saves laboro How much? You d o n t know without r e c o r d s . It is entirely possible to have too much
of the wrong kind of e q u i p m e n t . The cost of maintaining equipment is expensive and if it is not available
at the proper t i m e , it becomes more e x p e n s i v e .
Try to select equipment that your help likes* to operate; t h e y ' l l do more w o r k . W h e n buying a new m a c h i n e ,
ask the m a n who uses it if h e would like i t . The v e r y
fact that y o u asked for his opinion w i l l help his
a t t i t u d e . There are m a n y things that can be done on a
course with m a c h i n e r y that no one has taken any time
to do anything a b o u t .
E v e r y greenkeeper has some gadget that he m a d e himself
to save l a b o r . You probably have everything necessary
on the job to m a k e some t o o l that w i l l save l a b o r . As
an e x a m p l e , a corn weeder on a F o r d or F e r g u s o n
tractor w i l l loosen sand in traps as fast as a dozen m e n
and do a better j o b . Set into the r e e l area in an old
m o w e r , a delmonte raking f o r k does a good fast job of
raking g r e e n s . Just remove the regular r e e l , regular
bedknife b a r , use the front castor adjustment
equipm e n t to give it the desired p r e s s u r e . R e m e m b e r , that
it is best to give and to receive and it is not smart
to have trade secrets. You never get any ideas but
your own if y o u use that p r o c e d u r e .
Laborers today are not the uneducated dummies that
they once w e r e . There are m a n y m e n working in so-call-

ed labor positions who have college d e g r e e s . They do
this because times have changed; they m a k e m o r e m o n e y
than they could in a w h i t e - c o l l a r e d j o b . It is usually
the superintendent who has to recognize that labor is
m a d e up of smarter m e n . There are books and bulletins
w r i t t e n on the subject that are really valuable
books
to anyone handling l a b o r . This m a y seem like foolishness to s o m e , but it definitely has its place in modern g o l f . Purdue University and m o s t schools teach the
subject as part of their psychology courses put in
simple l a n g u a g e . You w i l l have to compete with changed
thinking of m a n . In a d d i t i o n , there is always the idea
of being a good fellow w i t h your m e n and treating them
as y o u v/ould like to be t r e a t e d — it works w o n d e r s .
Placing r e s p o n s i b i l i t y on m e n has some v e r y b e n e f i c i a l
results in m o s t c a s e s . If they are w o r t h h a v i n g , they
w i l l accept some responsibility and it w i l l h e l p them
f e e l that they are a part of the o v e r a l l p i c t u r e . This
can be done by giving a m a n a l l of the care of certain
holes and certain d u t i e s . This can be h e l p e d by taking
a man from time to time to see other c o u r s e s . The
other course is either better or w o r s e . In either
c a s e , the m a n gains k n o w l e d g e . If w o r s e , he is proud
of his w o r k . If the other course is b e t t e r , y o u can
bet that he w i l l improve his w o r k . I have done this
plenty of times with good r e s u l t s . This
procedure
makes the superintendent's w o r k easier because it is
easier to check one m a n for a certain job than to
check s e v e r a l .
Another w a y to get m o r e production from your labor is
to transport power mowers to them or build
small
buildings in some o u t - o f - t h e - w a y pJla ce to store this
e q u i p m e n t . The mowers are serviced in the area to be
u s e d , but that is less expensive than transporting
m o w e r s every d a y . A successful housing m e t h o d
saves
the price of one green cutting per w e e k over a y e a r .
This m i g h t not be true if our courses w e r e n ' t so large
and spread over so wide an a r e a . Changes in actual
costs w i t h the housing of mowers on the job cost us
about $7.b8 per c u t t i n g . Before the housing was built
it cost $ 9 o 0 3 , or a $1*55 saved per c u t t i n g . Our savings for the year were $335o^O for 228 c u t t i n g s .
You are p r o b a b l y wondering w h y I agreed to talk on
this s u b j e c t . S e v e r a l years ago I studied
accounting
with the idea of quitting golf w h i c h made me realize
that I w a s n ' t a pencil-pusher but retained an interest
in the records of o p e r a t i o n . I am going to give an
exact example as to h o w it worked to u s . Before w e
give the actual figures y o u should know that the club

I w o r k for has m a n y diversified a c t i v i t i e s , such as
b a d m i n t o n , horse r i d i n g , ice s k a t i n g , polo
fields,
t e n n i s , g o l f , swimming p o o l s . There are about 10,000
feet per g r e e n , about k miles of roads owned and maintained and also the maintenance of all the buildings
that go w i t h these a c t i v i t i e s . Before w e started these
r e c o r d s , I think that the average club member thought
that the larger part of the m a i n t e n a n c e w a s going for
g o l f . They found that wasn't s o . The first year that
these records were kept was 1 9 ^ 8 . The t o t a l cost was
$¥•1-, 5 1 0 . 7 7 . The next y e a r , 1 9 ^ 9 ? one of our
tough
o n e s , the cost was $36,832.31 or a saving of $ 7 9 7 7 8 A 6
and although the saving was g r e a t , prices had not
d r o p p e d . The two figures included the cost of buying
new equipment to m a k e the saving p o s s i b l e . The expense
of the new equipment was not amortized as it should
h a v e b e e n , but remained a lump sum figure t o d a y . This
record on one sheet usually refers to cost of l a b o r ,
cost of supplies for 75 different j o b s . The same sheet
is used for m o n t h l y statement, 6 months statement and
then totaled for the annual o p e r a t i o n . This
record
can be used at your a n n u a l m e e t i n g . This item is interesting only because it shows h o w weather can affect
c o s t s . In 19^9 rough cutting cost $ ^ 9 6 . 8 0 . In 1950
with an extra 25 inches of r a i n f a l l the cost was
$ 1 , V 7 6 . 3 0 . This was offset by this: the cost of water and electric power was
1 1 2 . 8 1 in 19*+9 and only
$3 9 0*f0.72 in 1 9 5 0 , but the wet year of 1950 took
i507«31 more gasoline.
If y o u want to know where m o n e y g o e s , just keep rec o r d s . You can be sure that y o u w i l l give your club a
better golf course if at the end of the year y o u can
show your club w h e r e a l l the m o n e y w e n t .
--o LABOR MANAGEMENT O N M Y COURSE
W . H . Glover
The v a l u e of any discussion about labor m a n a g e m e n t
problems on any particular golf course w i l l come from
comparisons m a d e between practices under one set of
conditions as they parallel or deviate from practices
at another golf course o p e r a t i o n . It m u s t be understood that practices or problem solutions at F a i r f a x
are different in m a n y respects from those on other
golf courses and that no attempt is being m a d e in this
discussion to lay down rules which should or could apply to every o p e r a t i o n a l p r o b l e m .

It is my intention to bring to your attention some of
the factors which influence the kind of labor used,
how the labor force is handled, what is expected from
it, what it expects from the employer and how successful we are in keeping good personnel once we have
found it and educated it. It will be helpful to you if
I give some of the general background of this particular operation.
Fairfax was designed and built to be operated as a
daily-fee golf course. Since it was known from the
start that it was to be operated for profit as well as
pleasure, much attention was given to the design as it
affected the playability and cost of maintenance. The
topography of the land made it possible to leave many
natural hazards and unnecessary to create new hazards
in the way of traps and bunkers. Banks and swales were
swept out to permit mowing with proper equipment. Hand
work is held to a minimum.
Public golf course or daily-fee course maintenance operations usually differ somewhat from country cl.ub or
membership club operations because of the extra traffic, time of day at which play starts and the general
level of care exercised by the golfer in attention to
the rules and etiquette of golf as it affects maintenance. I refer to the replacement of divots, leveling
of sand traps, disposal of paper and other wastes. The
courtesy which the golfer expects from the labor force
is no more important than is the understanding by the
golfer of the necessity for the presence of the labor
force on the golf course.
As a result of basic planning and construction and the
development and perfection of most types of mechanized
maintenance equipment in recent years, most every operation requires a man who can operate some kind of
motorized machine. Practically every man but the one
who takes care of the traps must know how to drive a
tractor and have some knowledge of the workings of a
gasoline engine. This points out the necessity for
either finding men who are familiar with the operation
of all types of golf course maintenance equipment or
going out in the labor market and finding them and
taking the time and affording the expense necessary to
adequately train them in the use of and in the maintenance of the machinery they use. Of even greater
importance is the intelligent handling of this trained
personnel so that replacement is seldom necessary«
In
todays labor markets the last metnioned point becomes
a really big order for every superintendent and every
golf club.

Ten years of experience and observation along with
some accurate cost accounting has proved the importance of enough equipment and enough men trained in the
use of such machinery to keep ahead of play in daily
maintenance operations. On a golf course where speed
of play can make the difference between showing a profit and a loss, the importance of being organized so
that you do not interfere with play and play does not
interfere with the maintenance operation, takes on
added weight. Every consideration should be given to
promoting the enjoyment of every round of golf by
every golfer. Patrons of the golf course are the best
advertising medium we have* In fact, they are the only
advertising medium which produces results.
Experience has shown that mowing operations on greens,
tees and fairways annoy the golfer greatly and
they
%
are also the operations which can be costly if ¿a-*
chines and operators must wait for players to pass by.
Watering of greens and the changing of cups are operations where the same thing holds true. It should be
easy to understand from the above explanations why our
mechanical maintenance operation has been so organized
that we are able at most times to keep ahead of most
of the play if we have the advantage of having completed the maintenance operation on the first hole on
the course.
How can it be done? Flexibility of manpower and enough
machines for the men is the answer. With three separate fairway machines and men to operate them the fairways are mowed in multiples of three and it is possible to mow all of the fairways in less time than it
takes the average foursome of golfers to play eighteen
holes. Therefore, with the advantage of the first
hole cut ahead of the first group, we can and do keep
ahead of play. V/ith five power putting green mowers
and the men to operate them, it is also possible to
keep ahead of play if given the same advantage of one
cut green. Greens are then cut in multiples of five.
Watering is done the same way only in multiples of
seven when heavy watering is necessary. That means
that we must have seven men who can be trusted to irrigate greens. Naturally, we do not use the seventeen
men which the addition of the men used in the three
operations would indicate. Instead, we use only the
seven men indicated as being used In the hand-watering
operation for all of the season except the critical
three months from the middle of June through the middle of September.
Besides

the

equipment already mentioned there is one

other standard golf course tractor and a five gang set
of Blitzer rough m o w e r s , a farm type tractor with
sickle bar attachment and power takeoff for belt w o r k ,
two fertilizer d i s t r i b u t o r s , a power s p r a y e r , two rotary .type power m o w e r s , two reel-type power m o w e r s ,
aerating e q u i p m e n t , compost m i x e r , chain saw and a
f u l l complement of small t o o l s . There is probably
more equipment on this eighteen hole installation than
is considered normal or necessary by m o s t c l u b s .
The m e n who w o r k on the golf course are m o s t l y young
m e n w i t h families and live w i t h i n a few miles of their
w o r k . Most of them have come to w o r k at F a i r f a x be
cause one of the m e n who has w o r k e d there before them
has recommended t h e m . Each new m a n serves a probation
period to find out whether he w i l l fit into the organi z a t i o n , if he w i l l be liked by the other m e n and
whether or not he has the capability and aptitude
to
m a k e it w o r t h w h i l e to train him and m a k e him a permanent e m p l o y e e . At the end of two or three m o n t h s he
knows whether he likes the type of w o r k , the m e n he
works w i t h , the employer he works for and whether or
not he wants to c o n t i n u e . We also have found out the
things we w a n t to know about h i m . After a conference
during w h i c h a l l aspects of his job are d i s c u s s e d ,
some sort of a m u t u a l agreement is r e a c h e d . The m a n
is either convinced that he wants to continue or he is
told that he does not have w h a t it takes to m a k e it
w o r t h while for us to spend the time and effort which
it takes to train him w e l l enough so he can command
top wages and top security in our o r g a n i z a t i o n . During
this first period the new m a n is shifted from one operation and from one m a c h i n e to another w i t h as m a n y
different m e n as is f e a s i b l e . This gives him the advantage of d i f f e r e n t m e n ' s interpretations on h o w to
do things and h o w m u c h is expected from each m a n and
each m a c h i n e .
W h e n it is decided that a m a n is to be kept in the
employ of the c l u b his training begins in earnest and
w i t h more specific d i r e c t i o n . Reasons for doing certain things in a definite w a y are explained to him and
the anticipated results are pointed o u t . W h e n a person
knows h o w to do his job and w h a t to expect the result
to itook l i k e , there is little excuse for him if he
does not do his w o r k as it should be d o n e . Sloppy w o r k
is not t o l e r a t e d . For i n s t a n c e , there is no
excuse
for a m a n to overwater an area of a green w h e n he
knows how m u c h the area w i l l take w i t h o u t
flooding.
He is cautioned along w i t h another explanation of w h a t
damage m a y occur from too m u c h w a t e r . There seldom is
a next t i m e . E a c h m a n knows that w h a t he contributes

to the best in m a i n t e n a n c e is best for the f i n a n c i a l
gain of the operation and therefore is best for the
golfer and is also best for h i m . The rest of the men
in the working crew quite often take the
necessary
steps to show a m a n that h e is hurting them as w e l l as
himself if he does not produce at his b e s t .
W h a t does the employer have to offer as compensation
for the best that his crew can produce? There are a
great m a n y ways in which a superintendent and foreman
can improve the m o r a l e and the desire to turn out the
best kind of w o r k . Below are some of the
considerations which w e t h i n k are important in keeping any job
on our m a i n t e n a n c e force one to be looked after rather
than just one at w h i c h a m a n can m a k e some kind of a
daily wage:
1 . K e e p abreast of or just a little ahead of the
going scale for comparable w o r k in the general
area.
2 . Guarantee a minimum w o r k w e e k of forty hours for
fifty-one weeks and the other w e e k a vacation
with pay for m e n w i t h one y e a r s ' service and increasing by one day for each additional year of
satisfactory e m p l o y m e n t .
3- Pay time and half for hours worked over the minimum set for each w e e k .
k . Stagger weekend w o r k so that each m a n gets a
f u l l weekend to himself each m o n t h during
the
summer s e a s o n .
5o Give them credit both privately and publicly for
their contribution to the successful operation
of the maintenance program at the c l u b .
6« Keep some sort of a library of books and magazines w h i c h have to do with the problems of turf
maintenance and encourage the m e n to use them
and to ask questions about the application of
w h a t they have read to the job w h i c h they are
doing.
7o Present an opportunity as often as possible for
them to attend a field m e e t i n g . The m e n at Fairf a x attend the annual field day at Beltsville
each y e a r , expenses p a i d .
8 . Make them f e e l that y o u have a personal interest
in their problems and that y o u can be asked for
advice.

9 . E n c o u r a g e , almost to the point of i n s i s t e n c e ,
that they learn how to play golf and use the
golf course whenever they have t i m e .
1 0 . Be sure that each m a n knows w h a t y o u w a n t him
to d o , how y o u want the w o r k done and how much
y o u expect him to accomplish in return for the
pay he r e c e i v e s .
W h a t w e expect from our m a i n t e n a n c e force in return
for the compensations we can produce can be said v e r y
simply and in few \rords. we f e e l that we have a right
to expect a w i l l i n g n e s s to cooperate in the effort
necessary to complete a r e a s o n a b l e w o r k program
each
day.
We f e e l that cur approach to our labor problem is
r e a l i s t i c . We also f e e l that it has paid w e l l in that
our quality of w o r k is high because of the small turnover in the p e r s o n n e l w h i c h does the m a i n t e n a n c e w o r k .
Golf course superintendents have experienced m a n y of
the same difficulties and m a n y of the same disappointments while continuously facing and fighting the problem of acquiring and keeping good m e n who can be
taught how to operate and m a i n t a i n the m a c h i n e r y
used
for m a i n t e n a n c e on the golf c o u r s e . Budget m a k e r s have
contributed to the difficulty by not making it possible to pay enough to attract good m e n and to give
them the security of employment throughout the y e a r .
Superintendents have contributed to their own difficulties by not being insistent in their demands for
budgets large enough to permit the employment of the
right type of m e n .
Good m a c h i n e r y is expensive to b u y . It is folly to
purchase expensive m a c h i n e r y and then not be able to
insure its best productivity by budgeting enough m o n e y
to provide the m e n who are capable of m a k i n g it produce its utmost over the longest period of t i m e .
If there is one thing w h i c h has come from the experience of operations at F a i r f a x over the ten years it
has been in u s e , it is the belief that enough of the
best equipment plus enough of the best m e n is a combination w h i ^ n can be made to produce high efficiency
and the' best use of m e n and m a c h i n e s in any turf maintenance p r o g r a m .
- o -

SUPERINTENDENTS' RELATIONS
F r a n k Dunlap
My first impression of this subject "Superintendents'
Relations" was that I had a cinch and could write a
book about it, but Colin Smith and Mai McLaren soon
convinced me that you people were not going to be in
the least interested in the eccentricities of m y inlaws .
Golf is an old game and has gone through m a n y stages«
The game as we know it today did n o t , h o w e v e r , come
into its own until 1902 when a member of the club
where I am now employed invented the so-called cord
ball.
This ball revolutionized the game of golf and brought
forth the modern golf course with greater yardage and
larger greens. The fact that the player was now playing to the green from hitherto unheard of distances
made larger greens m a n d a t o r y . H o w e v e r , it did create
a new p r o b l e m . The old bluegrass, fescue or what-havey o u putting surface was not satisfactory for the long
approach putts that were now called for on these
greatly enlarged greens. The golfer began to cast about for new and better types of g r a s s , and also for
someone who could produce and maintain smoother t u r f .
Thus was born the profession of greenkeeping. Up to
this time most anyone who could drive a team or push
a lawn, mower with a little greater degree of skill
than the rest of the crew was the man in charge of the
c o u r s e . These first greenkeepers at once started experimenting with different strains and types of grass.
Progress was very slow, for there was no organization
and thus no chance for an exchange of ideas and inform a t i o n . On the contrary the situation was quite the
r e v e r s e . There was much professional jealousy and m a n y
were those who were quite sure they and they alone had
solved the mystery of growing a putting surface that
just naturally led a ball into the c u p . During the
years this condition existed, the L o r d , the w e a t h e r ,
and nature in general conspired to shake their confidence in some of their so-called secrets.
In 1925 some of the old-timers who were more
ing and a bit more charitable-minded gathered
d o , O h i o , and out of that meeting came the
Association. The seed was planted and from it
modern day golf course superintendent.

far seeat ToleNational
grew the

The superintendent of today w o u l d not exist nor would
golf be what it is if it were not for this a l l .important side of superintendents r e l a t i o n s — r e l a t i o n s to
one a n o t h e r .
Through these relations and their exchange of i d e a s ,
t h e y soon learned that by giving a little in the form
of an idea they were gathering a h a r v e s t of w o r t h
while information that w a s producing better and better
golf courses for the players of this c o u n t r y . F r o m
this realization of the value of c o m m u n a l relations
came the desire for m o r e t e c h n i c a l and scientific approaches to their p r o b l e m s , so they turned to the colleges of agriculture and thus came about the close relationships that now exist between the superintendent
and the m a n y universities interested in the growth of
turf.
W h a t is the sum t o t a l of all of this? It is a quality
of turf and a degree of course m a i n t e n a n c e that would
give those t u r n - o f - t h e - c e n t u r y golfers and m a i n t e n a n c e
m e n m u c h the same feeling as that of the old colored
fellow w h o was taking his c h i l d r e n through the z o o .
W h e n they came to the giraffe the kids stood in openmouthed w o n d e r m e n t u n t i l their father s a i d , "Come away
from d a r , c h i l l u n s . Dar ain't no sich animal."
The present day course superintendent is not a scientist nor is he a farmer in the u s u a l sense of the
w o r d , but he does a v e r y h i g h l y specialized job of
scientific f a r m i n g . Year by year in addition to this
he has been called upon to acquire a working knowledge
of a greater and m o r e v a r i e d assortment of skills than
any p r o f e s s i o n a l m a n I k n o w .
W h a t are these skills that he m u s t have in addition to
his m a i n job of growing turf? F i r s t and foremost he
m u s t be a m e c h a n i c , for today's course is h i g h l y mecha n i z e d . He m u s t be a tree s u r g e o n , a l a n d s c a p e r , a
g a r d e n e r , a golf course a r c h i t e c t , road
builder,
p a i n t e r , c a r p e n t e r , swimming p o o l a u t h o r i t y , tennis
court e x p e r t , bookkeeper and labor relations e x p e r t .
T r u l y in this last department h e m u s t be a m a g i c i a n ,
for he is expected to keep competent w o r k m e n at a rate
far below that paid by industry as a w h o l e . The attit u d e of the club is - if it needs doing turn it over
to J o e , h e ' l l find a w a y to get it done and for less
money, too.
Now while Joe has been acquiring a l l this knowledge
and s k i l l , w h a t has happened to him? Primarily he has
been so "damned" busy that he has not had time to find

out what was happening to himself and what he was getting out of the deal. He has been so busy looking out
for the welfare of others that he has totally neglected his own well being.
The golf course superintendent of today has developed
into a full fledged executive and doesn't seem to realize it, and I for one think it is high time he did.
Certainly he is going to have to continue to improve
his knowledge of his job, but he is also going to have
to spend part of his time letting the public in general and the golfer in particular know just what an important part he plays in the welfare of golf. I say,
without fear of contradiction, that the golf course
superintendent is the only executive employee of any
club that is absolutely indispensible to its continued
operation.
!

L e t s take a look at some of the things that a superintendent can do to bring home to his club and people
in general just what an important part he plays in
their lives.
Unfortunately there are no magic wands to be waved or
Aladdins lamps to be rubbed to bring this about. In
the main it will be accomplished
by a process commonly
!f
called "public relations .
Public relations is, when all is said and done, salesmanship and in this case the product to be sold is the
golf course superintendent.
To sell any product you must first have a sales organization and that organization must have an advertising
department, the duty of which is to get the name of
the product before the public. Advertising campaigns
cost money and it is a job for experts trained in that
field.
We are well prepared to put on a sales campaign. We
have the organization in the form of the Golf Course
Superintendents Association«, It is up to us as stockholders in this organization to provide, through higher dues, the money for it to hire an expert to publicize and advertise our jobs. We also have branch offices in all important cities in the country, the
branch offices in this case being our local superintendents associations. The branch office or local
association is the point from which the salesman, who
calls on the trade, works and in this case the salesman is you.

Now that you are a salesman as well as a golf course
superintendent, let us see what it takes to be a good
salesman. Primarily he must have a product to .sell
and that he has. .He must..have, a thoroughly proven product and that he also has, as evidenced by the ..hundreds of fine golf.-courses in all.parts -of America.
A good salesman- must be industrious and resourceful
and always on the lookout for new ideas and new .argil*ments with which he may convince his customer, in our
case the club member, of the value of his p r o d u c e -and
their need for it. He must evidence an interest in the
things that they are interested i n — in our case, jgolf
tournaments,, tennis matches, swimming events, flower
shows and the like.
He must be helpful to his customer in ways that will
call attention to both himself and his knowledge of _
his job. He must be civic minded and willing ;to take
part in and lend a hand in the conduct of c o m m u n i t y
affairs and endeavors. If he is asked to s-peak at a
garden club he should do so, or if, as in some cases,
he is just not able to speak in public, tell * them
frankly that it is just n o t in his line, but that he
knows a fellow who can and that he will make arrangements for him to be there. This he can do for he is a
member of an organization that can provide the man
they need.
a. good salesman is a thoughtful m a n , especially where
his customers are concerned. If one of them is ill v .he
drops them a friendly card. If one of them takes a
step up the ladder of success, the good salesman sees
to it that he gets a chance to congratulate h i m . There
is no one thing that I know of that makes people feel
better than to have someone interested in their success. If you make them feel better about themselves,
they will by the same token feel better about you., and
after all that was the main idea in the first place.
Letters, are one of the most effective tools of the
salesman and he strives continually to improve his
ability to write good ones. Many business men are more
impressed by a good letter than by any other form of
sales approach. They very often judge a man's abilities by how well he writes^.a letter. We as superintendents miss m a n y opportunities to call our club officials' attention to ourselves by our failure to
write letters at the proper time.
We should always send a written report to our club as
to what we saw and heard that was of interest at con-

ventions and short c o u r s e s . Suggestions for improvem e n t s or alterations to the course should be in letter
f o r m . Budgets should always be accompanied by letters
of e x p l a n a t i o n , so also should the y e a r l y summation of
expenses.
If any u n u s u a l w o r k is to be d o n e , such as construction or renovation that m a y interfere «ith play or affect the appearance of the c o u r s e , a letter explaining
the why's and wherefore's should go out to the members h i p . It w i l l do two t h i n g s . It w i l l save y o u a lot
of grief from complaints and it w i l l also c a l l their
attention to the fact that y o u are the one who is running their course and y o u w i l l have become m o r e important in their e y e s , and again that is exactly w h a t
we were trying to accomplish with this sales campaign
of l e t t e r s .
Anyone who finds it difficult to talk to groups should
take one of the m a n y courses offered in all communities to aid people to m o r e easily and forcefully express t h e m s e l v e s . . Remember that the members of your
committees are business m e n and w i l l give m o r e consideration to and have m o r e respect for your proposals
and suggestions if they are properly voiced and in
respecting the proposal w i l l in turn have greater respect and regard for the m a n who made it*
This salesman superintendent of ours is now taking on
the aspects of quite a f e l l o w , so let us not neglect
that phase of salesmanship which a n y successful salesm a n w i l l t e l l y o u is of extreme importance,that is
p e r s o n a l appearance«
It is not necessary that w e become fashion p l a t e s , but if w e are going to be classed
as supervisors w e are going to have to look the p a r t .
A successful salesman m u s t look successful and a succ e s s f u l superintendent m u s t l o o k like a superintende n t . If we are ever going to command the salaries we
expect and to w h i c h our knowledge and experience entitles us we are definitely going to have to command
respect and believe m e that w i l l not h a p p e n as long as
the players on our. course cannot identify us from the
m e n who w o r k for u s .
All of this adds up to quite a b i l l of goods and I am
quite sure that none of us w i l l ever accomplish all of
it but if we honestly try w e are going to be amazed at
the r e s u l t s , and w e w i l l have contributed our share in
helping to elevate our p r o f e s s i o n . The same relations
that have done so m u c h toward gaining recognition for
our fine golf courses w i l l again pay off in gaining
p e r s o n a l recognition for ourselves and the profession
as a w h o l e .

As an old school teacher of mine used to say, "When
building air castles, build them high enough so when
they fall there will be something to the ruins."
Let's be respectful, but let's also be respected.
- o ROADSIDES AND AIRPORTS
Ho B . Musser
Sometimes it is desirable for those of us that are in
a very specialized field such as golf turf to stop a
minute and take stock. There may be stimulation in
realizing that we are a part of a much bigger picture.
And so perhaps this afternoon the best contribution
that I can possibly make is to show you that sometimes
the grass isn't a bit greener over the fence than it
is in your own particular daily w o r k — t o show you that
there are problems in other fields of turf production
also.
Highways and air fields present probably the widest
variations in grass problems as we are accustomed to
thinking of them. While the same principles of growing
special purpose turf apply no matter where you are
growing grass, '/the basic principles of moisture,
drainage, fertility, compaction and other factors of
that sort still apply. Yet in a great many cases we
treat them in a much different fashion on these other
specialized areas.
There are very specialized problems in the highway
field, especially in attempting to maintain turf on
steep slopes. Can we find better types of vegetative
material than we have been using in the past? This is
a close-up of part of our experimental setup where we
established a number of grasses to test o u t , under
practical conditions, possible differences in performance. The Pennsylvania Highway Department and many
other highway departments have been using a lot of
orchardgrass for their bank stabilization in the past,
and we are beginning to suspect that maybe it isn't
the best possible material for that purpose. We can
get an excellent stand for the first year or two and
then orchardgrass, being a bunch grass, will begin to
thin out and form tufts. The water begins to run down
around these individual tufts and gullies develop.

In contrast with t h a t , here is the tremendously heavy
cover and the excellent protection that we have secured from creeping red f e s c u e . Creeping red fescue is
normally considered as rather a fine type of grass,
but it does w e l l on these areas with very little clipping and very moderate fertilization. The fescues as.
a group are very tolerant to droughty conditions
and
to low f e r t i l i t y . These soils are practically sterile
from the standpoint of any fertility because they are
all subsoilso We do have to add a reasonable
amount
of fertilizer at the start.
This is a plot of Alta f e s c u e . You can see that it is
making and has retained an excellent type of cover after a three-year p e r i o d .
Crown v e t c h , I t h i n k , is by far the m o s t promising material that we have been able to find so far for this
type of slope. It is a legume, a perennial legume,
that spreads with underground root stocks, is very
tolerant 0f low moisture conditions and poor soil, and
has the ability to form a very dense protective cover
on the area plus the fact that it is quite spectacul a r . Those purplish-pink blooms start about the middle
of June and the whole area is a -mass of color from
then on until September. The highway people like it on
that account. They also like it because of the excellent stabilization, the excellent control that it
gives. Now Crown Vetch is not all "beer and skittles"
by any m e a n s . There are very definite problems connected with its establishment, less with m a i n t e n a n c e .
The first problem is the fact that it is slow to dev e l o p . The only way that y o u can get a satisfactory
stand of Crown V e t c h , that i s , a stand that w i l l control slope erosion the first y e a r , is by very close
vegetative plantings of the c r o w n s . On the other hand
we can establish excellent stands of Crown Vetch from
seed if we can afford to wait for the slower developm e n t that we get from seedling plants.
Right now the thing that we are primarily
interested
in is to try to find the best possible grass to grow
with the vetch that w i l l give us cover temporarily until the crown vetch has established itself. This is
an illustration of one of those first attempts. Here
we have a mixture of crown v e t c h , Alta f e s c u e , orchardgrass and timothy. You can see the small crown
vetch plants developing down in there among the grasse s . The following year the grass is beginning to thin
o u t , the crown vetch is beginning to take o v e r , and we
w i l l eventually end up with the solid plot of crown
vetch that I showed y o u . What kind of mixture can we

grow with the crown vetch? Well, most any kind of
grass that won't smother it too much in the early
stages. We are not interested in any of them after
the crown vetch establishes itself. The fact of the
matter is that I have never been able to keep any
grass with it.
One of the other important problems is off-season
seedings. As you know, many highway ,j.obs are completed
at times when we don't usually think about seeding
g r a s s e s — either at the tail end of the fall before
you go into the winter or in the mid-summer. So one
of our problems was to determine whether we had a reasonable chance of success or whether there was anything that we could do that would give us a reasonable
chance of success in making off-season seedings. We
immediately ran into the problem of where we were making those seedings. Our test was on a new highway
where there was a similar cut on each side of the
road. The one had a north exposure; the other had a
south exposure. This picture is an illustration of
the stand of red fescue, ryegrass, tall oat grass and
Alta fescue where we made winter seedings that didn't
come up until the following spring and were covered
with mulch to protect the slope. I don't think that
anybody would ask for better cover, a better stand of
protective grass than that. By the w a y , this is one
of the poorest soils that I know anything about in
Pennsylvania. In contrast this is the situation that
developed when we made the winter seeding on the
southern exposure. The sun lay in there and warmed
it up, took the frost out of the ground several times
during the winter when we had mild spells of weather
so that we got winter germination. Now red fescue and
Alta fescue germinate at lower temperatures than some
of these other grasses d o . The result was that we got
a definitely poorer stand of those grasses from winter
seedings on the southern exposure than we did, as you
could see from the previous picture, on the northern
exposure. That became very, very interesting to our
highway people who are charged with putting protective
cover on these areas. They had never given it any consideration.
We have practically the same situation for another
reason where we make mid-summer seedings. This is a
summer seeding with the five grasses that we are using
h e r e — orchardgrass, perennial rye, red fescue, tall
oat, and Alta fescue. By the w a y , we have seedings of
crown vetch in every one of those to see whether there
is any difference in the establishment of the crown
vetch with these various grasses. In this case the

results again were better on north exposures. Moisture
conditions were better.
Those are just some of the highlights of a lot of
problems. There are a lot of other things that we are
tackling, but it may serve as a bird's eye view of
some of the things we are up against from the standpoint of trying to establish cover on highways; and
the fact that there are just as serious, just as vital
problems in turf production in the case of this heavy
duty turf as there are of the specialized, intensive
type of turf that we are usually thinking o f .
Nov; for the airfield w o r k , I will have to take you
back to the war period because we have had very little
experimental work on airfields since that time, and
the fact of the matter is that most of the work that
was. done at that time was trial and error. All that I
am going to try to show you here are the problems that
are involved in attempting to do a workman like job of
making conditions satisfactory for operations on an
airfield. Nov/ this is not a poor picture-- that is an
excellent picture. The story is that the whole picture
is clouded by dust. Dust is probably the most important factor on larger air fields where the wind has a
chance to blow across and pick up soil from unprotected areas. Another of our problems is that where you
have dust and unprotected areas, you have m u d . Then
we have erosion, where water comes down from higher
areas onto the airfield and causes difficulties. That
is really a mild type along side some of the situations that developed until we could get a protective
cover on them. Here the engineers constructing an
airfield are experts in designing the size of inlets,
the amount of tile that is required to take the water
off; but one thing that they completely lost sight of
was the fact that as long as those large expanses of
open, flat areas were not protected against wash, the
inlets were not doing them a bit of good and they were
getting erosion and flooding on the field.f Here is
another type of erosion. Now that just i s n t a mound
of soil piled u p . That is the end of the approach to
a runway. It was leveled out and filled in so that it
could be built about level. There was just a little
slope on that runway toward this direction. The water
collected on it and eventually cut that gully back until it was almost at the edge of the concrete slab itself, In this whole airfield picture turf can do a
beautiful job of controlling dust and erosion if the
handling of it is understood.
This is an edge of an

apron

where planes are held to

service them. Mostly the tails are turned back off the
apron, and propwash comes back at a hundred miles an
hour or more and takes out everything down to a depth
of six o r eight inches. Then if there is traffic across that area, they rut it still d e e p e r . If that
happens along the edge of the runway or at the end of
a runway and a plane hits i t , you get an accident.
Turf can do an excellent job of controlling that situation. This shows where you have the same trouble along taxi areas where planes m a y be stored for any
length of t i m e .
And finally, one of the big problems, particularly in
the western areas where you have wet and dry seasons,
is f i r e . On m a n y airfields during the war at least,
there was no opportunity to keep them cut down close,
and when that grass matures and dries, it m a y burn
with almost explosive v i o l e n c e .
There are some of the problems. Are there
satisfactory solutions? The all over turf field can be kept in
satisfactory condition for landing and takeoffs of
light planes with a good grass c o v e r . You can do a
magnificent job with bermudagrass in the south, most
any kind of bermudagrass, although the better strains
are more desirable. In more northern localities y o u
go to the cool-season grasses. The shoulders of runways are a problem because in m a n y cases those runways
have b.een stabilized to 60 or 80 percent of the bearing capacity of the runway themselves. In the northern
area (this happens to be a field up at Syracuse, New
York)we did not have very much of a problem in getting-a good growth .of Kentucky.bluegrass-fescue turf
with some legume mixtures in it to protect those
shoulders. In Florida we ran into the situation of
almost solid limestone resulting from coral format i o n s . It was an entirely different problem, and I
included this picture just to show that you can do an
excellent job of stabilizing those shoulders even with
a pretty heavy bearing capacity m a t e r i a l on i t . The
area was ripped up with a road ripper and the bermudagrass sprigs planted in i t . This was about 3 or 4weeks after the sprigs had been planted, and in another month* s time it had become pretty w e l l covered.
Mow at those inlets I showed you a bit ago where we
had the w a s h , we found that by doing a rather simple
job of sodding around the inlet, we could protect our
soils from washing so that the inlet would work until
the grass that we had seeded out further took efi'eo*c.
If we didn't have sod available, we did a job of seedi n g , covered it with a straw m u l c h , and put some of

this grid m a t e r i a l on top of it to hold it down in any
areas where propwash was liable to blow it o u t .
Another method of controlling dust and especially wind
erosion was by the use of straw m u l c h . It is simply
dry straw that has been tucked into the soil sufficiently so that it w i l l h o l d . The way that is done is
that the area is loosened up much as you would loosen
up a seed bed. The straw is spread over it as we have
done over there where it has not been packed (this
picture was 1 taken before the job was finished) then
run a s h e e p s foot roller or a culti-packer or a dull
disk or something like that over it to cut that straw
into the soil. I have seen those straw mulches stand
a 70 mile an hour wind without blowing o u t . Another
method of control is the cut-back asphalt d r e s s i n g .
I am glad that I have this picture because it gives me
a very interesting and important contrast from the
standpoint of c o s t . That row of dressing along the
runway isn't fit for anything but to stop wind blowing
and d u s t . It won't stand traffic at all. It is just
a light application of about *f/10 gallon of cut-back
asphalt per square y a r d , and it only is good for about
6 or 8 months in contrast with the straw mulch that
w i l l hold up to 16 or 18 months without r e n e w a l . The
difference in price is about 1 to 6 in favor of the
straw m u l c h .
F i n a l l y , another method that I have very little faith
in it the gravel blanket. We can't put that gravel
blanket all over an entire area of hundreds of m i l e s .
Winds bring dust in that w i l l settle in the gravel.
Eventually it w i l l become another source of d u s t . So
it is not very satisfactory.
Good temporary dust control can be obtained by rough
tillage. It acts like a miniature snow f e n c e . Yes,it.
w i l l fill up and you w i l l have to do it over
again,
but as a temporary job, it is an excellent method of
controlling d u s t .
N o w , finally, the fire control. A material that din an
excellent job of fire prevention by fire-proofing the
grass itself, the dry grass, is mono-ammonium
phosp h a t e . As you can s e e , completely burned areas on
either side of the strip where we went across with a
20-foot boom sprayer effectually stopped the fire
right at that line.
Question: What is best height of cut for turf?
ive

have

maintained

all of our strains of grasses at

three different h e i g h t s , that i s , approximately 3 A
inch which checks closely w i t h the type of
fairway
turf that we like to s e e , about
or
inches w h i c h
checks with ordinary lawn height and then about l-§* and
3 i n c h e s . On the basis of v e r y car:efully kept records
of performance of the same grass under those three
heights of c u t , we have found that it is m u c h more
difficult to m a i n t a i n a good uniform stand of grass at
the
or 3 inch heights than w e have at the li inch
or even 3 A inch heights of any grass that w i l l stand
close c l i p p i n g . I believe that y o u don't need to w o r r y
m u c h about the h e i g h t at w h i c h y o u cut a great m a n y of
our grasses if y o u w i l l cut them frequently enough so
that w h B n y o u do cut them y o u d o n ' t take such a large
proportion of the leaf area off t h e m . Cutting a grass
close is injurious to it w h e n it has grown a leaf of
about 2-§- or 3 inches long and t h e n is cut down to the
point where y o u h a v e removed half to 3 A of that leaf
a r e a . It is a tremendous shock to the g r a s s . Bluegrass and fescues can't stand that s h o c k , can't recover from it because they don't grow rapidly
enough.
Unlike b e n t , they don't have enough leaf surface down
close to the ground to r e c o v e r . I think that if w e cut
f r e q u e n t l y and o n l y cut a small proportion of the leaf
surface o f f , we can get our cut a lot lower w i t h o u t
injuring the grasses than if y o u cut at longer intervals and shock them m o r e s e v e r e l y .
(Question about c r a b g r a s s )
Answer: The answer to crabgrass c o n t r o l is in shading
the g r o u n d . O b v i o u s l y y o u do a much better job of
shading the ground at a 2 - i n c h height of cut than y o u
do at the shorter c u t . On a t h i c k , h e a v y turf y o u do
not have to w o r r y about cutting too short for shading;
on a thin t u r f , y o u do have to w o r r y about cutting too
s h o r t . The r e a l l y important thing there is w h a t Musser
brought o u t — that h o w m u c h y o u are cutting off at any
cutting is extremely i m p o r t a n t .
(Question about w a t e r i n g )
Answers W e l l , of c o u r s e , I know that watering can be
o v e r d o n e . If there is any error m a d e , it seems quite
logical to me that it should be on the side of too
little water rather than too m u c h .
- o -

ATHLETIC FIELDS
M . E . Farnham
What should be the aim for athletic fields or other
heavy use turf areas? Last fall before the Army-Navy
game, some of the people from West Point came down to
look at the Municipal Stadium in Philadelphia. We also
went to Franklin Field and some of the other athletic
fields at the University of Pennsylvania. At the end
of the tour I asked C o l . Reeder, who is in charge of
the physical plant for the West Point Military Academy
Athletic Association, if he could give me a definition
of just what we do want on an ahtletic field. He evidently had given considerable thought to it because
quite promptly he said, "What we want is something
firm, smooth and green". Now that is a very good definition; I don't think anybody will quibble with it,
and it doesn't sound too difficult. However, the further we get into it, the less simple it becomes.
At one time over a year ago, I asked George Munger,
Pennsylvania football coach, a few questions
about
their reactions to various fields that they had played
o n , trying to find out on what basis they rated a
field as good, bad or indifferent. I was very much
surprised to have him telli me that looks are :'Of • prime
importance from the standpoint of the contestants. He
told me that in going into a strange field, the players, before ever setting foot on the field, havepretty well got their minds made up whether it is going to be satisfactory or not. In other words, the
players, as well as thousands of observers who sit in
the stands and have little to judge conditions except
by looks, are quite conscious of that looks angle. Mr.
Munger went on further to mention some specific fields
and I happen to know that one of the fields that in
the previous year they had found most satisfactory
must have been purely and simply looks because from
the turf standpoint they did not have much to offer.
Munger said, "I don't know. Maybe they dye the material that is there. But it looked nice and before the
boys ever set foot on the field, they had their minds
pretty well made up that they were going to like it."
In our consideration of athletic areas we will think
primarily of schools, overlooking professional baseball diamonds or whatnot, which really would give an
even more complicated program because some of those
areas are used pretty much the year around, and it's
hard enough when you concern yourself with the school

f i e l d s . With baseball, being a spring sport, y o u often
have an opportunity to go into those areas in the fall
and do whatever seeding or renovation is necessary arid
have it in pretty good shape by the time spring comes.
A n d , of course, the limited area of the infield makes
that a much smaller problem. A well-known baseball
player was asked about what he wanted on a d i a m o n d . He
evidently is a golfer for he said that he wanted something about like our fairways on the infield, something not quite as good in the outfield. I asked him
whether they wanted the grass in their infield because
of playing conditions. N o , the principal reason that
they want grass on their infield is because it cuts
down glare. Perhaps I stress the looks angle too much
but it is important.
In any sound program on new fields sufficient funds
should' be provided and sufficient time should be provided so that after the actual construction w o r k the
field w i l l have an opportunity to make some turf before it is put into u s e .
What should we do in soundly preparing soil conditions
for the establishment of a new field? One of the prime
considerations m u s t be to prevent development of compaction as-far as possible, and that means
basically
that we need to modify the existing soils by the addition of such quantities of organic matter and sand^as
m a y be sound procedure to produce a soil which w i l l
not compact too f r e e l y .
On fields in use the problems become complicated. .If
the use of a field in the f a l l finishes in time so it
is possible to go in with aerification, fertilization,
and dormant seeding, it's a good procedure to do s o .
If the program doesn't permit that or if conditions
get so that you can't do that w o r k in the f a l l , then
obviously y o u have to do it first thing in the spring
even though m a n y of us know that the planting of seed
in the spring is not too sound a procedure. It is
extremely important that the bare ground on the .worn
areas be c o v e r e d . T h a t , of c o u r s e , aside from such
fertilization and aerification as m a y be in the pict u r e , means the use of seedings. We m u s t consider
w h a t grasses we're going to use because too often
there is no let-up in use of these areas. You need to
have some grass that comes quickly even though theoretically it m a y have retarding effects on your perm a n e n t stand of g r a s s . During the summer time the
School fields give you a chance to do some w o r k on
them, but nature doesn't offer too m u c h opportunity.
In Philadelphia,, around the middle of August y o u can

put in some seedings w i t h a reasonable chance of succ e s s , particularly
on some of the college fields where
T
they d o n t get into use u n t i l the latter part of Sept e m b e r . If it comes down to a case of a practice
field where the players come out the first part of
September, then that's a horse of a different c o l o r .
W h e n we are confronted w i t h areas w h i c h become worn
and bare from u s e , your weed problem d e v e l o p s . We
have fairly simple weed 1 control m a t e r i a l for broadleaf
weeds lin the form of 2, +-D. The place in the program
for 2, +-D on s e e d l i n g s , h o w e v e r , has to receive a little more consideration than it needs on permanent turf
because it is quite w e l l established that 2,^-D applications often are quite rough on s e e d l i n g s . Crabgrass areas occur on bare g r o u n d , and that also justifies the use of considerable quick grasses to cover
the soil and compete with w e e d s . Some of the various
chemicals w h i c h are being tested for crabgrass have
given us quite a little help although w e don't
know
the w h o l e s t o r y . There a g a i n , we have to keep the
seedling grass in m i n d .
We are hearing m o r e and m o r e about compaction not because it is anything new but because we now are
able
to do something about i t . I've been quite enthusiastic
in the past year or so in trying to explain m a n y of
the benefits received from aerification procedures by
the fact that we are letting air into the s o i l . Then
w e go up to Penn State and Professor Alderfer gives us
a v e r y striking illustration that sometimes
the trouf
ble w i t h our soil is that the air c a n t get o u t . Of
c o u r s e , that isn't too critical because after a l l if
your conditions are such that air can get i n , it can
get o u t , t o o . In connection w i t h seeding or renovation p r o g r a m s , aerification procedures should be "rather severe.
The question has been asked h o w deep w e need to g o . I
think it is a sound statement that most of our compaction is at the s u r f a c e , in the top couple inches of
the soil. It becomes progressively less severe as y o u
get down into the soil, so that we don't have to worry
about extreme depths for aerification treatments unless there are some conditions of extreme depths which
are b a d . E v e n though m o s t of our compaction m a y be in
the top two i n c h e s , it probably is sound procedure to
aerify at least to the depth of four i n c h e s , and I
t h i n k that becomes self-evident w h e n y o u cut into some
of these holes w h i c h are f u l l of white roots following
aerification.

The growth of turf alone has been shown to be quite
effective in helping overcome soil c o m p a c t i o n . Some
of our soils are of such a nature that the aerification holes following our aerification procedures close
up rather r a p i d l y . In these cases we w i l l need to put
some m i x t u r e of materials into those holes through
t o p d r e s s i n g , d r a g g i n g , e t c . , to hold them open long
enough to permit the satisfactory root growth w h i c h we
see w h e n these holes do stay o p e n .
As far as aerification procedures are concerned in
routine m a i n t e n a n c e , I favor rather frequent aerification t r e a t m e n t s — once over an area frequently
rather
than being too severe in any one t i m e . A n d , of c o u r s e ,
with m u c h of the equipment w h i c h we frave available tod a y it doesn't take long to go over an area followed
by proper matting to put the area back into good playing c o n d i t i o n .
Now as far as the matter! of grasses is c o n c e r n e d , m o s t
of the areas w h i c h I v e seen are basically Kentucky
b l u e g r a s s . Of c o u r s e , w e w o u l d all be tickled to
death if we could get whatever quantities of B - 2 7 or
M e r i o n bluegrass that w e n e e d . If w e c a n ' t , it
still
seems sound procedure to plant c o m m e r c i a l bluegrass
which is a v a i l a b l e .
In some areas c o m m e r c i a l bluegrass is severely injured
by leafspot disease w h i c h occurs in spring and v e r y
little recovery occurs in the summer which practically
cuts bluegrass out of the picture w h e n use is heavy in
the f a l l . I still think that we ought to plant it to
be safe rather than s o r r y . W e , of c o u r s e , are looking
forward to available supplies of some of the new selections of red f e s c u e . The ryegrasses quickly cover
the g r o u n d , and I prefer to use perennial rye rather
than a domestic or principally a n n u a l t y p e .
Alta fescue seems to be doing an outstanding job in
some p l a c e s , but for m e it has been almost a total
f a i l u r e . Musser was astounded last f a l l to see hew
little results we had from plantings of Alta at the
University of P e n n s y l v a n i a . I don't know what the
answer i s , but I w i s h that I could produce the results
w h i c h they are getting in some p l a c e s . I know Charles
H a l l o w e l l comes back from C a l i f o r n i a and is enthusiastic about everything including Alta f e s c u e .
W h a t grasses don't we want on these hard-use areas?
Poa a n n u a , poa trivialis are pretty m u c h in the
same
class in that they m a k e a very shallow-rooted t u r f ,
and they just w o n ' t stand the hard w e a r . Both of them

go to pieces more or less in the summer time and unfortunately, they come back rather vigorously in the
f a l l . Nor do we want creeping bentgrass.
I don't want to go in too much to the possible application of the warm-season g r a s s e s — bermudagrass and
Z o y s i a . Perhaps for hard-use a r e a s , particularly when
y o u take into consideration the speed with which they
usually want this work don& or the speed with which
you have to do i t , the Zoysias are slow unless they
are put in as sod. The U-3 bermudagrass undoubtedly
fits into the picture somewhere and in some locations.
We put some test strips of U-3 down at the University
of Pennsylvania a year ago last 'June. W e put them in
one-inch strips, set three feet apart at Franklin
F i e l d . After the two growing seasons (the rest of 19^9
from June on was a good season for bermudagrass5 1950
was not so good even though the nitrogen program on
the field was fairly h i g h ) , the strips on Franklin
Field in no cases were a foot w i d e .
The
principal
thing is that your test of U-3 bermuda, or I might say
a test of most anything, needs to be done not only in
t h e locality where y o u are going to use it but insofar
as possible in the actual location in which you are
going to use i t .
That covers in a rather quick way the program as I see
i t . I am tremendously interested in the opportunity
for some of these contacts in fields of turf other
than those on the golf course because I think that it
makes the whole turf program much stronger. We have
been fortunate in developing several turf research
fellowships at Penn State and feel that we are really
getting somewhere. Then the state highway department
gets interested and has contributed more than the sum
total of the other fellowships. Any of this w o r k which
we can promote in the broad turf field certainly makes
us all stronger in our individual applications.
- o -

SHADE TREE CARE
C.arl Fenner
From the dome of the Capitol Building in downtown Lansing, the city appears to be in a f o r e s t , yet 100,000
people live beneath this f o r e s t . Such a background has
made it possible to develop a scientific tree-care
program over a period of ^0 years with which I am
associated.
Now..as to something practical as to how to take care
of your trees« This gentleman is cutting off a -huge
dead limb. His first cut is under the branch and he
cuts, undercut we call i t , until the saw p i n c h e s . Then
he goes on top and cuts through until the'branch falls
o f f . The final cut he has made is entirely flush with
the parent limb; then he paints i t . Be careful who you
have to do your tree w o r k . If y o u want to do some of
the simple parts of the tree w o r k , you can learn how
in this little lecture t o d a y . This beautiful elm tree
with all of its five trunks is covered with little
sucker g r o w t h — with feathers, we call t h e m .
Don't
ever cut any of those o f f . That is the beauty of that
elm t r e e — all those little suckers or feathers up and
down the trunks.
You know the old idea of trimming a tree down from the
top to make it spread out and get bushy. This tree was
topped about kO years ago and you can see where the
dark bark ends and the light bark starts. Initially
the tree looked b r o a d , fat and plump; but now new
sprouts have grown at the tips and they are dismal
branches. Now it is a tall tree that is dangerous and
w i l l break in a storm. Instead, just give it a haircut to make it look a little d e c e n t .
All the primary wires in our city are on 70-foot
p o l e s — that i s , 62 feet out of the g r o u n d . Then our
m e n go into the tops of the trees and simply cut away
those portions of the trees that are actually interfering with the w i r e s .
W h e n y o u see a V-shaped crotch in your elms or some of
your m a p l e s , bore a hole through there just below the
c r o t c h . Drill the hole about 3 A inch in size and put
an . iron bolt right through the heart of the t r e e . You
w i l l save yourself a lot of good t r e e s .
An automobile or mowing equipment could knock the bark
or"part of the bark off the t r e e . The first thing we

do is to take a sharp jackknife and trace the wound;
in other words, cut off the ragged edges of the bark.
Then we put nothing on that wound. We put this little
fence of burlap around it (notice that the burlap is
held about six Inches away from the trunk and nothing
touches the wound.) The cover is on there simply to
prevent the sun from drying out the cambium layer. If
that smooth, slippery cambium layer is protected from
the sun, it will thicken up into natural bark. We
leave the shade on for four w e e k s . Ordinarily that
would take about 5 years to grow bark in from the
edges. If you fail to treat it within 2b hours and the
sun does dry out your cambium layer, it dies. Scrape
it off with your hand or chisel and trace the edge of
the wound, shellac the edge and put p a i n t o n . That
will then grow over in the old-fashioned way from the
sides.
When your tree is off-color, get in touch with someone
who knows about tree diseases. In this particular tree
the top leaf is normal green, the bottom is off-color,
and it came out of the ground like a post. We found a
strangling or girdling root, literally shutting off
the life stream of that tree. Since the root had not
grown into the tree, it was taken off, the tree fertilized and watered and it came backWe do a lot of things to upset the balance of nature
when we bring a tree into the city 0 Here is a golf
course where we quickly rush out and pick up all the
leaves. Sometimes when trees in a city,; on a golf
course or on a street have gone too f a r — have slipped
too far in h e a l t h — we feed them artificially by boring holes in the ground. First we inject an air gun
in the holes and fracture the soil; then a man pours
in the fertilizer, reinserts the gun and distributes
the fertilizer through the soil. All the holes are
left o p e n — these are about 50 holes under each t r e e then the whole thing is covered with water to further
distribute the food. Sometimes our trees when brought
into the city on a golf course or street need extra
watering. A pipe needle can be made in your own shop
so that you can get the water down where the root
system really needs it.
The mist blower is the latest thing in spraying for
insects in trees or for mosquitoes. The finely broken
dust or liquid is blown out of this machine at a very
high velocity air current and is distributed over a
vast area. It is the cheapest way to cover a large
area. There is a saving of about 75$ in material alone.

I am sure that y o u are all familiar w i t h the picture
of this
nasty stuff coming out of an elm t r e e . It
T
d o e s n t kill a t r e e , but it has that a w f u l looking
stuff w h i c h is the result of a b a c t e r i a l action inside
the sap s t r e a m . We have inserted two pipes past the
heart wood and in the point where w e figured there was
the greatest i n f e c t i o n , and have drained out the infected s a p . The business end of this little drain is
w h a t is i m p o r t a n t . It is a v e r y simple thing that y o u
can m a k e in your own s h o p . D r i l l it f u l l of holes in
the side so it can gather m o r e of the infected sap and
carry it out away from the bark s i x , eight or ten inches o
A basswood tree and a red o a k and a f e w others perhaps
can be b e a u t i f u l and healthy on the outside (bark,
f o l i a g e , t w i g s ) but inside can be almost
completely
r o t t e d . You need to w a t c h out for t h e m . You can find
this rotted tree by m e r e l y tapping it w i t h a m a l l e t on
the o u t s i d e . It w i l l give a punky s o u n d .
W e should say a w o r d about the planting of t r e e s , I
t h i n k . You are more likely to succeed in planting
young trees on your golf course if y o u take them out
of a field w h e r e they have been grown and
cultivated
and w a t e r e d . They have been grown a little f a s t e r ,
their roots have been p r u n e d . T h e y have a s h o r t e r ,
d e n s e r , more compact root system w i t h less loss of
roots w h e n the tree is taken up and moved onto the
c o u r s e . Because of the transplanting shock and the
loss of some r o o t s , it is necessary to reduce the t o p .
Cut off a l l the big l i m b s , leave the little ones o n ,
and in a f e w years the tree w i l l assume its former
s h a p e . Cut and cut u n t i l it hurts and then cut
some
m o r e . In the planting of a tree there are just a
couple of things that I w a n t to s a y . We m a k e the h o l e
plenty b i g , of course; we throw the top soil in one
place and the subsoil in another p l a c e . W h e n w e replace the dirt in the h o l e , w e put the top soil around
the roots and ! f i l l it up w i t h the s u b s o i l . One prec a u t i o n — d o n t plant your trees too d e e p . Plant it
about the same height it was in the n u r s e r y .
W e protect a l l the m a p l e s and elms by wrapping ordinary building paper around them and tying it snugly in
place for two years after p l a n t i n g . Otherwise the flat
head borer w i l l get under the b a r k and destroy your
t r e e . A newly planted tree needs a couple of good waterings per s u m m e r . We dig a t r e n c h two feet from the
t r u n k and flood on 15 to 20 gallons of water at onetime .

Now a f e w trees that I like especially w e l l . The good
old sugar m a p l e in f a l l coloring is at the top of m y
l i s t . It is a slow grower but w e advise putting in a
certain proportion of the finest tree that g r o w s —
sugar m a p l e . It isn't a rapid growing t r e e . It is a
m e d i u m growing tree and quite subject to certain dis e a s e s . Sweet gum can grow r i g h t along w i t h the maples
and they have a brilliant f a l l c o l o r i n g . Don't buy a
-sweet gum with bare r o o t s . Don't even take it as a
g i f t . It has to have a b a l l of s o i l . Here is the good
old American elm w h i c h I am sure y o u have all heard
m a y possibly be wiped from the A m e r i c a n s c e n e . I! don't
know whether it w i l l or n o t . It has a couple of terrific d i s e a s e s , but it still is one of the
grandest
trees in e x i s t e n c e . I don't hardly know whether to
advise y o u to plant them or n o t . W e are still planting a few in strategic p l a c e s , but we expect in a few
years to have to spray them a couple of times a year
a l l the rest of their l i v e s .
Here is a s a s s a f r a s . It is one of the world's m o s t
b e a u t i f u l t r e e s . It grows at a moderate p a c e , has no
e n e m i e s , but '.brother! try to transplant i t . If y o u
b u y any locust be sure to m a k e your nurseryman guarantee t h a t it is both seedless and t h o r n l e s s .
Poplar—
w e l l , let's not smear this tree too q u i c k l y . Sure it
grows up fast and grows away from y o u f a s t , but y o u
w i l l get 20 years of v e r y good service out of them in
certain parts of your course as borders and
screens.
Another upright growing tree is the Norway m a p l e . It
is an upright growing type w h i c h grows in small spaces
and they grow at a good pace and apparently have no
e n e m i e s . A g a i n , they have to be planted with a ball
of e a r t h . Don't plant C h i n e s e elm in this a r e a . T h e y
do grow up q u i c k l y , but they w i l l just get up big enough to shade y o u in-your rocking chair a n d , b i n g o ,
down they g o . In some of the low r a i n f a l l areas of
the west the Chinese elm grows slower and is a pretty
good t r e e .
About putting copper in t r e e s . I drove l-§- pounds of
copper nails in one soft m a p l e t r e e . E a c h copper nail
killed a small area around its h e a d . That was about 20
years ago and those wounds healed over and the tree is
h e a l t h y and happy t o d a y .

RECOGNIZING A N D COMBATING DISEASES
J . C . Carter
Tree diseases are usually classified according to the
part of the tree that they e f f e c t . They m a y be divided
into leaf d i s e a s e s , cankers and d i e b a c k s , w i l t s , wood
rots and root r o t s .
LEAF DISEASES
Powdery m i l d e w — Powdery m i l d e w is a fungus
disease
that occurs occasionally on trees but seldom causes
serious damage*
It develops as a w h i t e powdery moldlike growth on the l e a v e s . C o n t r o l consists of applying dusting sulfur w h e n m i l d e w becomes a p p a r e n t .
Leaf s p o t s — B l a c k leaf spot of elm is one of the more
common l e a f spot d i s e a s e s . It produces s m a l l , circular to irregular black spots that appear early in Jul y . These s p o t s , confined m a i n l y to the upper
leaf
s u r f a c e , become gray w i t h numerous black pustules by
late s u m m e r . Leaf spot diseases usually cause insufficient damage to require t r e a t m e n t .
R u s t s — Most rust diseases have two h o s t s — evergreens
and deciduous t r e e s . On deciduous trees rust
usually
produces y e l l o w to orange-colored spots on l e a v e s , but
on evergreens it produces greenish-brown galls on
t w i g s . The m o r e common rust diseases can be controlled
by spraying with F e r b a m and sulfur• See spray c h a r t .
S c o r c h — F o l i a g e s c o r c h , caused by internal physiological" d i s t u r b a n c e s , unfavorable weather conditions or
frost i n j u r y , develops as yellowing or browning of
tissues between the veins or along the margins or as
complete browning and w i t h e r i n g of the l e a v e s . Most
f r e q u e n t l y , scorch develops w h e n the roots -are unable
to furnish sufficient water to compensate for the
m o i s t u r e lost from the leaves during prolonged dry
p e r i o d s . Drying w i n d s , when the temperature is h i g h ,
increase the amount and severity of s c o r c h . Although
trees affected w i t h scorch m a y lose m a n y leaves during
late s u m m e r , they should not d i e . Most shade trees
are subject to scorch*
C A N K E R S AND DIEBACKS
Canker and d i e b a c k diseases p r o d u c e dead areas of bark
on t w i g s , branches and t r u n k s . Cankers, are localized
dead a r e a s , especially in the bark and are usually

o v a l in shapeo T h e y m a y continue to enlarge u n t i l they
girdle the affected stem and the stem dies above the
girdle.
Dieback is the g r a d u a l dying of a twig or branch from
tip to b a s e . Canker diseases f r e q u e n t l y occur on weakened trees of various s p e c i e s . Branches affected
by
canker diseases should be r e m o v e d . To treat trunk
cankers a l l diseased b a r k and w o o d should be r e m o v e d .
The margins of the- canker should be traced back to
living bark to m a k e an o v a l exposed region of w o o d .
The exposed edges of bark should be painted with
s h e l l a c . Then the exposed wood surface should be protected by painting with a wound d r e s s i n g . Large
wounds should be painted once or twice each year u n t i l
t h e y are healed»
Trees in low vigor should be f e d . Two common ways of
feeding are dry feeding and liquid f e e d i n g . In d r y
feeding the tree food is placed in numerous holes under the branch spread of the tree and h e a v i l y w a t e r e d .
In liquid feeding the tree food is dissolved in water
in a spray tank and forced into the soil under pressures of jOO to 500 p o u n d s .
WILTS
Wilt diseases are commonly caused by parasitic
organi s m s — f u n g i 9 bacteria or v i r u s e s — w h i c h invade the
wood through w h i c h the sap f l o w s . Wilts cause the
leaves on one or more branches to wilt and d i e , or the
entire tree m a y be k i l l e d . F r e q u e n t l y , it appears that
w i l t of leaves is caused by toxins produced w i t h i n the
plant by the parasitic o r g a n i s m ,
D u t c h elm disease
This fungus disease affects all of our native species
and all E u r o p e a n species of e l m . Leaf symptoms i m a y
appear any time from late June u n t i l O c t o b e r . Affected
trees show c u r l i n g , y e l l o w i n g , wilting and death of
l e a v e s . Usually wilt occurs on one or a few branches
and spreads gradually to other branches u n t i l the
w h o l e tree is a f f e c t e d . Occasionally affected trees
wilt and die w i t h i n a period of four to six w e e k s .
Brown discoloration develops in the sapwood of wilting
b r a n c h e s , especially in the current-season w o o d . This
discoloration m a y appear as streaks or as diffused
browning of i n d i v i d u a l wood rings»
Since other
elm
diseases cause similar discoloration of the s a p w o o d , a
positive diagnosis m u s t be made by laboratory culture
tests of diseased s p e c i m e n s .

To prevent the spread of Dutch elm d i s e a s e , b a r k beetles w h i c h carry the fungus from -diseased and dead
trees to h e a l t h y elms should be c o n t r o l l e d . The DDT
spray formulations recommended for elm bark beetle
c o n t r o l are as follows: Hydraulic sprayer f o r m u l a ,
16 pounds t e c h n i c a l D D T , k gallons x y l e n e , 1 pint Triton X-100o
Mist blower f o r m u l a , 20 pounds
technical
D D T 9 5 gallons x y l e n e , 2% gallons acme white o i l , Ijt
pints Triton X - 1 0 0 . Concentrates of these
formulations made by s e v e r a l c o m m e r c i a l c h e m i c a l companies
are on the m a r k e t .
Trees m u s t be sprayed twice during the spring and
early summer to c o n t r o l bark b e e t l e s . The first spray
should be applied before the elm flowers or
leaves
a p p e a r . This spray for hydraulic sprayers should be a
2% emulsion of D D T . This spray for m i s t blowers should
be a 12% emulsion of D D T . The second spray should be
applied 10 to 12 weeks after the first s p r a y . This
spray for hydraulic sprayers should be a 1% emulsion
of D D T . This spray for m i s t blowers should be a 6 $
emulsion of D D T .
A l l d e a d , d y i n g , or recently cut elm w o o d , w h i c h m a y
serve as breeding m a t e r i a l for elm bark beetles should
be d e s t r o y e d . This m a t e r i a l m a y be burned or a l l bark
surfaces m a y be sprayed with DDT in N o . 2 f u e l o i l .
This solution contains 8 pounds of DDT in each 100
gallons of o i l . Since elm bark beetles can f l y several
m i l e s , these sanitary measures should be applied to
relatively large areas in regions where D u t c h ".elm
disease o c c u r s .
Elm phloem necrosis
This virus disease is widespread and destructive
to
American elm in the m i d w e s t . It also kills the Moline
v a s e , Holly-leaf and a l l other cultivated varieties of
American e l m , and can infect the w i n g e d e l m .
E a r l i e s t v i s i b l e symptoms of phloem necrosis
usually
appear as drooping and curling of leaves followed by
y e l l o w i n g , browning and finally by d e f o l i a t i o n . Elms
w h i c h show these leaf symptoms from late June to early
August usually die during a single growing s e a s o n . On
elms that are killed w i t h i n two or three w e e k s , the
leaves do not droop and turn y e l l o w , but w i l t r a p i d l y ,
turn brown and r e m a i n attached to the b r a n c h e s . Elms
w h i c h show leaf symptoms after the m i d d l e of August
frequently live over w i n t e r , produce a sparse crop of
leaves the next spring and die during late June or
J u l y . Since these leaf symptoms frequently can be con-

f u s e d w i t h those caused by other elm d i s e a s e s , field
diagnosis of phloem necrosis is based upon the color
and odor of t h e inner b a r k . The thin layer of inner
b a r k in c o n t a c t w i t h the s a p w o o d , especially at the
base of the t r u n k and in t h e buttress r o o t s , becomes
y e l l o w to butterscotch in c o l o r . The
butterscotch
color can be detected o n l y in f r e s h l y cut samples of
b a r k since the inner bark from diseased and h e a l t h y
trees turns b r o w n w i t h i n a f e w m i n u t e s after being exposed to a i r . T h e odor of w i n t e r g r e e n emanates
from
the discolored b a r k .
There is no s p r a y , c h e m i c a l i n j e c t i o n , t r u n k p a i n t ,
s o i l treatment or fertilizer known to have any benef i c i a l effects on elms infected w i t h phloem n e c r o s i s .
H e a l t h y elms can be protected from infection by spraying for the c o n t r o l of the leafhopper w h i c h carries
the virus from diseased to h e a l t h y t r e e s .
The DDT spray formulations recommended for elm leafhopper c o n t r o l are the same as the spray formulations
recommended for c o n t r o l of the Dutch elm disease insect c a r r i e r s . Trees m u s t be sprayed twice during the
growing season to c o n t r o l l e a f h o p p e r s . The f i f s t spray'
should be applied as soon as the spring leaf crop is
fully m a t u r e , usually between June 15 and June 3 0 .
T h e second spray should be applied immediately after
the midsummer or second growth of elm h'as o c c u r r e d ,
usually between July 20 and August 5« For these two
sprays a 1% emulsion of DDT should be used in hydraulic sprayers and a 6 % emulsion of DDT in m i s t b l o w e r s .
An average large e l m , $0 feet h i g h , w i l l require from
25 to 30 gallons w i t h the hydraulic sprayer or k to 5
gallons with the m i s t b l o w e r .
The effectiveness of spraying to prevent the spread of
phloem necrosis w i l l not be apparent for a year
after
the spray program was s t a r t e d , as trees are
infected
w i t h the virus one year or m o r e before they show the
d i s e a s e . No tree infected w i t h the virus when the
sprays are applied w i l l be b e n e f i t e d . The spray protects against infection only during the year in w h i c h
it is a p p l i e d . For continuous p r o t e c t i o n trees m u s t be
sprayed each y e a r . The cost of annual spraying m a y be
less than the cost of removing dead t r e e s .
Success in preventing phloem necrosis depends
on
spraying with such absolute thoroughness that no leafhopper bred in a diseased tree is left alive long
enough to feed on a h e a l t h y t r e e .
Where both Dutch elm disease and phloem n e c r o s i s occur

t h e two s p r a y p r o g r a m s r e c o m m e n d e d for the two
diseases c a n be combined into one s p r a y p r o g r a m consisting of t h r e e s p r a y s . T h e f i r s t s p r a y is the same as
t h e f i r s t s p r a y for the c o n t r o l of D u t c h elm d i s e a s e .
The second s p r a y c o m b i n e s the second spray for
Dutch
elm d i s e a s e and t h e f i r s t s p r a y for p h l o e m n e c r o s i s .
T h e t h i r d spray is the same as the second s p r a y for
the c o n t r o l of p h l o e m n e c r o s i s . T h e t i m i n g and conc e n t r a t i o n s of t h e s e sprays r e m a i n the s a m e as
sugg e s t e d above for D u t c h elm d i s e a s e and p h l o e m necrosis .
Oak wilt
T h i s f u n g u s d i s e a s e affects a l l of the i m p o r t a n t
nat i v e species of o a k in the m i d w e s t . R e c e n t l y it has
b e e n r e p o r t e d a f f e c t i n g C h i n e s e c h e s t n u t in
Missouri.
W i l t u s u a l l y appears f i r s t on b r a n c h e s in the upper
p o r t i o n of the c r o w n . W i l t of l e a v e s p r o g r e s s e s «downw a r d and inward u n t i l a l l of t h e f o l i a g e is
affected.
L e a v e s o n red and b l a c k oaks b e c o m e d u l l or p a l e g r e e n
and t h e m a r g i n s m a y c u r l u p w a r d . T h e s e s y m p t o m s
are
f o l l o w e d b y y e l l o w i n g , b r o w n i n g or b r o n z i n g of the
leaf t i s s u e s w h i c h spread f r o m the m a r g i n s t o w a r d 'the
m i d r i b . A f f e c t e d leaves m a y f a l l at any stage of leaf
w i l t . M a t u r e leaves u s u a l l y r e m a i n stiff and
fully
e x p a n d e d d u r i n g the d i f f e r e n t stages of w i l t and after
d e a t h . I m m a t u r e leaves c u r l , d r o o p , t u r n d a r k b r o w n
to b l a c k and r e m a i n a t t a c h e d to t h e b r a n c h e s . L e a v e s
on w i l t i n g bur and w h i t e oaks u s u a l l y t u r n l i g h t b r o w n
or straw c o l o r , c u r l and r e m a i n a t t a c h e d to
the
branches.
In red and b l a c k o a k s , b r o w n to b l a c k
discoloration
usually develops
in the sapwood or w i l t i n g b r a n c h e s ,
e s p e c i a l l y in the c u r r e n t s e a s o n w o o d . This d i s c o l o r a t i o n m a y appear as streaks or as d i f f u s e d b r o w n i n g of
individual wood rings. Similar
sapwood d i s c o l o r a t i o n
has b e e n o b s e r v e d in w i l t i n g bur o a k s .
A f f e c t e d r e d and b l a c k oaks m a y w i l t and d i e in four
to s i x w e e k s , or at least d u r i n g a single g r o w i n g
s e a s o n . O c c a s i o n a l l y , large b r a n c h e s of trees i n f e c t e d
l a t e in t h e summer live over w i n t e r and p r o d u c e a f e w
s c a t t e r e d leaves b e f o r e d y i n g the f o l l o w i n g s p r i n g .
Bur and w h i t e oaks u s u a l l y die s l o w l y over a p e r i o d of
years.
In l o c a l i z e d areas c o n t r o l of o a k w i l t has been obt a i n e d by p o i s o n i n g h e a l t h y oaks a d j a c e n t to
diseased
t r e e s or b y t r e n c h i n g b e t w e e n d i s e a s e d and h e a l t h y
t r e e s . T h e s e t r e a t m e n t s i n t e r r u p t an e x t e n s i v e under-

ground system of Intergrafted roots through which
spread of the disease from tree to tree m i g h t take
p l a c e . R e m o v a l of the first wilting branches in w h i t e
oaks m a y keep the trees healthy for a few y e a r s , but
they are subject to r e i n f e c t i o n . Effective c o n t r o l
m e a s u r e s to prevent the spread of oak wilt over long
distances have not been d e v e l o p e d .
CHLOROSIS
Chlorosis develops when a tree cannot get
sufficient
iron to m a n u f a c t u r e green c h l o r o p h y l l . This causes the
leaves to become y e l l o w i s h - g r e e n . Chlorosis can be
corrected by supplying iron (ferrous sulfate) to the
t r e e . This m a t e r i a l m a y be injected into the trunk or
fed through the s o i l . F o r t r u n k injections
ferrous
sulfate is used at the rate of 5 grams per inch of
trunk d i a m e t e r . F o r soil treatment a 50-50 m i x t u r e of
ferrous sulfate and powdered sulfur is applied at the
rate of 1 pound per inch of t r u n k d i a m e t e r . This mat e r i a l is placed in holes as suggested for feeding
trees.
CHEMICAL INJURY
Chemical injury to plants m a y result from the use of
weed killers such as 2,^-D and 2,l+,5-T. Leaves on
injured plants m a y be c u r l e d ,T cupped upward or downward or distorted into r a m s h o r n and various other
s h a p e s . Great care should be t a k e n in spraying lawns
w i t h weed killers to prevent injury to trees and
shrubs.
SPRAYS F O R CONTROL-OF S O M E T R E E DISEASES
The following spray chart does not represent a spray
schedule to be followed each y e a r . It is given to show
the relationship between the time of year and the order in w h i c h fungicides should be applied for the m o s t
effective c o n t r o l .

SPRAY CHART
Ko. of
sprays

Season

Plant

Diseases

Material in 100
gallons of water

March-May

Sycamore

Anthracnose

Puratized Ag. Sp. 1 pt.

3-5

April

Hawthorn,
crabj etc.

Fire blight

Bordeaux 2-6-100

1-2

Rusts

Ferban js lb., wettable
sulfur 3 lb.
Elgetol 1 gal. or
Bordeaux 8-8-100

Juniper
April-May

"

7

k-h-100

3

10-lU

Leaf blotch

Bordeaux 8-8-100

Oak

Anthracnose

Elm

Black leaf
spot

Bordeaux 8-8-100, or
commercial sulfur sprays

Walnut

Leaf spot

Puratized Ag. Sp. 1 pt.

June-August Elm

Leafhopper
(phloem
necrosis)

Special DDT formulation
(inquire for folder)

July-August Juniper

Rusts

Ferban \ lb., wettable
sulfur 3 lbs.

,f

1-2

10

Horsechestnut

June-July

7-10

5

Bordeaux

"

7

Twig blight Bordeaux 8-8-100

Pine, spruce> Tip blight
Douglas fir
May-June

No. days
between
sprays

10-lii
2

IG-Ui

2

111

2

21

2

35-hO

21-28

TREE HABITAT
To E . Shaw
One of the things that has always impressed m e as a
forester has been the m a g n i f i c e n t flora that w e have
in the c e n t r a l part of the United S t a t e s . W h y don't
we use m o r e species in shade tree and o r n a m e n t a l
plantings? On this campus y o u m a y notice a l l the bald
spots where elms have died w i t h i n the last three
y e a r s . Over half of the trees on the campus of Wabash
College at Crawfordsville are American e l m . In contrast at E a r l h a m C o l l e g e , R i c h m o n d , Indiana, over half
of their trees are m a p l e s . Yet w e have a magnificent
flora of at least fifty good species adapted to your
uses.
In the tree habitat of the forest the soil profile is
entirely different from the one w h i c h y o u find out in
the open f i e l d s . It is characterized by three m a i n
differences: the f i r s t , the s o i l is so porous
and
f u l l of organic matter that the m o i s t u r e - h o l d i n g cap a c i t y m a y be 50% m o r e than the moisture-holding capacity of soils in open f i e l d s . So in planting deciduous trees I f i l l the holes w i t h about half dirt and
half c o m p o s t , w e l l m i x e d . Now it is different w i t h the
c o n i f e r s — the e v e r g r e e n s . If y o u study their
forest
soil conditions in the f o r e s t , they pile the organic
matter up on top of the soil and create a big
thick
layer of litter and h u m u s . So if I help a farmer plant
a w i n d b r e a k , I am apt to encourage him to m u l c h the
evergreen t r e e s . A l l that I am $ o i n g , y o u ! s e e , in
both i n s t a n c e s , is taking a page out of n a t u r e s book;
and if y o u w i l l keep that one thing in m i n d , I think
y o u can help t r e e s .
Now let's take s h a d e . If w e take a tree w h i c h is a
shade lover and stick it out in the o p e n , w e should
w r a p it so it won't get s u n b u r n . W h a t about
competition? In f o r e s t r y , if w e start off a plantation with
1200 trees to the acre in the seedling s t a g e , \\re end
up with just a few hundred at m a t u r i t y , all of them
long-boled with samll t o p s . I would certainly use
wide-spacing of shade trees for your type of p l a n t i n g ,
as y o u want to get good crown d e v e l o p m e n t . I hope that
y o u don't ever f a l l for this old fallacy that y o u want
to plant the trees close t o g e t h e r , say thirty feet ap a r t , and later take out every other o n e . In the dev e l o p m e n t of tree w i n d b r e a k s , w e thought we could have
a six by six foot spacing and then thin to a 12 by 1 2 .
A b e a u t i f u l plan on p a p e r — the only thing is that is

never worked* Why? Because when a farmer had grown
those trees up to a point where they needed that thinning, they were his own creation. They were his trees.
There has been a lot of misinterpretation of the possible range of trees. The text books say that sweet
gum is native only as far north as Jackson County,
Indiana, and yet it is growing in Lansing. They say
that bald cypress reaches its northern limit in the
lower Wabash Valley around Vincennes, Indiana, and yet
you have some in southern Michigan. May I suggest,
however, that if you do use a tree north of its range,
you should try to get it from a source in the northern
part of that range.
If you look at the habitat under which a tree grows
naturally, you will get some index as to where to
plant it. Dogwood, I think, is a prime example of
that. If we put it out in the open where it is not
accustomed, we don't have too much success with it.
When we transplant it from the woods, we had" better
take some woods soil because it has a little attachment on the roots which enables it to get nitrogen.
If it is pulled out bare rooted, you usually don't get
that.
Another thing is the matter of tree s i z e — little
trees, medium-sized trees and big trees. In the big
tree size, I think that the prime example is the sycamore. Now, here is a fellow with a little city lot,
and he plants a sycamore. Isn't he building up a
beautiful bunch of grief for somebody? All he has
room for is a small or a medium-sized tree at the best
and if he will use one of these small to medium-sized
trees (a list of which I can give you but will not
enumerate now), he will adapt something to his lot and
he won't have to go to this barbarous custom of topping which is one of the curses in Indiana.
A medium-sized tree only gets up to about 35 or kO
feet in height. Right out in front of the Purdue University Library is a yellow wood. Its bark looks like
beech. In Way and June these drooping racemes of
white flowers are simply beautiful. But it is a rare
tree. F e w people know it. The only place that it occurs naturally in Indiana is down in deep ravines in
Brown County.
When we talk about these trees, we talk about things
that we like, just the same way as we like clothes.
One fellow.*likes one kind of a suit and another fellow
likes another. I know of two very gnarled and twisted

Scotch pines• They evidently are from a seed source in
southern E u r o p e , w h e r e Scotch pine trees grow in every
d i r e c t i o n . These trees have grotesque shapes and are
not attractive to m e , but the owner likes t h e m . Lots
of people want something v e r y g r a c e f u l and s y m m e t r i c a l
some people w a n t t h e m nice and straight and c l e a n . Of
l a t e , I have been thinking m o r e and more in terms of
using a wider v a r i e t y and of choosing those
species
w h i c h are freer from d i s e a s e s . Sassafras is free of
d i s e a s e , has c h a r a c t e r . It is one of the m o s t beautif u l things here on our campus in the f a l l of the y e a r .
I commend the following to your attention: The matter
of tree size is i m p o r t a n t . F i t the tree variety to
the area and position y o u h a v e . In m y b o o k , .any tree
w o r t h planting deserves v e r y good care for at least
two years after planting until its roots are v e r y w e l l
e s t a b l i s h e d . Look over the site and pick trees
best
a d a p t e d , using as m a n y of the fifty varieties as poss i b l e . And l a s t l y , read the pages out of nature's book
and simulate her c o n d i t i o n s .
- o -

A T H L E T I C F I E L D TURF MANAGEMENT
M. E . Farnham
This m o r n i n g w e are trying to aid the thinking of each
one of us rather than giving y o u too m a n y
specific,
iron-clad r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s . I w a n t to stress again from
the angle of new fields t h a t , if-it is desirable to
m a k e an a r t i f i c i a l m i x t u r e to improve the n a t u r a l soil
w i t h w h i c h w e are c o n c e r n e d , it is absolutely
essent i a l that the m a t e r i a l s be w e l l m i x e d . It is entirely
possible that if w e are not going to take care of that
angle in the w a y it should be d o n e , then w e m i g h t be
better off to leave the m i x t u r e o u t because if y o u
h a v e pockets of differing m a t e r i a l s , materials, in laye r s , those v e r y conditions do far more harm than g o o d .
T h e f o o t b a l l stadium at Rutgers in New Jersey to the
best of m y knowledge used no s o i l m i x t u r e s , but they
did bring in enough soil from one of their v e r y best
draining soils in the s t a t e . Covering of the field in
advance of games becomes rather a c a d e m i c . The soil on
the field drains b e a u t i f u l l y , and I t h i n k the good
conditions of this field emphasize h o w important that
is.
E v e n aside from the desirable effects of organic matter in the s o i l , w e should be c a r e f u l not to go too
far to the extreme of excessive organic matter because
w e w a n t the soils not to hold too m u c h w a t e r , particularly at times w h e n t h e y have to be u s e d . Whether w e
are talking about athletic fields or turf problems in
g e n e r a l , I w a n t to c a l l your attention again to the
f a c t that the b o o k , "Turf M a n a g e m e n t " , offers m u c h to
each one of u s . I t h i n k of it primarily as a reference b o o k . After y o u have t h o u g h t t h r o u g h a problem
y o u do have that book to go b a c k to a n d , using it as a
reference b o o k , c h e c k your t h i n k i n g .
W e have discussed somewhat the possible place in the
picture of warm-season grasses along w i t h our
coolseason g r a s s e s . The place in our picture we can only
decide for o u r s e l v e s . I f e e l strongly from m y experience that it is e s s e n t i a l not only to make our own
t e s t p l o t s , but to m a k e those plots,wherever p o s s i b l e ,
in the a c t u a l p o r t i o n of the property in w h i c h we are
going to use t h e m .
We continually are asked what is the proper
c u t . It is quite obvious that a h e a v y turf
port a mower and keep the mower from cutting
ly as it w i l l on a thin turf w h e n set at

h e i g h t of
w i l l supas closethe
same

height»
A g a i n , a turf that is thick w i l l stand closer
m o w i n g . On our golf fairways m a n y -of us f e e l that we
need to go to b e n t , but I f e e l quite sure that bluegrass m i x e d w i t h bent w i l l s t a n d , to a certain e x t e n t ,
a shorter cutting than bluegrass alone will... The
really important thing that should be stressed is that
it is not only the height to w h i c h y o u cut the grass
but the really important thing is h o w m u c h grass y o u
are cutting off in each c l i p p i n g . The plan should be
to m a k e mowings frequently enough so t h a t , regardless
of the height of c u t , in any one cutting we are not
cutting off an excessive proportion of the plant tiss u e s . Severe cutting is o b v i o u s l y quite a s h o c k . W h e n
y o u decide what your proper height of cut is,definitely keep in the picture the frequency of the m o w i n g and
cut frequently so that light clippings are taken off
rather than h e a v y o n e s .
1

Vie h a v e n 1 said too m u c h about fertilizing in our disc u s s i o n so far this w e e k . I t h i n k that it is pretty
w e l l agreed that phosphorus is v e r y important in connection w i t h new s e e d i n g s . W e seldom see results of
potash a p p l i c a t i o n s , but it probably comes into the
picture more than we r e a l i z e . It m a y w e l l be important in the disease c o n t r o l or the production of turf
w h i c h is less susceptible to the d i s e a s e . T h a t definitely is the case w i t h t o b a c c o . I think that w e can
keep our thinking clarified on that angle to a ! considerable extent if w e follow some of 0 . J . N o e r s
cont i n u a l advice about t h a t . You w i l l r e c a l l that he
m e n t i o n e d the fact that phosphorus-potash applications
can be confined to spring and f a l l a p p l i c a t i o n s . The
rest of the season applications m a y w e l l be n i t r o g e n .
P e r s o n a l l y , I am m u c h inclined towards the use of organic n i t r o g e n . I think that m u c h of the w o r k at
State College has pointed out that in m a n y cases applications of inorganic nitrogen in the s p r i n g , particularly in the' case where y o u are only making spring
and f a l l a p p l i c a t i o n s , the resulting turf by midsummer
or perhaps f a l l is poorer than the turf w h i c h received
no n i t r o g e n . It is quite possible by spreading the
number of applications of inorganics y o u can even out
that growth p i c t u r e . The organics probably offer a
considerable safety factor in that they are not as
subject to u n u s u a l weather conditions as are inorgani c s . For the past couple of years we have been using
more and more nitrogen even during the growing s e a s o n ,
p a r t i c u l a r l y from June o n .
I w a s v e r y m u c h interested last w e e k to see some figures by D r . Davis from the New Jersey A g r i c u l t u r a l

E x p e r i m e n t S t a t i o n on large b r o w n p a t c h . W e
aren't
t h i n k i n g too m u c h p e r h a p s of l a r g e b r o w n p a t c h o n athletic f i e l d s , but this p a s t s e a s o n ' s w o r k h a s s h o w e d a
d e c i d e d d e c r e a s e in the a m o u n t of l a r g e
brownpatch
w h e n h e has m a d e a n a p p l i c a t i o n of n i t r o g e n , and part i c u l a r l y o r g a n i c n i t r o g e n , a w e e k or t e n d a y s in adv a n c e of e a c h f u n g i c i d e t r e a t m e n t . As I r e m e m b e r i t ,
the f u n g i c i d e t r e a t m e n t s w e r e o n a t a f r e q u e n c y of t e n
d a y s to two w e e k s . W e h a v e o f t e n t h o u g h t t h a t b y using n i t r o g e n d u r i n g the s u m m e r , w e not c n l y m a y feed
our c r a b g r a s s b u t w e m a y s o f t e n our t u r f . If D r .
D a v i s ' w o r k c o n t i n u e s to h o l d s i m i l a r l y to the r e s u l t s
of t h e p a s t s e a s o n , w e ' v e got to r e v i s e our t h i n k i n g
along t h o s e lines t o o .
A e r i f i c a t i o n t o o l s now o f f e r a m u c h - n e e d e d aid
for
o v e r c o m i n g c o m p a c t i o n . T h e i r f u n c t i o n in h e l p i n g the
i n f i l t r a t i o n of w a t e r d o e s n ' t need m u c h a c t u a l scient i f i c p r o o f b e c a u s e y o u can so e a s i l y o b s e r v e i t . Howe v e r , I w o u l d p o i n t o u t t h a t in some of D r . A l d e r f e r ' s
w o r k at Penn State i t is s t r i k i n g h o w a l i m i t e d a m o u n t
of t r a m p l i n g r a p i d l y r e d u c e s or p r e v e n t s the
proper
i n f i l t r a t i o n of w a t e r . I e m p h a s i z e the p o i n t t h a t h a s
a l r e a d y b e e n m a d e - t h a t our a e r i f i c a t i o n
program
n e e d s to be not a s e a s o n a l t r e a t m e n t , but p o s s i b l y a
continuing program.
W h e n turf needs w a t e r i n g , it s h o u l d b e w a t e r e d
suffic i e n t l y to w e t the s o i l a t l e a s t s i x i n c h e s and not
l e a v e a n y d r y layer d o w n t h e r e , and t h e n t h e
watering
should not be r e p e a t e d u n t i l p e r h a p s the g r a s s begins
to suffer a l i t t l e b i t , or at a n y rate shows signs of
shortage of w a t e r by b e g i n n i n g to d i s c o l o r . W e proba b l y need to g i v e m o r e c o n s i d e r a t i o n to the r a p i d i t y
w i t h w h i c h w e c a n put w a t e r o n b e c a u s e , g o i n g b a c k to
D r . A l d e r f e r ' s f i g u r e s a g a i n , h e has f i g u r e s s h o w i n g
t h a t w i t h two r a t e s of a p p l i c a t i o n s of w a t e r , 14i n c h e s per hour and 2.8 i n c h e s per h o u r , t h a t t h e r e
w a s less p e n e t r a t i o n or i n f i l t r a t i o n of w a t e r into t h e
same soils w i t h t h e 2.8 i n c h e s a p p l i c a t i o n per hour
t h a n t h e r e w a s w i t h the
i n c h e s per h o u r . Of
course, l A
i n c h e s is a lot of w a t e r , but I b e l i e v e
t h a t h e t o o k t h a t f i g u r e b e c a u s e the s o i l h e w a s w o r k ing w i t h w o u l d take t h a t a m o u n t of w a t e r even at t h a t
f a s t r a t e . W h e n he d o u b l e d t h e r a t e of
application,
he g o t less w a t e r e n t e r i n g
the s o i l t h a n h e d i d w i t h
the single r a t e of a p p l i c a t i o n . W e are a l w a y s in a
h u r r y to get t h i n g s d o n e , and w h e n w e w a n t to go o u t
and w a t e r we f i n d the b i g g e s t s p r i n k l e r
that we
can
f i n d and t h r o w t h e w a t e r as f a s t as w e c a n and our
h u r r y is c a u s i n g a lot of h a r m .

f

L e t s talk just a little bit about crabgrass«, It has
!
been m y good fortune to be able to watch Burt M u s s e r s
treatments from day to day for the last two y e a r s . In
19^9 a series of treatments were put on our
practice
fairway using sodium arsenite, potassium cyanate and
P M A . The arsenite was put on both in dry and spray
treatments. As often happens in experimental w o r k ,
the principal thing that we found out in that first
year*s work was that potassium cyanate deteriorates
v e r y rapidly if not properly stored.
Perhaps we can summarize the thing rather briefly by
saying that one of the striking things was the value
of sodium a r s e n i t e . I have used sodium arsenite since
1937 on various scales. We recently have been thinking about dosages as small as a pound to the acre and
have some rather striking results from it. We should
have watched the moisture conditions of the soil more
closely than we did because we know the injury, or
perhaps the burning I should s a y , resulting to the desirable grasses from sodium arsenite is much more severe when the soil moisture is not in good condition.
In spite of that f a c t , we didn't kill any grass with
our sodium arsenite applications, and the end of the
season presented a rather striking picture. There
were from 1 to 5 applications made during the season
starting on the 22nd of June with one treatment in
July and three treatments in A u g u s t . A brief
summary
would say that the result of 3 to 5 applications of
sodium arsenite at 1 pound to the acre and 3 to 5 applications of potassium cyanate at 8 pounds to the
acre gave about the same end result* The arsenite was
a day or two behind the cyanate in the development of
the discoloration, and the recovery was a little bit
behind t o o . We did m a k e applications of S c u t l . In
general, we found that the double-strength -application
of Scutl was necessary to produce any results«, One
application was followed within a few hours by a thunderstorm,. We got absolutely no results from that even
though spray applications of PMA made at approximately
the same time schedule did produce satisfactory results« We f o u n d , particularly in 19^9, that 5 pints
of PMAS per acre wasn't enough. 10 pints did a pretty
good job; 15 pints to the acre was pretty severe on
the grass. The applications this last year were made
at the weaker dosage of 5 p i n t s , and with 5 a p p l i e s
tions the end results were quite satisfactory. 0 n e
thing w e have still not been able to explain. There
were also a series of plots on which a single application was m a d e , one on one date and another plot on another date, and one 10-pint application of PMAS made
in July gave us striking r e s u l t s . When we had a Field

D a y that was the outstanding p l o t . I would hate to
try to repeat it a g a i n . I t h i n k the p r i n c i p a l factor
at that time w a s the unusually satisfactory conditions
of the soil m o i s t u r e .
Perhaps I shouldn't say too m u c h about c o s t , but it
should be pointed out that for a single application on
an acre b a s i s , S c u t l would cost $50 or m o r e ; a single
application of PMAS or potassium cyanate at 5 pints to
the acre and potassium cyanate at 8 pounds to the acre
m i g h t cost around $10 or $ 1 2 , w h i l e sodium arsenite at
1 pound to the acre costs y o u 25 c e n t s . O b v i o u s l y
there is quite a difference t h e r e , and I w o u l d be m u c h
happier to be able to confine m y activities to sodium
arsenite and put the rest of the m o n e y in the weed
c o n t r o l program into m y s a l a r y .
Sodium arsenite has a further r o l e . W e never got to
first base in trying to introduce bent into Poa a n n u a ,
clover-infested turf u n t i l we did something to check
t h e m , and thus give the new grass seeding a chance to
start at least on an even s c a l e . W i t h o u t changing any
other renovation programs w e w e r e successful in getting a stand of turf on f a i r w a y conditions w i t h an infestation of Poa annua and clover w h e n we used 3 or *f
applications of sodium a r s e n i t e , w e t or d r y . The same
procedure m a y be even more e s s e n t i a l w h e n trying to
introduce slower growing bluegrass into inferior t u r f .
We have pretty w e l l come to the opinion that m a y b e we
have been making a m i s t a k e in worrying about
killing
100 percent of the crabgrass w h e n w e treat a r e a s . If
by these various treatments y o u can keep the crabgrass
from taking over the t u r f , keep it from
smothering
your desirable g r a s s e s , and at the end of the season
keep it from producing seed, y o u are making p r o g r e s s .
- o -

PLANT F O O D SUPPLIES FOR 1951
A• Ho Bowers
My message to y o u can1 be 'stated in one sentence. It
is*
"If you h a v e n t already ordered your plant food
needs, do so as soon as y o u get home."
!

I t s ! , no fun to come down here with a sad story about
how things are tough all o v e r " — y e t , two of !the three
years that I have been on your program, t h a t s been m y
general t h e m e . In 19^8, plant food industry was faced
with a severe shortage of n i t r o g e n — the very element
that pinches turf men the m o s t . In 19^9 foreign commitments of nitrogen by the government were greatly
decreased, new nitrogen plants were brought into production, and there was plenty of everything for everyb o d y . In 1950 the situation was even better and there
was no use in coming down here to tell you about t h a t .
W e thought last fall that this happy state of plenty
would continue on into 1951 but such was not to b e .
What's the trouble this time? W e l l , it is
something
that nobody envisioned as ever 'causing a shortage of
plant f o o d . The shortage is sulfur.
Early last f a l l , the sulfur producers announced that
there would be a 20% reduction in the amount of sulfur
available in 1951• It seems that heavy exports to
Europe and tremendous industrial demand in this country teamed up to deplete above-ground sulfur
stocks
faster than the producers could get it out of the
ground. Since, as a security m e a s u r e , our country must
keep on hand a stock pile of sulfur for war
emergency
u s e , this cut-back becomes necessary. As a result,
only 75% of the sulfuric acid available prior to January 1st w i l l be available during the coming y e a r . This
situation may last for a good two years or more depending on the rapidity of development of new sulfur
sources.
This hits the plant food industry in two places where
it h u r t s . F i r s t , is in superphosphate manufacture and
the other is in supplies of sulfate of ammonia. As
m a n y of y o u k n o w , superphosphate is produced by treating phosphate rock with sulfuric acid. A l s o , large
quantities of sulfate of ammonia are needed to make
the high nitrogen grades that greenkeepers like.
The net result of this 1 - 2 punch is thiss Many manufacturers are cutting down on or discontinuing entirely such high phosphate grades as k-2k-12,
10-20-0,

!

8 - 3 2 - 0 , e t c . It is true that! this phase of it d o e s n t
bother y o u p e o p l e . But h e r e s something that will?
Because of the sulfate of ammonia s h o r t a g e , regular
grades of 1 2 - 8 - 6 , 10-6-*+, and 8-8-8 have become increasingly hard to g e t . In f a c t , some companies have
stopped m a k i n g any plant foods that contain over
n i t r o g e n . F o r t u n a t e l y , m y own company is not one of
t h e s e . It is expected that o r n a m e n t a l goods containing
6% nitrogen m a y be somewhat easier to obtain than farm
grades although their availability decreases as their
nitrogen content goes u p .
As the spring shipping season goes o n , w e don't
look
for things to improve too m u c h and the state experim e n t stations are warning farmers as never before that
the bird that places the early order has the best
chance of getting what he w a n t s . Professor George Enfield emphasized early ordering and off-season b u y i n g ,
in the 1 1 January issue of "Midwest Turf News and Research . To his article I w a n t to add an emphatic
"Amen".
-

o -

CHEMICAL O U T L O O K F O R TURF F U N G I C I D E S
J . L . Marzak
1

I t s a pleasure to participate in the Sixth A n n u a l
Turf Conference of your Midwest R e g i o n a l Turf Foundat i o n . When B i l l D a n i e l invited rue to talk on the
c h e m i c a l outlook for f u n g i c i d e s , m y immediate reaction
to this somewhat m u d d l e d s i t u a t i o n w a s that
someone
from the c h e m i c a l section of the National Production
Authority w o u l d be in a better position to supply y o u
w i t h the information w h i c h was d e s i r e d . H o w e v e r , it
did not take me too long to convince myself that anyo n e could be as c o n f u s i n g , so h e r e I a m .
M r . Bowers presented a v e r y good insight into the outlook for f e r t i l i z e r . P e r s o n a l l y , I thought the picture
there w o u l d be m u c h b r i g h t e r , but the sulfur
shortage
certainly does appear to be s e r i o u s . I s t i l l envy him
for in m a n y respects his assignment was less complicated.
I would like to say at this point that the
to be presented to y o u is not an expression
ions by the Mallinckrodt C h e m i c a l W o r k s ,
p e r s o n a l views based on information and
w h i c h I attempt to keep up-to-date in m y
work.

information
of opinbut rather
data with
d a y to day

The most objective approach in giving you some basic
information on the outlook for fungicides, would be to
divide the known commercially-available products into
categories; each based on the important raw material
which is essential to continued production. Actually,
crude materials and their availability will in turn
govern the availability of the fungicides. For example mercury is necessary for the production of CaloClor or PMAS, while Cadminate and Crag 531 are dependent upon cadmium.
In the first group are those products containing mercury. This includes Calo-Clor; Corrosive sublimate or
mercuric chlorides; Calomel or mercurous chloride;
PMAS or phenylmercuric acetate; Puraturf or mercury
trienthanol ammonium lactate; Puraturf GG, an organic
mercury cadmium complex; and Special Semesan or hydroxymercurichlorophenol. We will know from previous
experiences during the last war that the use of mercury for fungicide manufacture was prohibited. Thus
far, the National Production Authority has not issued
a mercury order restricting any one use of mercury
compounds. It may be that the product in which mercury was used during World War II is now obsolete or
replaced by one not requiring mercury.
On the other hand, this product may not be needed at
the present time according to the production timetable. One of the most important and largest uses for
mercury during the last war was in the manufacture of
mercury batteries -for the armed forces. Whether there
will be a need for this type battery during this emergency, is not known.
Perhaps the reason for controlling the uses of mercury
in the past war was due to the vulnerability of our
chief mercury source. You may or may not know that
Spain is the most important supplier of this raw material, and when Spain is in enemy hands, this source
is lost to u s .
It might be worthwhile at this time to give you some
background on the recent price advances for mercury.
The group which has a strangle-hold on these important
sources of mercury also controls its price. This is
accomplished to some extent much in the same manner
that the diamond monopoly maintains the high price
levels for diamonds. In short, the supply of diamonds
placed on the market never quite meets the demand.
Approximately five months ago, mercury was selling for
about $85 per 76 pound flask. My latest information
on mercury prices, which is not necessarily current,

was that quotations were in the neighborhood of $225
per 76 pound flask« We have domestic sources of mercury but these are considered m a r g i n a l p r o d u c e r s . A
m a r g i n a l producer cannot operate profitably until the
price reaches a certain level. In the case of our domestic mercury producers, I believe this price level
is in the neighborhood of $190 per 76 pound f l a s k . It
is quite possible that the mercury prices m a y stabilize with the entry into the market of these m a r g i n a l
producers, but this is only a g u e s s .
The second category Includes the cadmium containing
fungicides such as Cadminate or cadmium succinate;
Puraturf 177 or p-amino phenyl cadmium dilactates
Puraturf G G , an organic cadriun l-ercury conplex; Crag
531 or F 531> both are the same product
chemically,
which is a cadmium zinc copper calcium chromate. Undoubtedly, y o u note that Puraturf GG was also included
in the mercury category. The National Production
Authority recently issued an order on cadmium salts
prohibiting their use in certain pigments, and this
order goes further in listing unrestricted u s e s . Although fungicides were not included in this o r d e r , the
general interpretation was that cadmium could be used
in manufacturing this important group of products.
Some people are evaluating the issuance of this order
as an omen of further restrictions, but again, this is
purely conjecture. Cadmium is not nearly so abundant
as such metals as copper, lead or zinc. F o r t u n a t e l y ,
sources of this important raw m a t e r i a l are available
domestically and in friendly South A m e r i c a n countries.
The third category lists those products which can adequately be described as organic fungicides, such as
Spergon W or tetrachlorobenzoquinone and Tersan or
tetranethylthiuramdisulfide. The key raw materials
needed for Spergon are chlorine and benzine which are
currently in tight supply. If either item is required
in larger quantities by the Government, production
capacity would be enlarged in the case of chlorine,
while benzene can be produced synthetically, although
it will command a higher price. It appears that the
critical material for Tersan is sulfur which is currently being produced in diminishing quantities. M r .
Bowers delved into the sulfur situation and there is
no need for me to say anything f u r t h e r . H o w e v e r , I
recently noticed in a chemical journal that new sources of sulfur would be available by a new process at
some time in the f u t u r e . The ingenuity of the chemical
industry is truly amazing. It seems that no barriers
are too difficult to surmount when the problem is important ehough.

I would like to say something briefly on the nature of
the chemical industry w h i c h certainly has a profound
effect on the availability of basic raw m a t e r i a l s . The
tremendous amount of research and development w h i c h is
constantly being c o n d u c t e d , usually results in new
p r o d u c t s . In some instances these new products replace old p r o d u c t s , thereby in m a n y cases
increasing
the availability of the raw materials w h i c h w e r e required for the old p r o d u c t s . On the other h a n d , these
new products m a y use raw materials which are not ab u n d a n t , thus creating controls during periods of em e r g e n c i e s . This is being brought to your
attention
m e r e l y to show y o u that the picture on availability of
products can easily change overnight w h e n periods of
emergencies are in e f f e c t .
I would like to summarize the information presented to
y o u , and this certainly should not qualify me as a
p r o p h e t . It is not m y intention to deviate from the
information that is currently available to m a k e longterm p r e d i c t i o n s .
1 . Let's take the easiest f i r s t — the organic fungicides should not present too m u c h of a probl e m . The outlook here is g o o d .
2 . For the mercury-containing c o m p o u n d s — the outlook is uncertain«, If i d e n t i c a l
circumstances
were to p r e v a i l as they did during World War II,
the outlook would be obvious to y o u .
3 . The information available for the cadmium category does not permit me to say anything more
definite than that the o u t l o o k is also
uncert a i n . Of c o u r s e , we have no previous experience
upon w h i c h w e can r e l y . In the case of Cadmina t e , it appears that m y company w i l l have sufficient m a t e r i a l to m e e t demands t h r o u g h 1951«
This m a y also be the case for the other cadmium
fungicides.
I believe that the best statement w h i c h could be m a d e
relative to the outlook for chemical fungicides in
g e n e r a l was given to y o u by D r . Grau in his talk Monday a f t e r n o o n . I would like to repeat t h i s . He s a i d ,
"Let's look ahead to tough t i m e s , and if they do not
c o m e , w e can breathe a sigh of relief." I hope that I
have given y o u an insight into the m a n y factors inv o l v e d and w i t h t h e s e , y o u m a y be able to understand
the situation m o r e c l e a r l y . C e r t a i n l y , if any of y o u
have some inside information w h i c h is not general
k n o w l e d g e ? y o u can now more easily m a k e your own predictions .

INSECTS OF TURF
Go Eo Lehker
Many folks are hoping that cold winter weather here in
the midwest has killed m o s t of the i n s e c t s , but unfort u n a t e l y , this is not true*
Most of the soil inhabiting species w h i c h are native to this part of the country such as w h i t e g r u b s , ants and w e b w o r m s , are w e l l
accustomed to this c l i m a t e . F i r s t , permit m e to say a
word about turf insects in g e n e r a l . Many of y o u were
here last year w h e n John Schread of the C o n n e c t i c u t
E x p e r i m e n t Station gave his v e r y excellent
discussion
on turf insects and their c o n t r o l . You w i l l r e c a l l
that 15 or 20 years ago w e did not have anything v e r y
good to c o n t r o l , for e x a m p l e , such insects as white
g r u b s . Now there are so m a n y chemicals w h i c h w i l l
k i l l grubs and other turf insects that it is a question of w h i c h one to u s e . Here is one principle we
should bear in m i n d — any c h e m i c a l giving a quick
k i l l usually has a short r e s i d u a l action because of
its v o l a t i l i t y . L i k e w i s e , chemicals having a long
r e s i d u a l action are often less v o l a t i l e a n d , t h e r e f o r e ,
kill more slowly.
I believe that C h l o r d a n e , Toxaphene and possibly Ald r i n and D i e l d r i n w i l l be our m o s t u s e f u l insecticides
on turf since they have long r e s i d u a l action and w i l l
k i l l a great v a r i e t y of i n s e c t s . C h l o r d a n e , for example is v e r y good for w h i t e g r u b s , and sod webworms
and also excellent for controlling a n t s .
Question: Is Chlordane effective against m o l e s ?
Answer; Y e s , in that moles are primarily insect and
earthworm f e e d e r s . If the insect and worm
population
is e l i m i n a t e d , there is nothing for the moles to eat
and they m o v e out of the a r e a . You have probably seen
a w e l l cared for green having little or no insect population
Moles m a y m o v e in 3 or b feet looking for
insects on w h i c h to feed,but if they do not find t h e m ,
they m o v e out and go someplace else where the
hunting
is b e t t e r .
Question: Do w e know anything about the new m a t e r i a l
for m o l e s known as Mole-go?
A n s w e r : Permit m e to say first that I am not an expert
on c o n t r o l of m o l e s . That problem is left to M r . G . C ,
O d e r k i r k of the F i s h and Wildlife S e r v i c e , who is located in our building here o n the c a m p u s . M r . O d e r k i r k
says that moles have a v e r y sensitive smell equal to

that of m o s t any a n i m a l in e x i s t e n c e . T h e y have a
tendency to avoid foreign m a t e r i a l s rather than come
in contact with them or eat them«, Your Mole-go m a y
get r e s u l t s , but M r . O d e r k i r k believes the best m e t h o d
of m o l e c o n t r o l is trapping u n t i l poisoning
methods
h a v e been t h o r o u g h l y worked outc
Question; W h a t is the cheapest method of getting rid
of night crawlers in fairways?
Answer: Chlordane applied at the rate of 10 pounds per
xuu square f e e t . Lead arsenate
is probably better
but it is quite expensive and w i t h the Chlordane
treatment y o u are also getting grub and ant c o n t r o l
and are killing several birds w i t h one s t o n e .
Question? How about cutworm control?
Answert There are m a n y kinds of cutworms«
Here in Indiana there are over 120 s p e c i e s . Some kinds are killed w i t h DDT and others with Chlordane and nearly a l l
w i t h poisoned bran baito
Insofar as the new chemicals
are c o n c e r n e d , the best o v e r a l l k i l l can be obtained
w i t h T o x a p h e n e . It has been tested against cutworms
on a number of crops (not so m u c h on t u r f ) and is also
a comparatively cheap material*
W h e n used at the rate
of 2 pounds of a c t u a l c h e m i c a l per a c r e , it usually
does a good j o b . Your question brings to m i n d another
s u b j e c t . Most of the new insecticides come in three
f o r m s , n a m e l y , w e t t a b l e p o w d e r s , emulsions, and d u s t s .
The wettable powders w o r k v e r y nicely in hydraulic or
so-called h i g h pressure s p r a y e r s . If y o u are using
a low pressure weed-type s p r a y e r , the wettable powders
are not v e r y s a t i s f a c t o r y . T h e y w i l l clog the nozzles
and cut out the gears«
If y o u are intending to apply any insecticide on fairways w i t h a low pressure type s p r a y e r , y o u w i l l .want
to be sure and get the emulsion type of insecticide
rather than a w e t t a b l e p o w d e r .
Question;How long w i l l DDT sprayed on trees and shrubs
remain effective against mosquitoes?
Answer; The chances are they w i l l remain effective not
over a v e r y f e w days and possibly not that l o n g . Mosquitoes breed in stagnant water and a number of them
w i l l fly in and annoy your players and customers without ever settling down on sprayed trees and
shrubs.
We have found that if one is arranging a lawn party or
concert that spraying or dusting trees or shrubs w i t h
DDT usually cleans out the m o s q u i t o e s but it ±&. decid-

edly a temporary t h i n g . Mosquitoes are also big problems on golf driving r a n g e s . F o g g i n g machines are now
on the m a r k e t w h i c h cost about $ 5 0 0 . One m a c h i n e , the
Silver Creek m o d e l , lends itself to s m a l l area treatm e n t . It is operated w i t h an electric motor and a
long extension c o r d . During periods of h e a v y mosquito
f l i g h t s , this m a c h i n e could be sprayed two or three
times every evening if necessary and on ether occasions it m i g h t not be needed for s e v e r a l d a y s . On golf
driving ranges and around club houses w h e r e people sit
o u t s i d e , I believe that one of these little m a c h i n e s
would prove to be a good i n v e s t m e n t . T h e y operate on
the same principle as the big ones and w i l l give imm e d i a t e but t e m p o r a r y c o n t r o l of m o s q u i t o e s . The machine I m e n t i o n e d is m a n u f a c t u r e d by the Silver Creek
Precision C o r p o r a t i o n , Silver C r e e k , New Y o r k .
Question: Is DDT effective on bagworm?
Answer: N o , it is not v e r y e f f e c t i v e , at least not the
bagworm here in the middle w e s t . In the v i c i n i t y of
Lafayette bagworms hatch around the first of J u n e .
W h i l e they are small they can be killed w i t h a n o m i n a l
strength of lead a r s e n a t e , but as they m a t u r e t h e y become m o r e resistant and are difficult to k i l l . There
are two chemicals that do an excellent job on the mat u r e w o r m s . The best is Parathion at the rate of 2
pounds of a 15 percent w e t t a b l e powder in 100 gallons
of w a t e r . The other m a t e r i a l that is less
dangerous
is T o x a p h e n e , used at the rate of k pounds of 50 percent w e t t a b l e powder in 100 gallons of w a t e r . I know
that m a n y of y o u are afraid to use P a r a t h i o n , but virtually a l l of our fruit growers and greenhouse m e n in
Indiana are using i t . Y o u , t o o , can use Parathion if
y o u are willing to buy a respirator and wear it and
also follow the other directions on the
Parathion
p a c k a g e . W h e n y o u spray w i t h this m a t e r i a l use your
respirator and protective clothing*
Button the shirt
sleeves around your w r i s t and wear n a t u r a l rubber
gloves and a h a t . In other w o r d s , do not
purposely
expose your body to P a r a t h i o n . Stay out of the
spray
drift and if y o u get Parathion on your hands or b o d y ,
t a k e time to w a s h it off before y o u f i l l the sprayer
a g a i n . W h e n y o u are through s p r a y i n g , take a bath and
do not re-wear the clothing u n t i l after it has been
washed.
-

o-

CONTROL OF TURF DISEASES IN MICHIGAN
D r . J . R . Vaughn
You m a y not be familiar w i t h the "melting-out" dise a s e , but a number of the superintendents up at Michigan had a great d e a l of trouble with it two years a g o .
W h e n the disease first appeared and was finally distinguished from large b r o w n p a t c h , which m o s t of us
first thought it w a s , w e found that none of the
usual
fungicides had any effect on the d i s e a s e . It just
continued
u n t i l the weather stopped i t . S i n c e we
?
c o u l d n t order up the w e a t h e r , that w a s n ' t v e r y satisfactory c o n t r o l .
This last summer the only place w e had any great am o u n t of m e l t i n g - o u t in Michigan was on o n e golf
c o u r s e . At that location, infection got as high as 30
p e r c e n t . T h i r t y percent of the green was entirely in
the black-brown stage. One of the differences between
this and large brownpatch is that the turf in the center of the patch is d e a d . W i t h large b r o w n p a t c h , if
y o u stop the d i s e a s e , the turf w i l l start to grow
a g a i n . After m e l t i n g - o u t a t t a c k s , the only w a y the
turf recovers is to grow in from the o u t s i d e . If the
patches are v e r y l a r g e , of c o u r s e , you have to resod
that particular a r e a .
On one green the area sprayed w i t h Acti-dione did have
m e l t i n g - o u t come i n , and by July 10 it affected
about
one percent of the a r e a , but never got any larger than
t h a t . (See Chart I) On the area treated w i t h
phenyl
m e r c u r y acetate about 10 percent was affected by June
26 and this increased to more than 25 percent by the
first of A u g u s t . Patches were put in before the first
of A u g u s t , but in spite of t h a t , the disease continued
to increase (grow away from the patched a r e a ) u n t i l about the second of August when the weather turned v e r y
d r y and quite h o t (hot, d r y weather is the best weather y o u can have to stop t h i s ) . That stopped the disease on this green and the patches took h o l d and the
green r e c o v e r e d . The green sprayed with the A c t i - d i o n e
held the disease in check in spite of the w e a t h e r .
Chart II shows dollarspot c o n t r o l on one of the golf
courses at H o l l a n d , Michigan where w e had an experim e n t a l p l o t . W e used Acti-dione on four greens and
copper zinc chromate (Crag 5 3 1 ) on the other
greens.
E a c h one of the little dots represents .01 percent of
the area of the entire green. The number of spots is
more important than the size of the patch because one

CHART I- w MELTING-OUr; HELMINTHOSPQRJUM SPECIES,
INCIDENCE AT RED CEDAR GOLF COURSE, 1950,
LANSING, MICHIGAN

PHENYL MERCURIC
ACETATE

ACTI-DIONE

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d o l i a r s p o t can throw a b a l l off and that m a k e s it b a d .
O n July 1 , w h i c h was two w e e k s after our f i r s t s p r a y ,
there were d o t s o n t h e green sprayed w i t h the copper
zinc c h r o m t t e . There were none o n the g r e e n sprayed
w i t h A c t i - d i o n e . A b o u t the first of S e p t e m b e r , it was
m o i s t and c o o l a g a i n and a n e w infestation of dollarspot o c c u r r e d . O n September 1 1 , there w a s considerable
infestation on the Crag 531 treated greens and .02 per
c e n t o n the o t h e r .
Now I don't m e a n to imply by this that A c t i - d i o n e is
that m u c h better than Crag for d o l l a r s p o t , but this
w a s put out o n the protective b a s i s . Those o f y o u w h o
h a v e seen Sharvelle's article o n t h e curative
effect
of these m a t e r i a l s w i l l get a n entirely d i f f e r e n t pict u r e . It depends o n h o w y o u w a n t to approach the
p r o b l e m — whether y o u w a n t to t r y to cure these dise a s e s , or whether y o u w a n t to t r y to p r o t e c t against
t h e m . A t this c l u b , Acti-dione did a better protective j o b . Sprays w e r e p u t o n e v e r y ten d a y s .

In another experiment on one green,one-half was sprayed with 531 and one-half with Acti-dione. (See Chart
III) There was apparently better control by the Actidione than by the Crag 531. On the twenty - third of
August when the late summer infestation started there
wasn't as much difference as there was on the other
dates. On the seventh of September, the last rating
date, there were quite a few more spots in the Crag
than in the Acti-dione areas. Again, these sprays
were based on protective measures put on regularly all
through the summer.
For some t i m e , D r . Sharvelle and I have been interested in r e s e a r c h o n f u n g i c i d e s . In t h e case of the turf
f u n g i c i d e s , v e r y little w a s k n o w n , so w e are testing
the m a t e r i a l s in culture w i t h the fungus growing
in
p e t r i dishes in a m e d i u m w h i c h contains a known concentration of a turf fungicide f i g u r e d in parts peJ
m i l l i o n . We know that these fungicides do not behave
the same in t h e culture as they do in the f i e l d , but
w e c a n t e l l a good fungicide in c u l t u r e . At 10 p p m .
of Calo-clor,growth of the m e l t i n g - o u t fungus is about
the same as the c h e c k and at 50 p p m . there is an increase over the c h e c k . W i t h 100 p p m . o f C a l o - c l o r ,
the fungus h a s g r o w n better t h a n in the c h e c k — there
is actual stimulation in that f u n g u s , grows about
t w i c e as m u c h or m o r e than it does where there is no
fungicide p r e s e n t . T h e n at 2 5 0 p p m . the fungicide begins to restrict the growth like it s h o u l d , and at 550
p p m . it almost c o m p l e t e l y stopped the fungus
from
g r o w i n g . Now that is just an interesting
observation

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and is one of the things that we are trying to find
o u t about these f u n g i c i d e s — w h a t do they actually do
against the fungus i t s e l f .
T h e A c t i - d i o n e at 50 p p m . completely inhibits Helminthosporium; the Calo-clor at 50 ppm does n o t . They
both c o m p l e t e l y inhibit the d o l l a r s p o t , perhaps a little better for the Acti-dione than w i t h the m e r c u r y .
At 10 p p m . the A c t i - d i o n e c o m p l e t e l y inhibits the Helm i n t h o s p o r i u n " and both inhibit d o l l a r s p o t .
Acti-dione is an antibiotic f u n g i c i d e . That m e a n s that
it comes from the same sort of process as does Penic i l l i n , Streptomycin and the so-called wonder d r u g s .
It is a drug for the g r e e n . We have reported our results to the c o m p a n y , and we have suggested that we
t h i n k there is a m a r k e t for i t , t h a t there is a need
for it based on our t e s t s . That is not o n l y in Michigan but last summer we had tests in O h i o , W e s t Virginia and I n d i a n a . We think it compares w i t h the
other
materials o n d o l l a r s p o t and brownpatch c o n t r o l , and it
is the only one that we have f o u n d that w i l l c o n t r o l
m e l t i n g - o u t . The drug companies are able to sell a l l
the P e n i c i l l i n , Streptomycin and drugs that they can
m a k e and m o r e , so if they go into the fungicides manufacturing b u s i n e s s , they w i l l have to quit m a k i n g
some of these drugs to make t h i s . T h e y have to decide
t h a t . It is not on the m a r k e t y e t . I think it is
w o r t h w h i l e to m e n t i o n these new m a t e r i a l s even
though
they aren't a v a i l a b l e . If they decide t h a t they are
not going to m a k e it there is no' use of
further
t e s t s . If it is never going to be available to y o u ,
we don't care h o w good it i s . If the c o m p a n y desires
to make i t , it w o n ' t be available on a large scale unt i l a year from this next s e a s o n .
Questions W h a t time of the year does m e l t i n g - o u t start?
W h a t time of d a y is it m o s t n o t i c e a b l e ?
For one t h i n g , it needs a lot of m o i s t u r e . You have
to h a v e rainy weather or foggy weather or v e r y heavy
dews,. It d o e s n ' t need such h o t weather as b r o w n p a t c h .
We found that w h e n we produce it in the
laboratory,
where we can do it under c o n t r o l , there are two critic a l t e m p e r a t u r e s — o n e for i n f e c t i o n and one for the
d i s e a s e to show s y m p t o m s . The temperature at w h i c h
infection takes place is around 72 d e g r e e s . The temperature for it to develop and k i l l the grass is about
8 0 to 85 d e g r e e s . It is e a r l i e r , p r o b a b l y , t h a n brown
p a t c h , doesn't need quite as h o t weather and is probL
ably more sensitive than b r o w n p a t c h to m o i s t u r e . • he
early stage has sort of a b l u i s h , smoky tinge to the

g r a s s . I t h i n k t h a t y o u c a n see it b e s t e a r l y in t h e
m o r n i n g or in t h e late a f t e r n o o n w h e n t h e l i g h t is
s o r t of a t a s l a n t .
Q u e s t i o n ; Is this H e l m i n t h o s p o r i u m c o n f i n e d to bentg r a s s e s or d o e s it also occur o n b l u e g r a s s , and if s o ,
w h a t is the d i f f e r e n c e ?
W e k n o w t h a t t h e r e is a d i f f e r e n c e . The o n e on bluegrass is w h a t t h e y c a l l e y e s p o t . It is a d e f i n i t e
species of H e l m i n t h o s p o r i u m , h a s b e e n i d e n t i f i e d , and
w e k n o w w h a t it i s . T h e s p e c i e s t h a t c a u s e s this m e l t ing o u t is not the same t h i n g . It is a v e r y
c l o s! e
r e l a t i v e and b e l o n g s in the same f a m i l y , but it h a s n t
been named y e t . O n e of the t h i n g s t h a t w e are w o r k i n g
o n now is to t r y to get t h a t thing s e p a r a t e d
from
these o t h e r H e l m i n t h o s p o r i u m s . H e l m i n t h o s p o r i u m
is
sort of like the S m i t h f a m i l y — there are a l l kinds
of t h e m . E v e r y g r a s s t h a t y o u c a n t h i n k o f , including
c r a b g r a s s , has two or t h r e e H e l m i n t h o s p o r i u m s
that
w i l l attack it. Usually, they cause leafspot like they
do in the b l u e g r a s s . This m e l t i n g - o u t also c a u s e s a
l e a f s p o t and a c r o w n r o t . It is a specific H e l m i n t h o sporium and as far as we k n o1 w , it h i t s nothing
more
t h a n b e n t g r a s s . W e h a v e n t f o u n d1 any b e n t g r a s s that
is r e s i s t a n t to i t , but we h a v e n t gone into that as
t h o r o u g h l y as we w i l l in the f u t u r e .
- o T H E 1950 F U N G I C I D E T R I A L S
E. G.-Sharvelle, Chairman
Insects and D i s e a s e s
In the last five y e a r s y o u h a v e seen appear in the
turf p r o g r a m picture a number of new f u n g i c i d e s . T h e s e
f u n g i c i d e s are of t h r e e m a j o r c a t e g o r i e s : we h a v e the
o r g a n i c m a t e r i a l s w h i c h a l l of y o u are f a m i l i a r
with;
w e have the m a t e r i a l such as D r . V a u g h n d i s c u s s e d t h e 5 3 1 9 c a d m i n a t e s ; and then we h a v e
non-mercurial
f u n g i c i d e s s u c h as S p e r g o n and T e r s a n . Y o u are a w a r e
of t h e f a c t t h a t t h e r e has b e e n some c o n f u s i o n r e g a r d ing t h e s e m a t e r i a l s and last y e a r , for the second year
in s u c c e s s i o n , t h e r e w a s a n a t i o n a l l y - c o o r d i n a t e d program d e s i g n e d to t e s t t h e s e m a t e r i a l s . W e
reported
o n this in C h i c a g o s e v e r a l w e e k s a g o , and as a r e s u l t
of t h e s e c o o r d i n a t i v e t e s t s , w e f e e l that we are in a
b e t t e r p o s i t i o n to talk a b o u t t h e r e l a t i v e v a l u e „ df

these different f u n g i c i d e s . There w e r e ten states
w h i c h took part in this w o r k in 1 9 5 0 . In 1951? I would
like to take this o p p o r t u n i t y to announce that Charley
Wilson in F r e d Grau's office w i l l be the
coordinator,
and the prospects look as though w e w i l l h a v e at least
15 states working on a coordinated program in testing
f u n g i c i d e s . John has discussed the d i s e a s e s . Glen
has m e n t i o n e d the i n s e c t s . Glen has also m e n t i o n e d
some of the new i n s e c t i c i d e s . I have tried to m e n t i o n
some of the f u n g i c i d e s . John has also pointed out h o w ,
by research in the laboratory,we perhaps can find more
l e a d s , and now w e are r e a d y for your q u e s t i o n s .
The cadminates are groups of m a t e r i a l s - Crag 531 and
F - 5 3 1 . It isn't fair to use the name Cadminate because
that is a brand n a m e . Let's t a l k about the
cadmium
c o m p o u n d s . Here are t y p i c a l results that we obtained
throughout the country in 1950 on dollarspot
control
w i t h the different f u n g i c i d e s . These results from
Iowa are v e r y characteristic of a l l the states
that
tested chemicals for d o l l a r s p o t c o n t r o l . On the unsprayed plots approximately 80 percent of the area was
involved w i t h dollarspot,and as the season p r o g r e s s e d ,
where no sprays were a p p l i e d , the disease progressively got w o r s e and w o r s e throughout the s e a s o n . As contrasted w i t h t h a t , the cadmium compounds gave the most
effective c o n t r o l . Three of them m e n t i o n e d here are
C a d m i n a t e , Puraturf 177 9 and Carbon and Carbide
1025These materials performed the best in. I o w a , Indiana
and California and other a r e a s . The m e r c u r i a l s were
intermediate and in this particular w o r k T e r s a n was
not as e f f e c t i v e . Now that is the situation, gentlem e n , n a t i o n a l l y . Everyone appears to be in agreement
that the cadmium-type compounds including c a d m i n a t e ,
Carbon and Carbide 1 0 2 5 , Crag 531 and F - 5 3 1 are the
m a t e r i a l s that are the safest to use and the m o s t effective on d o l l a r s p o t .
Questions W h e n y o u get into your h o t weather and large
b r o w n p a t c h becomes a p r o b l e m , w i l l the cadmium compounds do the job?
Answer: N o , they w o n ' t . On an unsprayed area 22 percent of the t o t a l area was involved in large "brownp a t c h . You w i l l notice that the best standard m a t e r i a l
was the m e r c u r i c c h l o r i d e , that i s , it gave the
least
b r o w n p a t c h . A new c h e m i c a l , ^06:, gave good results but
is not a v a i l a b l e . It is a California spray chemical
company p r o d u c t . F r o m Spencer D a v i s ' w o r k in New Jersey you w i l l notice that the cadmium c o m p o u n d s , when
It comes to large brownpatch controls are at the low
end of the s c a l e . In g e n e r a l , the m a t e r i a l that has

been m o s t e f f e c t i v e for large b r o w n p a t c h is T e r s a n .
T e r s a n 75 is r e l a t i v e l y the same product as the T e r s a n
that y o u are familiar w i t h . It w a s a 50 p e r c e n t active
ingredient and it is changed to a 75 p e r c e n t
active
i n g r e d i e! n t . T h e cost w i l l r e m a i n a b o u t the s a m e , and
y o u w o n t apply q u i t e as m u c h . I t h i n k that it is w e l l
w o r t h m e n t i o n i n g that t h e m e t h o d of a p p l i c a t i o n is
quite important on m o s t a l l of t h e s e c h e m i c a l s . Pers o n a l l y , I like to see the least a m o u n t of water used
o n any of the c h e m i c a l compounds for non-mercurials as
possible.
T h a t is the situation on b r o w n p a t c h . T h e r e is v e r y
little d i f f e r e n c e in the performance of some of these
m a t e r i a l s and It comes down to the point of sorting
o u t v e r y fine d i f f e r e n c e s .
Question: W i l l the use of iron sulfate c o n t r o l greasespot?
Answers Now grease spot is an entirely d i f f e r e n t disease'.™' G r e a s e s p o t h a p p e n s to be a d i s e a s e caused by
p y t h i u m , a f u n g u s , and w i l l o n l y be a problem in years
of h i g h h u m i d i t y and h i g h t e m p e r a t u r e . It w i l l not
appear u n t i l the temperatures get up to 85 or
above;
and so long as the temperatures remain above 8 0 with
h i g h h u m i d i t y , greasespot or pythium (some c a l l it
spot b l i g h t ) w i l l be a p r o b l e m . None! of t h e m a t e r i a l s
that h a v e been so far tested! (we d o n t have this disease every year so we c a n t test the value of fungicides against i t ) have done the job of
preventing
greasespoto
It is called g r e a s e s p o t because it looks
!
as if y o u v e gone out there
and drained the o i l out of
T
an a u t o m o b i l e , and y o u v e got these g r e a s e s p o t s
all
a r o u n d . D r . 0- J> Noer suggested the use of iron sulf a t e at 1 pound to five thousand square feet in 30
gallons of w a t e r . This rate w i l l speed r e c o v e r y from
g r e a s e s p o t and there are certain greenkeepers who have
tried it and h a v e found that it speeded the
recovery
from g r e a s e s p o t . Now let me offer this s u g g e s t i o n .
W e hear a l l these names - m e l t i n g - o u t , g r e a s e s p o t ,
spot b l i g h t , and a l l those other names - and it is important that the superintendent know exactly what the
cause of the trouble i s ,
- o -

PMAS O N T E E S , M Y E X P E R I E N C E
M . Mo Parsons
D r . D a n i e l asked m e to t e l l y o u w h a t I tried to do at
Highland C o u n t r y Club on our tees in 1 9 5 0 . To start
w i t h , we have about any type of grass that grows around I n d i a n a p o l i s — P o a a n n u a , seeded b e n t , b l u e g r a s s ,
planted b e n t , Alta f e s c u e , U-3 bermuda that has been
played on this last s u m m e r , and the c r a b g r a s s e s . W e
have s m a l l t e e s , fairly h e a v y p l a y . We started w i t h a
treatment of 2 ounces of PMAS in 20 gallons of water
per thousand square feet at two-we'ek i n t e r v a l s .
F i r s t treatments
Crabgrass d i s c o l o r e d , clover leaves
were d i s c o l o r e d . Chickweed was almost c o m p l e t e l y killed.
Second treatment: Crabgrass was v e r y s i c k . Some discoloration of our grasses w i t h the exception of U-3
b e r m u d a , (Two slides s h o w n ) . We put six treatments
on
at two-week intervals of t h i s . I w o u l d n ' t say that we
had control; w h a t I was after was to kill the
crabgrass in the seedling stage and that is w h y we put it
on every two w e e k s . We w a t e r e d h e a v y for two nights
before the application w e n t o n . After it w e n t o n , we
kept water off for three or four days and we
followed
up w i t h a fertilization plan to h e l p bring b a c k the
color of our g r a s s e s . I was a little discouraged w i t h
our so-called hard or silver c r a b . It nipped it down
some and stopped the g r o w t h . The seed head
d i d n ' t seem
!
to mature the w a y it did w h e n it h a d n t been t r e a t e d .
The thing that I am interested in and hope for is that
we are sterilizing our soil so this crabgrass
seed
w i l l not g e r m i n a t e , as w e l l as killing the crabgrass
plant that comes u p .
We also used on some t e e s , one ounce of PMAS to one
ounce of sodium arsenite in 20 gallons of water and w e
got about the same results and maybe a little better
than we did w i t h the s t r a i g h t P M A S .
As we said y e s t e r d a y , we know v e r y little about crabg r a s s , w h e n it g e r m i n a t e s , so t h e r e f o r e , it is quite a
job to try to eliminate i t . If we can stop it in the
s o i l and keep the seed from g e r m i n a t i n g , I think that
a lot of our trouble w i l l be over w i t h . But it is like
a f e l l o w w h o works for me s a i d . W h e n he was a kid down
in southern K e n t u c k y his dad used to m a k e him get out
w i t h a grubbing hoe to dig o u t the J o h n s o n g r a s s , pile
it u p , d r y i t , dig out all the roots and b u r n the
whole t h i n g . They would set that on fire and every

place the smoke hit the g r o u n d , it took r o o t . It can
be likened in that w a y to c r a b g r a s s . I hope to follow
this plan if labor w i l l permit this next year
and
start along in May and apply a treatment every two
weeks on through S e p t e m b e r . The reason for the twow e e k interval between treatments is to let the seed
down there germinate and get those shoots above the
ground to burn those o f f . The same rates m a y be varied
a little in w a t e r — I was told yesterday that I m i g h t
be using a little too m u c h w a t e r . I am going to use
2 0 , 1 5 , 10 and even 5 gallons of water per
thousand
square feet in different m o n t h s . I am going to cut
d o w n the water and try some high pressure and low
pressure.
Question:
ting?

When do y o u think crabgrass starts germina-

In 1950 the first that I found on our tees was just a
little bluish-green spike maybe a half-inch long coming through the second w e e k In M a y .
The tees are cut -g* i n c h , mowed 3?
or 5 times a w e e k .
If we can w h i p it on the t e e s , then we w i l l go on the
rough and b a n k s . I am going to play with sodium arsenite a lot more next y e a r .
In 19^6 we went through a scorched earth policy at our
club to get rid of the grasses that we thought we did
not w a n t . There was an awful lot of creeping bent on
the fairways that had become f l u f f y , so right after
the Purdue meeting in the spring of 19^6 we had G r a u
and Mott come down and we w e n t over the course and we
set up a program for $8*4-00 worth of m a t e r i a l which the
board a p p r o v e d . We burned every spear of grass off
our f a i r w a y s . We let them have the course on the
f o u r t h of July and on the morning of the 5th we started putting on c h e m i c a l s . B y the first of August there
was no more grass on those fairways which I hope never
to go through again as long as I l i v e . We burned it
o f f , we followed up w i t h 300 pounds of arsenate lead
to the a c r e , 300 pounds superphosphate to the
acre,
(we used Milarsenite at 1200 pounds to the acre to
b u r n ) , and put some humus in I t . We seeded 60% bluegrass and b 0 % Astoria b e n t , by w e i g h t .
The next year we had a bad year and didn't have enough
w a t e r , it went d o w n quite a little and we got quite a
lot of Poa a n n u a . The seeded bent has taken over very
w e l l and it has got so at our club that if they see a
dandelion or weed on the f a i r w a y , I hear about i t . So
b o y s , if y o u get your course to w h a t is called a per-

feet g r e e n , God help y o u , because y o u haven't m u c h to
look forward t o .
<o S U M M A R Y OF CHEMICAL CONTROL MEASURES F O R C R A B G R A S S
Bo Ho G r i g s b y
M i c h i g a n State College
E x a m i n a t i o n of w e e d c o n t r o l literature shows
that,
while a large number of compounds have been used exp e r i m e n t a l l y in the last f e w y e a r s , only a limited
number have given results that were
satisfactory.
Among these w h i c h have given p a r t i a l success there are
m a n y conflicting reports ranging from no c o n t r o l to
9 0 $ or better c o n t r o l . L i k e w i s e , varying effects upon
turf grasses have b e e n r e p o r t e d .
Results obtained in the north c e n t r a l states are often
different from those reported in the north
eastern
states and no consistent p a t t e r n is evident in either
region« Climatic d i f f e r e n c e s , s o i l f a c t o r s , species of
grass and stage of growth at the time of
application
a l l play some part in the wide v a r i a t i o n of reported
r e s u l t s . The m e t h o d of evaluating results has not b e e n
uniform throughout the reports and this m a k e s comparisons d i f f i c u l t .
The chemicals used for c o n t r o l of crabgrass are
generally contact herbicides and exert their toxic action
upon the foliage of sprayed grass or upon the root
system of grass in treated a r e a s . A few compounds are
effective o n l y upon germinating seedlings and one or
two appear to be translocated in the grass p l a n t . Evidence for translocation is v e r y limited but the possib i l i t y of this type of action cannot be dismissed at
the present t i m e . A l l are compatible w i t h 2 , ^ - D .
A r s e n i c a l c o m p o u n d s , alone or in combination w i t h fert i l i z e r s , have b e e n used on crabgrass longer than any
other type of c o m p o u n d . The results that can be obtained and the difficulties involved in their use are
so w e l l known that it is scarcely necessary to include
them in this d i s c u1s1 s i o n . H o w e v e r , they do make a conv e n i e n t "yardstick for use in evaluating new crabgrass killers and probably should be included in m o s t
experimental trials.
Of the newer h e r b i c i d e s , p h e n y l m e r c u r i c , (PMA) has
p r o b a b l y been used more extensively than any of the
o t h e r s . PMA was first reported as a suitable herbicide

b y DeFrance f r o m Rhode Island and later b y other investigators in the northeastern s t a t e s . These reports
have generally indicated satisfactory control w h e n at
least three applications are made and w h e n the
treatments are started w h e n crabgrass is s m a l l . The compound appears to be effective w h e n applied as a spray
or as a d r y powder incorporated w i t h a suitable carrier.
In the m i d w e s t , results obtained with PMA have
not
been as good as those in the e a s t . There a r e , h o w e v e r ,
some reports of excellent c o n t r o l from
experimental
and c o m m e r c i a l a p p l i c a t i o n s . The technique of applicat i o n and timing appear to be c r i t i c a l in this
area.
D r y applications of P M A , while less likely to cause
d i s c o l o r a t i o n of turf g r a s s e s , frequently give
less
c o n t r o l of crabgrass than liquid applications of the
same c o m p o u n d .
The available reports on the use of P M A lead to the
g e n e r a l conclusion that this c o m p o u n d , w h e n used under
favorable conditions w i l l give c o n t r o l of crabgrass
but under other conditions m a y give poor c o n t r o l and
m a y cause some injury to c e r t a i n turf g r a s s e s . Unfort u n a t e l y , there is not enough evidence to permit a
statement of w h a t constitutes favorable conditions and
consequently g e n e r a l recommendations for r e g i o n a l usage cannot be m a d e .
Potassium c y a n a t e , (KOCN) was used quite w i d e l y in the
1950 s e a s o n . The results obtained b y the various investigators exhibit a pattern of v a r i a t i o n similar to
that with PMA* S o m e reports indicate that early summer
treatments are b e t t e r , while other results were better
w h e n the c h e m i c a l was applied after m i d s u m m e r . In
the m a j o r i t y of the r e p o r t s , some temporary burning of
turf grasses was f o u n d . W h e n weather conditions were
favorable for crabgrass seed g e r m i n a t i o n , reinfestation of K O C N treated areas f r e q u e n t l y o c c u r r e d .
The m e t h o d of a p p l i c a t i o n , use of a sticker and temperature appear to have considerable effect on the results obtained w i t h K O C N . Sprinkling can applications
were generally u n s a t i s f a c t o r y . A t least two treatments
and a dosage rate of 12-16 pounds per acre plus some
adapted wetting agent were found to be n e e d e d . The
type of wetting agent is important and data concerning
such materials in the m i d w e s t are inadequate.
The injury from K O C N was reported to be a rapid and
severe browning of bluegrass and other turf g r a s s e s .
R e c o v e r y was usually r a p i d , except where
excessive
dosages were used and can be facilitated by the use of

fertilizer and water w h e n r a i n f a l l is l i m i t e d .
Petroleum o i l s , ranging from c o m m e r c i a l kerosene
to
light naphtha d i s t i l l a t e s , such as are used as the
base for c e r t a i n i n s e c t i c i d e s , were used b y a number
of i n v e s t i g a t o r s , chiefly in the north c e n t r a l s t a t e s ,
and again the results ranged from poor to
excellent.
While the oils m a y not always c o n t r o l c r a b g r a s s , they
seldom cause injury to turf g r a s s e s , unless v e r y h e a v y
dosages are u s e d .
An evaluation of kerosene is difficult to m a k e because
of the great v a r i a t i o n between lots of
commercial
p r o d u c t s . No two samples are i d e n t i c a l and the data
do not indicate w h a t the effective components m a y b e .
Oils w h i c h are effective
in killing crabgrass
have
generally fallen w i t h i n rather narrow p h y s i c a l chara c t e r i s t i c s . A distillation range of 3 5 0 - 5 0 0 , A P I
gravity of J+O-^S and aromatic content of 1 - 3 percent
have been reported for some of these o i l s . The
term
"specialty oils" has been used in some reports but it
is not specific enough and some of the less
favorable
results m a y have been due to the use of oils which
were too h e a v y , had too m u c h aromatic materials
or
contained other toxic c o m p o u n d s . The toxic action of
oils on crabgrass appears to be chronic in nature
but
the exact m e c h a n i s m of action is not k n o w n . Two applications g e n e r a l l y are required and no effects on ungerminated seeds have been r e p o r t e d .
Reports on the use of maleic hydrazide as a foliage
spray for c o n t r o l of crabgrass were uniformly
disapp o i n t i n g . Rates of application w h i c h had any effect
on crabgrass were injurious to desirable grasses and
lesser rates were a waste of time and m a t e r i a l s . It
should be noted here that one of the effects of maleic
hydrazide is that of stunting the growth of
sprayed
plants but there appears to be l i t t l e , if a n y , possib i l i t y of getting turf to a desired h e i g h t and
then
holding it at that p o i n t b y spraying w i t h the chemical
instead of m o w i n g .
A rather extensive list of e x p e r i m e n t a l chemicals was
used in crabgrass c o n t r o l trials but m o s t of these are
not available for commercial u s e . D i c h l o r a l urea is
perhaps the m o s t outstanding compound of this type and
has given rather promising results w h e n applied to the
s o i l at or before the germination period of
crabgrass
s e e d s . Further w o r k w i t h this c o m p o u n d , w i t h T C A , End o t h a l and 2,^-D appears to be desirable but no evaluation of these compounds is possible from the limited
data available.

A survey of the reports on crabgrass control by chemical methods shows that a fully satisfactory method has
not yet been found. Some four or five types of chemicals have considerable value but all have some objectionable features, chiefly with respect to the perennial grasses in the turf. The results show that basic
data on the response of crabgrass is very limited and
this lack of information prevents our establishing
principles for the proper evaluation of crabgrass
herbicides.
An ideal herbicide or combination of herbicides for
grass control in turf should provide for the immediate
kill of crabgrass, prevent germination of dormant
seeds and have no effects upon permanent grasses. Obviously, the ideal has not yet been reached but some
progress toward that ideal has been m a d e . Further research under conditions which will facilitate comparisons on a regional basis will be necessary before a
reasonable chemical control program can be devised.
Question; How about using oils in renovating and how
does it affect Poa annua?
!

W e v e used those oils for renovation under circumstances which were critical. We took a calculated risk
in that we anticipated that we might have lost all of
the grass on those areas. The thing that we were using
was an aromatic oil called Stoddard solvent. It has
the property of burning the foliage of all grasses. In
Poa annua it will burn the Poa to the ground, but the
crown may be left alive and a regrowth will take
place. The reason we haven*t said much about it in
connection with Poa annua is where you want to control
Poa annua and you have other grasses with it we know
that the solvent would cause rather severe injury. One
case in particular we used the Stoddard solvent on a
particular fescue with lots of crabgrass. It cleaned
out all of the crabgrass and what fescue and bluegrass
he had in the lawn was burned to the ground. But within two days, regrowth was taking place. We were disappointed with Poa a n n u a — it is a stinker, as you
know. When we found that the oils were effective only
on annual species, we thought that we had the answer
because it isn't going to hurt these other grasses.
The unfortunate thing is that Poa annua is just as
immune to the toxicity of those oils as is bluegrass.
It does not work on them although the thing is an annual grass. If you can tolerate the top burning that
will go along with the use of Stoddard solvent, that
is the quickest way I know to get the grasses out. Two
applications would probably eliminate the Poa annua.

Use 80 gallons to the acre of Stoddard solvent and two
applications.
Question?
What rate would y o u put on the o i l and h o w
would y o u put it on?
The o i l usually is applied at the rate of two
gallons
to the thousand or 80 gallons to the a c r e . It goes on
as a straight s p r a y — not m i x e d with a n y t h i n g . A n y
sprayer w i l l apply i t .
Questions

W h a t is the cost per gallon of this oil?

The cost of these new products is somewhat higher than
they would be after usage is e s t a b l i s h e d . Last y e a r ,
if it were b o u g h t in 50 gallon q u a n t i t i e s , the o i l
would have cost about forty cents a g a l l o n .
Questions
Is that the same Stoddard solvent that they
are using in m a c h i n e shops?
The term Stoddard solvent is pretty w i d e , but the
thing that has been used to clean electric m o t o r s and
things of that s o r t , that is the type of Stoddard solv e n t that is used for w e e d c o n t r o l in carrots b u t not
the thing that we use on g r a s s e s .
- o TESTING FOR B E T T E R GRASSES
F . V . Grau
There are s e v e r a l ways of f i n d i n g better g r a s s e s . One
is through breeding and s e l e c t i o n . That requires the
services of a h i g h l y trained plant b r e e d e r , a genetic i s t , a plant p h y s i o l o g i s t , a c y t o l o g i s t . Another w a y
to find better grasses is to select those that
nature
has developed over a long period of time under a given
set of c i r c u m s t a n c e s . A c t u a l l y , m o s t of the improved
grasses we have today are selections from t h e s e . Nature developed Merion bluegrass and it was because of
an observing golf course superintendent that we have
Merion bluegrass t o d a y . Joe Valentine noticed a patch
of improved grass on his N o . 17 tee w h i c h stayed good
at a l l times of the year and kept crowding out w e e d s .
He gave a plug of it to the Green S e c t i o n . We started
working w i t h i t , increasing i t , put it into nationwide testing and find that it was the best bluegrass
available.
In the testing of better grasses the

experiment

sta-

tions and universities can-go up to a certain p o i n t .
Then each of y o u take those improved g r a s s e s , place
them under your c o n d i t i o n s , under the wear to w h i c h
the turf w i l l be subjected and give the f i n a l testing
there.
- o GOLF G R E E N S , G O O D AND BAD
R. R0

Davis

Most golf courses have one or more "problem g r e e n s " .
Greenkeepers insist that all their greens are
problem
g r e e n s , but they readily admit that "number 5 is the
f i r s t one to give t r o u b l e " . There m u s t be a r e a s o n for
everything so there are one or more r e a s o n s , for a
troublesome g r e e n . Some likely causes are poor physical condition of the s o i l , poor drainage (both soil
and air d r a i n a g e ) , proximity of trees and diseases
associated w i t h these c o n d i t i o n s .
Poor physical condition of the s o i l is recognized as
one of the basic causes of poor turf on g r e e n s . W i t h
this in m i n d , a detailed study was made of the "best"
and the "poorest" greens of some golf courses in Indiana and I l l i n o i s . It was hoped that some
measurement
could be made to determine if a green would be troub l e s o m e . In addition an estimate of the s o i l mixture
needed to construct a good green could be m a d e .
S o i l cores 8-§- inches long w i t h the turf intact were
taken from each "best" and "poorest" g r e e n . The rate
of water m o v e m e n t (percolation) through these soils
was m e a s u r e d to get an estimate of their
drainage
c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s . Percolation was
inch per hour faster through cores from the "best" g r e e n s .
Another m e a s u r e m e n t was large pore space in the long
cores to determine s o i l aeration*
The "best" greens
had 6.2% large pores while the "poorest" greens
had
h . 9 % large p o r e s , the difference being statistically
significant.
After percolation and pore space measurements
were
m a d e , the cores were sliced into h o r i z o n t a l sections
and the moisture content of the sections
determined.
A series of slides shows the irregularity of the moisture curves w h e n layers are encountered in the g r e e n s .
An organic layer causes a high peak in the curve because of its high water holding c a p a c i t y . A uniform
curve represents a uniform s o i l w h i c h we should strive
for in golf g r e e n s .

Similar s o i l cores were w a s h e d over screens to separate roots from s o i l and the quantity of roots was
m e a s u r e d . O n l y living roots were included. The aver-*
age w e i g h t in miligrams of roots from the "best" and
the poor greens are shown on the following slide:
Grass Roots

(mgs)
Green

Course

"best"

2
3

X

»*6.6
20.5
192.7

5
6
7
8

5A
88.7
1*7.0
55.3
62.1

Avg.

"poorest

21.6
11.1*
5.7
12 ; 3
1.0
35.1
20.8
52.1
20.0

The poor root systems in the "poorest" greens are considered an effect rather than a c a u s e . This m e r e l y
indicates that the greenkeepers knew w h a t they were
talking about w h e n they picked the "poorest" g r e e n s .
Another type of sample was taken at four depths
in
each g r e e n . Pore s p a c e , volume w e i g h t , organic matter
and particle size determinations were m a d e . The average percentage pore space of a l l greens sampled is
shown on a s l i d e .
Depth
(inches)

1
3
6
8

lA
3A
lA
3A

- 3
- 5
- 8
-10

lA
3A
1A
3A

% Large
Pores

7o0
9-6
9*5
10.0

% Small
Pores

% Total
Pore Space

^lo6
35*1
3^0
33A

51-2
¡+7*0
^5.7
^5A

The important thing shown on this slide is the
strikingly small amount of large or aeration pore space
near the surface of the green (1 l A - 3 l A
inches).
If it were feasible to take a sample.closer to the
s u r f a c e , the difference would undoubtedly be more
s t r i k i n g . The s o i l particles are pressed close together (compacted) under traffic making s m a l l pores instead of the badly needed aeration p o r e s . There was
apparently no effect from compaction b e l o w about 3 1/2
inches.
Volume w e i g h t varied w i t h the organic

matter

content

of the s o i l s . The h i g h e r the p e r c e n t o r g a n i c m a t t e r :
the lower the v o l u m e weight«, The " p o o r e s t " greens had
m o r e o r g a n i c m a t t e r and a lower v o l u m e w e i g h t t h a n the
"best" g r e e n s . V o l u m e w e i g h t was an i n d i c a t i o n of org a n i c m a t t e r and not a m e a s u r e of compaction»
The soils of the greens sampled w e r e g e n e r a l l y
poorly
m i x e d s a n d y l o a m s . The p e r c e n t sand in the greens
v a r i e d f r o m 72% to 2 9 % . C o a r s e sand (greater t h a n l A
m m ) v a r i e d f r o m k6% to 3 % . There was no
consistent
difference
in the m e c h a n i c a l a n a l y s i s of the "best"
and the "poorest" g r e e n s . The average a n a l y s i s of a l l
the greens
s a m p l e d was?
2.9% organic m a t t e r ,
2.1%
g r a v e l , 2 0 . k % c o a r s e s a n d , 3)+<7% f i n e s a n d , 2 1 . 2 $ s i l t
and 1 8 . 7 % c l a y .
C e r t a i n r e l a t i o n s h i p s are w o r t h noting«
C o a r s e sand
in a g r e e n c a u s e d an i n c r e a s e in the a m o u n t of large
or a e r a t i o n pore s p a c e . O n the other h a n d , o r g a n i c
m a t t e r c a u s e d m a n y s m a l l p o r e s , a p p a r e n t l y at the exp e n s e of the large p o r e s .
A chemical analysis
s h o w e d t h a t the c o n d i t i o n of the
"poorest" greens w a s not due to a l a c k of
fertility.
T h e y w e r e m o r e f e r t i l e - t h a n the "best" g r e e n s .
A l a c k of a e r a t i o n pore space is t h o u g h t to be the
s o i l factor m o s t o f t e n c a u s i n g poor turf on
greens.
A n y t h i n g t h a t w i l l b r e a k up or l o o s e n the t o p 3 - 3 i
inches of the s u r f a c e s o i l s h o u l d t e m p o r a r i l y
help
this situation»
The use of c o a r s e sand in s o i l m i x tures for greens w i l l m a k e m o r e a e r a t i o n pore s p a c e .
Under g r e e n c o n d i t i o n s , o r g a n i c m a t t e r
is s l o w to
b r e a k d o w n to f o r m true s o i l humus and some types of
o r g a n i c m a t e r i a l s are l i k e l y to be h a r m f u l rather t h a n
h e l p f u l in i m p r o v i n g s o i l c o n d i t i o n . M y p e r s o n a l conc e p t i o n o f a good s o i l m i x t u r e for c o n s t r u c t i n g a new
golf g r e e n w o u l d b e an o r d i n a r y loam t o p s o i l w i t h
c o a r s e sand (i to 2 m i l l i m e t e r s . d i a m e t e r ) a d d e d u n t i l
the m i x t u r e c o n t a i n e d k-0 to 50 p e r c e n t c o a r s e
sand.
The same m i x t u r e
w o u l d be used for t o p d r e s s i n g in
later y e a r s .
- o E X P E R I E N C E S W I T H U-3 B E R M U D A
A1 Linkogel
As y o u m a y k n o w our m a i n t r o u b l e is S t . Louis is crabgrass and g o o s e g r a s s . A n y grass w h i c h w i l l
compete
w i t h these is c e r t a i n l y of i n t e r e s t to that a r e a . M y

experience w i t h U-3 bermuda goes back to 19^7 w h e n we
built a couple of practice holes*
We put b e r m u d a on
one tee in July and w i t h i n three weeks time we had a
pretty stand of c r a b g r a s s . B u t we kept it w a t e r e d and
fed and b y August y o u could see the bermuda coming up
a l l through that t e e . B y the end of September that
tee was 90% b e r m u d a .
We have one tee of less than 1000 square feet where
plugs were placed at eighteen inch c e n t e r s . W h e n f a l l
came I couldn't see the b e r m u d a because the golfers
teed their balls off the p l u g s . The following May I
noticed some b e r m u d a coming through on this t e e . It
was fed h e a v i l y and the following f a l l that tee was
50% bermuda w i t h a l l the abuse it g o t . This past f a l l
it was 100% bermuda; one of the finest tees on the
place .
In the m e a n t i m e I was trying to figure out d i f f e r e n t
ways of introducing bermuda into the t e e s . Plugging
was pretty s l o w , so I advanced the idea of making a
narrow r e p l a c e m e n t sod s t r i p . (Slide) This is a 30inch power mower w i t h a strip cutter in f r o n t . In our
spare time we cut strips of sod in the nursery1 1 and
transferred them over on the t e e s . We "striped
another par 3 hole tee in June w h e n Poa annua was
just
starting to go out and it was the w o r s t tee on the
c o u r s e . The strips of bermuda that were taken out of
the nursery and put in on 18-inch centers were
then
fertilized and w a t e r e d . We fertilized again the latter
part of June«
The tee appeared to be solid
crabgrass
about three weeks l a t e r . I used sodium arsenite at the
rate of two ounces per thousand square f e e t on one of
the h o t t e s t days we had in J u l y . (Slide) This is the
resulto
A l l the green grass is.' bermuda; the sodium
arsenite killed at least 95% of the c r a b g r a s s , (Slide)
This is the same tee two weeks later*
You can see how
the bermuda is crowding in although It d i d n ' t cover
c o m p l e t e l y that y e a r . This past year it did cover
c o m p l e t e l y . Strips which are 18 inches apart are a
little far as the tee is under h e a v y play«
I suggest
putting the strips in at 12-inch intervals so that y o u
can get a cover in one s e a s o n . If y o u had a big enough n u r s e r y , w o u l d y o u sod the tee? Y e s , at p r e s e n t .
If I were to transfer tees over n o w , I w o u l d
just
plant enough area in the nursery to sod a l l of m y
t e e s . It would be the cheapest in the long r u n .
I do believe that the combination of B - 2 7 and b e r m u d a
is going to w o r k s w e l l , b u t we are going to have to
learn h o w to feed i t . I once read that B - 2 7 and berm u d a were fed heavy over the summer and B - 2 7 didn't

come back the following f a l l . This piece here had no
feed over the s u m m e r . Only fed in spring and f a l l , the
B - 2 7 came b a c k . This is the second winter it came
b a c k and right at present this piece of grass which is
about 10,000 square feet is about 9 8 $ g r e e n .
Here's a big U-3 b e r m u d a nursery at A l g o n q u i n C o u n t r y
Club in S t . L o u i s . Oscar B o w m a n is sodding the majority of his tees w i t h U-3 b e r m u d a . Some nursery rows
at Westwood C o u n t r y Club were planted in July and a
lot of crabgrass and weeds came u p . We sprayed it w i t h
sodium a r s e n a t e . Everything was wiped out and the
bermuda stayed nice and g r e e n .
Here's a close-up of a m i x t u r e of C - 1 9 , C - l and U-3
b e r m u d a . This is cut at i i n c h . No water was used
this past y e a r . Over July and August it was
pretty
w e l l all b e r m u d a , v e r y little b e n t . As the c o o l weather started this f a l l , the bent came through and
right
at present it is 95%
b e n t . The fact i s , y o u have to
look close to see any bermuda in i t . I tried this
spot at the suggestion of D r . Grau and it r e a l l y has
b e e n an excellent piece of t u r f .
There are going to be several U-3 putting greens grown
in the S t . Louis area this year on private estates and
p r a c t i c a l l y a l l of the golf clubs in that area are using U - 3 , especially for their t e e s . Tees have
been
our biggest problem down there and U-3 has proven to
be the only type of grass that we can keep on our
tees.
- o TESTING F A I R W A Y G R A S S E S
Do E . Likes
This is a report on a fairway experiment w h i c h was
started at Purdue in 1 9 ^ 8 . Most of the information
was obtained in 19^9 5 a r e l a t i v e l y dry year and one
v e r y bad in severity of leafspot a t t a c k s . Twenty-seven
d i f f e r e n t turf grasses were selected w i t h characteristics that showed they have possibilities for
fairway
u s e . Three d i f f e r e n t heights of c u t , i , 1 , l i i n c h ,
were used to determine what w o u l d be the best height
of cut for each g r a s s . The outstanding grasses in this
test were M e r i o n b l u e g r a s s , C-6 creeping b e n t , C-56
creeping b e n t and C-232 (Elk-16) creeping b e n t . They
were the m o s t disease r e s i s t a n t , the m o s t d r o u g h t res i s t a n t and had better healing qualities than the
other g r a s s e s .

Merion ( B - 2 7 ) w i l l hold its color better than any
other bluegrass, partly due to its leafspot resistance. In comparing C-56 creeping bent with Astoria,
the creeping bent has held its color better than Astoria. This slide was also taken during a dry period,
and no artificial water had been applied to these
grasses. This slide shews C-6 creeping b e n t , another
outstanding b e n t , compared w i t h C-M+ creeping
bent.
As you can s e e , it held its color much better than
C-M+o
The latter was off-color and also had quite a
bit of dollarspot on it during a good part of the seas o n . However, there was no crabgrass in either grass
since both had a turf cover.
Seaside bent held its color better during the dry periods than the A s t o r i a . However, as you probably know,
Seaside tends to be matty and grainy. I think the Astoria would make a better playing surface, especially
if you have watered fairways. The creeping red fescue
is thinned out by leafspot and consequently crabgrass
and bentgrass have come in. Here Is
another chewing
?
fescue compared with C - 5 6 b e n t . I t s the same story
again of leafspot disease attacking f e s c u e s .
You w i l l find redtop in several of your lawn mixtures»
This was planted in the fall and in the spring
the redtop was beautiful. Along about midsummer
it
went out at the same time the fescues went out with
leafspot.
To determine grass recovery ratje we made an extremely
large divot, so that we could get more information
from the grasses on the rate of h e a l . When bent isn't
w a t e r e d , it doesn't heal quite as w e l l as Merion bluegrass.
To summarize, the outstanding fairway grasses in this
experiment were C-232 ( E l k - L 6 ) , C - 5 6 and C - 6
creeping
bent along with Merion bluegrass, The fescues were
least impressive of all the grasses. This
includes
Alta fescue, Red fescue and the chewing f e s c u e s . More
leafspot resistant strains of fescue need to be dev e l o p e d . The optimum height of cut varies for the different grasses. Bluegrasses did not do w e l l when cut
closer than one inch although Merion w i l l withstand
closer clipping than other bluegrasses. When cut at
inch, it was unable to resist crabgrass infestation.
The creeping bents performed best at
inch. The colonial bents apparently should be cut slightly higher,
possibly 3A- inch. The fescues that are now available
should not be cut closer than li inches. When cut
closer than this, they receive considerable
damage
from leafspot.

CHICKWEED CONTROL IN LOUISVILLE
Pat Russell
In the f a l l of 19^8 and the s p r i n g of 19^9» c o m m o n
c h i c k w e e d b e c a m e n o t i c e a b l e in f a i r w a y s and l a w n areas
o n a l l the g o l f c o u r s e s a r o u n d our s e c t i o n . B y the
spring of 1 9 5 0 , w e r e a l l y h a d a c r o p of i t . H o w e v e r ,
a t this time w e h e s i t a t e d to do a n y t h i n g a b o u t it bec a u s e the p r e v i o u s f a l l we h a d s e e d e d A s t o r i a b e n t .
T h r o u g h the summer of 1 9 5 0 w e h a d a lot of h o t , h u m i d
w e a t h e r and l o s t some b l u e g r a s s and a l i t t l e b e n t .
In A u g u s t 0 . J . Noer w e n t over the f a i r w a y s w i t h us
and we d e c i d e d there w e r e e n o u g h p e r m a n e n t g r a s s e s
l e f t so t h a t it w a s not n e c e s s a r y to s e e d the
whole
a r e a , o n l y some s m a l l p l a c e s
and p o s s i b l y some app r o a c h e s and b u n k e r s . W e t r e a t e d these areas
with
s o d i u m a r s e n i t e on S e p t e m b e r
15 a t the rate of
li
p o u n d s per a c r e . We s e e d e d w i t h A s t o r i a b e n t j u s t before t r e a t i n g w i t h the same a m o u n t s of s o d i u m a r s e n i t e
on October 1.
We d e c i d e d o n a p r o g r a m to e l i m i n a t e c h i c k w e e d in the
r e s t of the a r e a s and this p r o g r a m w a s o u t l i n e d
to
s t a r t the w e e k s of O c t o b e r 1 2 , 1 9 , 2 6 and N o v e m b e r 2
w i t h t r e a t m e n t s of M i l a r s e n i t e a t 150 pounds per a c r e .
We h a d u s e d 1 5 0 0 pounds M i l o r g a n i t e per acre on
September 1 5 . W h e n the f i r s t a p p l i c a t i o n was put o n , it
r e s u l t e d in the s l i g h t b u r n i n g of a l l the g r a s s e s . The
s e c o n d one gave a little m o r e s e v e r e b u r n and b y the
time we put the third one o n , e v e r y t h i n g b r o w n e d o u t .
We d e c i d e d to w a i t a little longer b e t w e e n the third
and f o u r t h t r e a t m e n t . R i g h t n o w w e at Big Spring f e e l
t h a t we h a v e a b o u t 80% less c h i c k w e e d t h a n we h a d this
time l a s t y e a r .
A v e r y i n t e r e s t i n g thing h a p p e n e d d o w n t h e r e l a s t w e e k
d u r i n g the K e n t u c k i a n a G r e e n k e e p e r s m e e t i n g . In w a l k ing over the f a i r w a y s , s o m e of the f e l l o w s n o t i c e d
some i r r e g u l a r strips r a n g i n g f r o m two inches wide to
t h r e e or four f e e t . Now in t r e a t i n g
those
fairways
four t i m e s , it is n o t r e a s o n a b l e
to t h i n k t h a t y o u
w o u l d s k i p the same areas a l l four t i m e s . S o the o n l y
t h i n g t h a t we c a n f i g u r e o u t is t h a t t h o s e areas were
s k i p p e d one t i m e , b u t w h i c h time w e do not k n o w .
"This
p r o c e d u r e of e l i m i n a t i n g the c h i c k w e e d in our f a i r w a y s
has w o r k e d v e r y w e l l for us d o w n at B i g S p r i n g .
Question:
chickweed

D i d y o u have
infestation?

a n y k n o t w e e d a l o n g w i t h the

r

N o , we d i d n t have I any knotweed to speak o f . Knotweed
is a weed that 2, f-D w i l l do a good job on in the
s p r i! n g . After the knotweed gets large in s u m m e r , 2,*-f-D
i s n t as e f f e c t i v e . E v e n at that time of the y e a r ,
sodium arsenite w i l l k i l l i t . The best time to kill
it is in the spring w h e n it is in the two to three
leaf s t a g e . If it has not gone to s e e d , y o u can use
2,*+-D5 h o w e v e r , if those areas are thin and y o u propose to put a little seed in t h e r e , then y o u had better not use 2,*f-D because of the danger of 2,*f-D inhibiting germination of your grass s e e d . If y o u w i l l
use sodium arsenite spray at £ ounce per thousand
square f e e t , it w i l l take it right o u t .
- o CHICKWEED AND C L O V E R CONTROL O N O U R FAIRWAYS AT
L A N S I N G C O U N T R Y CLUB
LeRoy Jones
The need for better turf on our fairways was
realized
back in 1939 and even before the t i m e . B u t it was not
u n t i l 19^1 that a c t u a l w o r k was s t a r t e d .
It was decided that we would take one.of our
fairways
for the trial t r e a t m e n t s . Then if this proved satisf a c t o r y , we would go ahead with the r e s t . Renovation
of our second f a i r w a y we felt was justified because of
the clover and weeds and v e r y little perennial grasses .
So treatments were started using Milarsenite at 300
pounds per a c r e . The f i r s t treatment was applied on
August 2 3 , 19*4-1, followed by other treatments at intervals of about two weeks depending on newly formed
leaves or d a n d e l i o n s . Then they would attain a length
of about 1-|- inches»
After the third treatment we spiked the f a i r w a y
thoroughly to prepare the seed b e d . We used a seed
mixture of 85% K e n t u c k y b l u e g r a s s , 10% Astoria bent
and the balance r e d t o p , using about 100 pounds per
acre»
Following the seeding the last treatment was
applied.
In the spring of 19*+2 I applied 1000 pounds of Milorganite per a c r e . That was the last fertilizer this
f a i r w a y had u n t i l 1 9 ^ 5 . We had a long period of c o o l ,
w e t weather in 19*f2 and by fall the bent had
actually

taken o v e r . The club m e m b e r s were w e l l pleased w i t h
the results but due to the w a r , treatments could
not
be c o n t i n u e d . It was gratifying to see h o w w e l l turf
on this f a i r w a y had stayed despite the f a c t that nothing had been done to it since the spring of
19^2.
There was some clover b u t this was eliminated b y three
more applications.
We again started our treatments
in A u g u s t of 19^5 on
a l l the other fairways that needed t r e a t i n g . Our # 1
f a i r w a y was b a d l y infested w i t h c h i c k w e e d . I have
never seen c h i c k w e e d as t h i c k as it was o n this
fairw a y . The same treatments were applied as b e f o r e , only
in seeding we used Astoria bent at ten pounds per
acre.
Since these treatments we have f e r t i l i z e d our fairways
each year and have aerified our fairways spring
and
f a l l since 19*4-7. We f e e l that m u c h has been accomplished b y the use of Milarsenite and proper
fertiliz a t i o n . A lot of credit is due to D r . 0 . Jo Noer for
his h e l p f u l s u g g e s t i o n s .
- o CHEMICAL CONTROL, A SUMMARY
0 . J . Noer
I am glad that two p r a c t i c a l talks preceded, me and
that y o u heard something about a c t u a l accomplishments
in the f i e l d . Lansing C o u n t r y C l u b , as I r e c a l l , installed a water system and expected to have
better
t u r f . Instead they lost a l l their f e s c u e . They ended
up w i t h lousy turf and a good crop of d a n d e l i o n , buckh o r n , p l a n t a i n , clover and c h i c k w e e d . That is w h y
r e n o v a t i o n was in order t h e r e .
In the f i r s t p l a c e , a few comments about the
characteristics of c h i c k w e e d and c l o v e r . There are two types
of c h i c k w e e d , the mouse-ear and the c o m m o n . The m o u s e
Its. l e a v e s are narrow and
ear is b l u e - g r e e n in color«
somewhat l o n g e r . They are w h a t the botanist says
pubescent5 that i s , they have a h a i r y fuzz on the surface of the l e a v e s . It is not nearly as d i f f i c u l t to
eradicate as the common chickweed w h i c h is the bad
o n e . It has an apple g r e e n c o l o r . The
leaves ars
somewhat pointed and are broader at the base«
Common
chickweed produces seed t h r o u g h o u t the y e a r . Mature
plants possess everything from seeds near the base to
flowers near the growing t i p . C o m m o n chickweed is a

v e r y profuse s e e d e r , so once it gets s t a r t e d , it
really goes to t o w n . We cannot rely on maintenance
practices to rid the turf of c h i c l w e e d . In other
w o r d s , fertilization w i l l not cause the grass to choke
them o u t . C o m m o n chickweed w i l l invade the grass
and
reduce the turf p o p u l a t i o n , so some type of herbicide
or c h e m i c a l treatment is n e c e s s a r y , particularly on
watered f a i r w a y s .
Clover is a surface grower; that i s , the stems creep
near the s u r f a c e . Roots are shallow so
superficial
watering and an open turf encourage its d e v e l o p m e n t .
Clover Is a legume and does not depend upon s o i l to
supply n i t r o g e n . Therefore, in nitrogen
deficient
s o i l , clover grows at the expense of g r a s s . Clover
c o n t r o l is a matter of growing grass to r e s i s t the inv a s i o n rather than the use of chemical h e r b i c i d e s .
Chickweed in greens m u s t be eliminated b y resodding
the patches or b y using a c h e m i c a l . Lead arsenate is
about as good as a n y t h i n g . Dusting the patches
with
it w i l l kill the chickweed w i t h o u t damage to the
g r a s s . We get m a n y letters asking about c h e m i c a l control of clover in g r e e n s . For m y p a r t , I think maintenance practices should be scrutinized first to find
out w h y the clover is growing better than the g r a s s .
Grow good grass and keep it dense and t h i c k . This is
the best w a y to solve the clover problem p e r m a n e n t l y .
Where clover is bad because of a low soil level of
n i t r o g e n , one approach is to use a little sulphate of
ammonia first at three pounds per thousand square feet
to scorch i t . The best scorch Is obtained by waiting
one or two' hours before w a t e r i n g . It w i l l turn the
grass brown as w e l l as the c l o v e r , but if properly
d o n e , there w i l l not be any permanent damage to the
g r a s s . One can also use sodium arsenite but y o u had
better have a m a n who knows what he is doing or y o u
m a y end up with less grass and more c l o v e r .
Where fairways have been allowed to get so bad that
c h i c k w e e d , clover and Poa annua are the
principal
ground c o v e r , the problem resolves itself into one of
r e n o v a t i o n . After a good coverage of desirable grass
is o b t a i n e d , clover can be kept in check by following
good practices w i t h respect to f e r t i l i z a t i o n , mowing
and the use of w a t e r . Chickweed m a y come back because
the soil m a y be heavily infested with s e e d . E v e n with
a 90 or 100% k i l l of c h i c k w e e d , y o u had better not become complacent because the v e r y next year there is
apt to be a reappearance of chickweed in p a t c h e s . For
e x a m p l e , at Milwaukee Country Club where the fairways
are good and consist of m o s t l y b e n t g r a s s , John treats
six to eight fairways for chickweed c o n t r o l each y e a r .

He treats w i t h s o d i u m a r s e n i t e in O c t o b e r and November o There is a l m o s t no d i s c o l o r a t i o n b e c a u s e the
p a t c h e s are s m a l l and grass h a d s t a r t e d to go d o r m a n t .
There is no i n c o n v e n i e n c e as a c o n s e q u e n c e .
I

A b o u t c h e m i c a l s - W h e n 2, f-D w a s f i r s t d i s c o v e r e d and
d u r i n g Ithe p r e l i m i n a r y e x p e r i m e n t a l d a y s , it was said
t h a t 2, f-D was the answer to the clover and the chickw e e d p r o b l e m . 2,*+-D checks b o t h of these w e e d s , b u t
it d o e s not e l i m i n a t e them w i t h one t r e a t m e n t . So.,
the r e s u l t s as far as these w e e d s are c o n c e r n e d have
b e e n d i s a p p o i n t i n g . If s u c c e s s i v e t r e a t m e n t s are m a d e
at the o r d i n a r i l y r a c o m m e n d e d r a t e s , 2,*f~D mayv.do cons i d e r a b l e d a m a g e , p a r t i c u l a r l y to the c r e e p i n g bents
in the f a i r w a y s . T h e r e f o r e , it is q u e s t i o n a b l e w h e t h e r
one w o u l d be j u s t i f i e d in using 2 , ^ - D s a y 2 , 3 or k
times in order to c o m p l e t e l y eliminate
clover
or
c h i c k w e e d . I h a v e seen places w h e r e
was used at
v e r y l i g h t r a t e s of less t h a n a q u a r t e r p o u n d to the
acre to k e e p the clover in c h e c k and to p r e v e n t it
f r o m p r o d u c i n g b l o o m . At these rates even
successive
t r e a t m e n t s h a v e not e l i m i n a t e d the w e e d . L a 1s t f a l l I
s a w some w o r k in the C h i c la g o area w h e r e 2, +,5~T was
b e i n g tried o n c l o v e r . 2, +,5~T Is a brother or a sister of 2 , ^ - D . C h e m i c a l l y , the o n l y d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n
t h e m is that 1there is one m o r e chlorine in the b e n z e n e
ring w i t h 2, +,5-T t h a n there is in 2 , ^ - D . In other
w o r d s , the D m e a n s d i , the 2 and k refer to the positions
in the ring 'where the c h l o r i n e
is; and so
2 , ^ , 5 - T (T is for t r i ) m e a n s t h a t there are
three
chlorines
in the 2 , ^ , 5 p o s i t i o n s . The rates used on
the f a i lr w a y s v a r i e d f r o m £ to 1 p i n t of b 0 % emulsiontype 2, f,5-T per a c r e . For the f i r s t two w e e k s or so
there was no n o t i c e a b l e e f f e c t and t h e n in some ins t a n c e s the clover d i s a p p e a r e d b u t in o t h e r s it was
not e n t i r e l y s a t i s f a c t o r y . S o m e d e t a i l s r e q u i r e clari f i c a t i o n so far as this m a t e r i a l is c o n c e r n e d before
it c a n be g e n e r a l l y r e c o m m e n d e d . The 2 , ^ , 5 - T is o f t e n
r e f e r r e d to as b r u s h k i l l e r .
The a r s e n i c a l s c o m m o n l y used are s o d i u m a r s e n i t e and
a r s e n i c a c i d . E i t h e r one of t h e m w i l l do-> the job on
a l l three of these w e e d s . B o t h k i l l P o a a n n u a also b u t
not the seed in the g r o u n d . A r s e n i c acid is a l i q u i d
w h i c h is a b o u t twice as h e a v y as w a t e r , , v I t has a spec i f i c g r a v i t y of a b o u t 1.75 and m o s t of the c o m m e r c i a l
p r o d u c t s c o n t a i n a b o u t 75% of arsenic a c i d . Using
these f i g u r e s as a b a s i s , it is e a s y to c a l c u l a t e the
l i q u i d v o l u m e r e q u i r e d to f u r n i s h w h a t e v e r a m o u n t of
a r s e n i c acid y o u w i s h to u s e . A r s e n i c acid
resembles
s u l f u r i c acid and s h o u l d be h a n d l e d w i t h r e s p e c t . It
p r o d u c e d b u r n s , so w o r k m e n s h o u l d use g l o v e s , e t c . It

u s u a l l y c o m e s in c a r b o y s and should be r e m o v e d w i t h a
siphon such as the ones sold b y auto supply h o u s e s to
g a r a g e s f o r h a n d l i n g the sulfuric a c i d u s e d in b a t t e r ies« The b e s t w a y to h a n d l e arsenic a c i d is to siphon
it off into b o t t l e s of a p p r o p r i a t e s i z e . A r s e n i c acid
is n o t r e a d i l y o b t a i n a b l e . T h o s e w h o u s e it p r o b a b l y
get t h e i r
supply f r o m p e o p l e like S h e r w i n - W i l l i a m s ,
Dow C h e m i c a l C o m p a n y , P i t t s b u r g h P l a t e G l a s s C o m p a n y —
in o t h e r w o r d s , f i r m s w h o m a n u f a c t u r e l e a d arsenate»
S o d i u m a r s e n a t e is a v a i l a b l e on the m a r k e t as such in
two f o r m s - - t h e g r a y and w h i t e p o w d e r w h i c h d i f f e r only
in the d e g r e e of p u r i t y , and as a l i q u i d formulation»
C h i p m a n C h e m i c a l C o m p a n y , f o r e x a m p l e , p u t out
a
l i q u i d s o d i u m a r s e n i t e u n d e r the trade n a m e of A l t a cide A , It comes in d r u m s of a b o u t 5 5 g a l l o n s . The
m a t e r i a l c o n t a i n s f i v e p o u n d s of s o d i u m a r s e n i t e
per
g a l l o n , so for e a c h q u a r t there is
p o u n d s of sodium
a r s e n i t e . The l i q u i d m a t e r i a l is v e r y c o n v e n i e n t for
spray u s e b e c a u s e there is n o s e d i m e n t to c l o g
the
n o z z l e s of the s p r a y e r .
T h e n , of c o u r s e , there is M i l a r s e n i t e , the
material
m e n t i o n e d a n d u s e d b y R o y Jones and Pat R u s s e l l . It is
dry s o d i u m a r s e n i t e c o a t e d on M i l o r g a n i t e , The c o n t e n t
of sodium a r s e n i t e is 3%', A t p r e s e n t p r i c e s it is n o t
a cheap
source of sodium a r s e n i t e b e c a u s e y o u p a y iiO
to 5 0 c e n t s a p i e c e for the b a g s w h i c h y o u are t o l d to
d e s t r o y . I t h i n k that r e c e n t d e v e l o p m e n t s w i l l elimin a t e M i l a r s e n i t e . B e f o r e the d i s c o v e r y of 2,L|.-D M i l a r s e n i t e w a s u s e d to k i l l n o t o n l y w e e d s such as clov e r , c h i c k w e e d a n d Poa a n n u a w h i c h are
easy-to-kill
w e e d s b u t also to e l i m i n a t e d a n d e l i o n , p l a n t a i n , c r a b grass and other w e e d s . That is w h y R o y u s e d 300 p o u n d s
p e r acre i n s t e a d of the 150 p o u n d rate w h i c h w a s app l i e d at B i g S p r i n g . The t r e n d n o w is toward
light
r a t e s , s o m e w h e r e b e t w e e n 1 and 2 p o u n d s p e r acre of
sodium a r s e n i t e as a l i q u i d s p r a y w i t h or w i t h o u t
a
s t i c k e r . P r a n k D u n l a p did an e x c e p t i o n a l l y f i n e job
at C l e v e l a n d in the e l i m i n a t i o n oT c l o v e r and c h i c k w e e d f r o m the f a i r w a y s at The C o u n t r y C l u b . The f i r s t
t r e a t m e n t s w e r e just u n d e r two p o u n d s p e r a c r e . A f t e r
that h e d r o p p e d to about
p o u n d s or 1 q u a r t of the
l i q u i d s o d i u m a r s e n i t e p e r a c r e . H e u s e d a low g a l l o n age s p r a y e r , u s i n g a p p r o x i m a t e l y t e n g a l l o n s of w a t e r
p e r a c r e . W i t h a h i g h p r e s s u r e s p r a y e r , d o n ' t u s e any
m o r e w a t e r t h a n is n e c e s s a r y to give s a t i s f a c t o r y
c o v e r a g e . F o r t y to f i f t y g a l l o n s p e r acre should suffice.
So f a r as m e t h o d of a p p l i c a t i o n Is c o n c e r n e d , u n i f o r m
c o v e r a g e is i m p o r t a n t b y the dry or the l i q u i d m e t h o d .
Overlapping should be avoided because
of the g r e a t e r

i n j u r y to the g r a s s . T r e a t m e n t s in s p r a y i n g are b e s t
done a c r o s s the f a i r w a y s . L e n g t h w i s e
applications
s h o u l d s t a r t at the c e n t e r a n d w o r k t o w a r d the e d g e to
a v o i d o v e r l a p a l o n g the c e n t e r . It Is a l s o
important
to h a v e some k i n d of a m a r k e r so t h a t the d r i v e r w i l l
n o t o v e r l a p . W h e r e a s p r e a d e r Is u s e d , the
outlet
spouts
should be
close
e n o u g h t o g e t h e r so t h a t the
c u r t a i n of m a t e r i a l d r o p p e d is u n i f o r m ; o t h e r w i s e the
f a i r w a y s w i l l l o o k l i k e a z e b r a . A l l t h e s e d e t a i l s are
I m p o r t a n t to o b t a i n s a t i s f a c t o r y r e s u l t s .
If t h e r e Is n o t h i n g b u t w e e d s or c l o v e r a n d n o g r a s s ,
It m e a n s a r e n o v a t i o n p r o g r a m I n c l u d i n g
some s e e d i n g .
B e g i n b y u s i n g 2,I|.-D I n M a y or June to k i l l off the
b r o a d - l e a v e d w e e d s a n d do t h a t l o n g e n o u g h I n a d v a n c e
of the o t h e r t r e a t m e n t s so t h a t the 2,1|-D w i l l n o t inh i b i t g e r m i n a t i o n of the g r a s s . T h e n b e f o r e July p r e p a r e the m e m b e r s f o r some t e r r i b l e l o o k i n g f a i r w a y s .
Sodium arsenite
or a r s e n i c a c i d t r e a t m e n t s
should
start t h a t m o n t h to k i l l the F o a a n n u a , c l o v e r
and
c h l c k w e e d . The s p a c i n g of the t r e a t m e n t s is i m p o r t a n t
p a r t i c u l a r l y w i t h r e s p e c t to c l o v e r .
The m e t h o d of k i l l b y a r s e n i c a l s is n o t like t h a t of
2,1}.-D. W i t h a r s e n i c a l s y o u d e f o l i a t e the p l a n t , b u r n
off the l e a v e s , t h e n the p l a n t u t i l i z e s
the r e s e r v e s
of s u g a r a n d s t a r c h i n the t i s s u e s
to b u i l d
new
leaves. Repeated
defoliation exhausts
the
reserve
s u p p l y of c a r b o h y d r a t e s . T h e p l a n t d i e s w h e n it does
n o t p o s s e s s the s t o r e d f o o d n e e d e d to i n i t i a t e g r o w t h .
W h e n the i n t e r v a l b e t w e e n t r e a t m e n t s
Is too l o n g , the
new leaves make
e n o u g h e x t r a s u g a r to r e p l e n i s h the
r e s e r v e s in the s t o r a g e t i s s u e s , T h e n y o u m i g h t
as
well forget about that application because nothing was
a c c o m p l i s h e d . A n I n t e r v a l of a b o u t 10 to II4. d a y s is
a b o u t r i g h t . In t h a t time c l o v e r l e a v e s are a b o u t 3/k
normal size.
D o n ' t e x p e c t the p o u n d or p o u n d and a h a l f r a t e to
c o m p l e t e l y d e f o l i a t e the p l a n t the f i r s t t i m e . If
clover
or c h l c k w e e d g r o w t h is d e n s e , o n l y the
top
l e a v e s w i l l be b u r n e d . T h e y are the o n l y o n e s t h a t
come I n d i r e c t c o n t a c t w i t h the h e r b i c i d e .
Because
the l e a v e s u n d e r n e a t h are u n t o u c h e d , y oT u
naturally
t h i n k e n o u g h m a t e r i a l itfas n o t u s e d . D o n t w o r r y
bec a u s e y o u c a n n e v e r g e t c o m p l e t e d e f o l i a t i o n the f i r s t
time u n l e s s the r a t e Is so h e a v y t h a t it is apt to
p e r m a n e n t l y I n j u r e the g o o d g r a s s . O n e c a n seed i m m e d i a t e l y b e f o r e the l a s t t r e a t m e n t as R o y d i d . In f a c t
P a t d i d some t r e a t i n g at l i g h t r a t e s e v e n 011 the y o u n g
grass
seedlings when they were about a month o l d .
A f t e r a g o o d t u r f c o v e r a g e is o b t a i n e d , y o u c a n s a f e l y
t r e a t in s p r i n g as Pat p r o p o s e s to k i l l the s m a l l a-

m o u n t of c h i c k w e e d t h a t d e v e l o p s f r o m s e e d . Pie h a s
e n o u g h g r a s s so t h a t it w i l l c l o s e i n a n d n o t c r e a t e a
crabgrass problem.
T h e a m o u n t of b u r n or the a m o u n t of d i s c o l o r a t i o n
on
an a r e a of t u r f is g o i n g to d e p e n d u p o n a n u m b e r of
f a c t o r s . F i r s t is the m a t t e r of
soil m o i s t u r e .
If
the s o i l is b o n e d r y , e v e n a r a t e of
to 1-|- p o u n d s
p e r a c r e m a y d i s c o l o r b e n t v e r y b a d l y . T h a t is w h y it
is a d v a n t a g e o u s to h a v e w a t e r a v a i l a b l e
for a renovation program, particularly
if t h e r e is a h i g h c o n t e n t
of g o o d g r a s s . The s o i l s h o u l d h a v e
enough
moisture
to g r o w g o o d g r a s s . T h e k i l l o n the w e e d s w i l l b e b e s t
if t h e y are g r o w i n g . W h e r e c o v e r a g e is n o t h i n g b u t
c l o v e r and c h i c k w e e d , the a r e a Is g o i n g to T l o o k b r o w n
a f t e r it h a s b e e n t r e a t e d b e c a u s e t h e r e l s n t a n y t h i n g
l e f t a f t e r t h e y h a v e b e e n b u r n e d . If t h e r e is o n l y a
s c a t t e r i n g of c l o v e r a n d c h i c k w e e d , the
discoloration
w i l l not be noticeable
at the above r a t e b e c a u s e d i s c o l o r a t i o n of the g r a s s w i l l b e v e r y s l i g h t . It Is
a l w a y s d e s i r a b l e to h a v e at l e a s t t w e l v e h o u r s w i t h o u t
rain following an application although by using a good
s p r e a d e r a n d x^etting a g e n t , a p r e t t y g o o d s c o r c h w i l l
be o b t a i n e d w i t h t h e s e w e e d s a f t e r 1+ to 5 h o u r s .
Q u e s t i o n : W h a t is y o u r o b s e r v a t i o n o n t h i s n e w F-7^1f e s c u e ? C a n it b e c u t to a -f i n c h h e i g h t w h i c h s e e m s
to b e w h a t the g o l f e r s n o w d e m a n d ?
Do y o u t h i n k t h a t
is g o i n g to b e a b e t t e r g r a s s f o r s a n d y , i m p o v e r i s h e d
soil areas?
!

I c a n t answer that, but from what I have
seen of i t ,
F - 7 k f e s c u e l o o k s v e r y g o o d . B y a l l m e a n s t r y it a n d
do e n o u g h w i t h It to see w h e t h e r t h a t is g o i n g to b e
a n a n s w e r to y o u r p r o b l e m , I b e l i e v e M e r l o n b l u e g r a s s
Is p e r f o r m i n g v e r y w e l l . C l i f f R u n y o n h a s u s e d u n b e l i e v a b l y s m a l l r a t e s of s e e d p e r a c r e , P a t
says t h a t
Big Springs N o ,
f a i r w a y Is c o m i n g a l o n g b e a u t i f u l l y
a n d e s t i m a t e d t h a t t h e y h a v e 60% M e r l o n b l u e g r a s s a n d
kOfr b e n t . One t h i n g a b o u t M o r i o n , it s e e m s to t h r o w
rhizomes vigorously
a n d to g r o w w e l l e v e n w h e n c u t at
3AI- I n c h e s ,
i
- o -

BREEDING TURF GRASSES
H . B . Musser
B r e e d i n g a n d d e v e l o p m e n t of t u r f g r a s s e s is a t r e m e n d o u s l y b r o a d t h i n g , so I a m g o i n g to c o n c e n t r a t e on
just one p h a s e of i t . P e r h a p s y o u m i g h t b e i n t e r e s t e d
i n s e e i n g w h a t g o e s i n t o the f i n a l p r o d u c t
that comes
o u t as a n i m p r o v e d t y p e of g r a s s . F i r s t , I w o u l d l i k e
to c o r r e c t a p r e t t y g e n e r a l i m p r e s s i o n a m o n g l a y m e n
t h a t t h e r e is s o m e t h i n g m y s t e r i o u s , s o m e t h i n g
abracad a b r a a b o u t r e s e a r c h w o r k of t h i s k i n d . M o s t of it is
just p l a i n , o r d i n a r y , m e c h a n i c a l , e v e r y d a y w o r k . A
g r e a t d e a l of it is v e r y r o u t i n e . A t r e m e n d o u s a m o u n t
of e f f o r t is i n v o l v e d in ! i t . T h a t is p a r t of o u r job;
w e love i t , or w e w o u l d n t be i n i t .
U r n g o i n g to c o n c e n t r a t e
this morning on showing you
just h o w w e t r y to r e a c h the e n d p o i n t i n the p r o d u c t i o n of a n i m p r o v e d s t r a i n of g r a s s .
I w i l l u s e f e s c u e as a n i l l u s t r a t i o n of h o w the b r e e d i n g p r o g r a m w o r k s . O v e r at S t a t e C o l l e g e w e are d o i n g
some w o r k w i t h the b l u e g r a s s e s
a n d the b e n t g r a s s e s as
w e l l . D o w n i n the s o u t h e a s t at T i f t o n , G e o r g i a , D r .
G l e n n B u r t o n is d o i n g w o r k o n the w a r m - s e a s o n g r a s s e s .
H e r e at P u r d u e y o u h a v e s t a r t e d some w o r k o n the b e n t grasses. I wish.that we had a lot more
of that t y p e
of w o r k b e c a u s e
at the b e s t i t is a l o n g , d r a w n - o u t
p r o c e d u r e , a n d the m o r e h a n d s w e h a v e p u s h i n g , the
faster we w i l l get somewhere.
The unit
i n a n y b r e e d i n g or s e l e c t i o n p r o g r a m is the
i n d i v i d u a l p l a n t . Vie g e t t h o s e
i n d i v i d u a l p l a n t s to
start w i t h i n m a n y d i f f e r e n t w a y s . T h e y m a y b e f o u n d
b y g r o w i n g c o m m e r c i a l l o t s of
s e e d or t h e y m a y
be
f o u n d as s u p e r i o r p l a n t s g r o w i n g i n e s t a b l i s h e d t u r f ,
a v e r y g o o d source of m a t e r i a l . O n the
other
hand,
t h e y m a y b e p r o d u c e d b y h y b r i d i z a t i o n of i n d i v i d u a l
parents and therein lies a most
interesting
s t o r y of
the s t u d y of the p a r e n t c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s and h o w t h e y
m a y b e t r a n s m i t t e d . W e c o u l d t a l k a b o u t t h a t and p e r h a p s e n j o y i t f o r a w h o l e h a l f d a y e v e n if w e d o n ' t
h a v e a n y s p e c i a l i n f o r m a t i o n on it b e c a u s e w e a l l are
i n t e r e s t e d in w h e t h e r our c h i l d r e n h a v e b l u e e y e s or
brown eyes
or w h e t h e r
t h e y h a v e b l a c k h a i r or r e d
h a i r , e t c . W e h a v e the same p r i n c i p l e s of i n h e r i t a n c e
a p p l y i n g to the w a y c h a r a c t e r s
are t r a n s m i t t e d in
p l a n t s . T h o s e are the t h r e e p r i m a r y s o u r c e s
of these
individual plants
t h a t w e start w i t h as our i m p r o v e ment units.
It is

not

possible

to t e l l v e r y m u c h a b o u t w h a t the

g e n e r a l p e r f o r m a n c e of a p l a n t is g o i n g to b e w h e n it
is g r o w n i n the n u r s e r y w i t h e v e r y o p p o r t u n i t y to d e v e l o p to i t s m a x i m u m c a p a c i t y . A n d s o , a f t e r w e
get
the i n d i v i d u a l p l a n t s
t h a t l o o k like t h e y m i g h t h a v e
some d e s i r a b l e c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s , w e I .have 'to ^develop
additional m a t e r i a l from those individual p l a n t s . The
n e x t step is the p r o p a g a t i o n n u r s e r y w h e r e seed f r o m
the i n d i v i d u a l p l a n t is g r o w n i n p r o p a g a t i o n r o w s .
H o w r t h a t seems like a q u i t e s i m p l e p r o c e s s a n d y e t i t
c a n t be over
s i m p l i f i e d b e c a u s e of the m a n y p r o b l e m s
w h i c h w e r u n i n t o e v e n as e a r l y as t h a t i n the g a m e .
Y o u m u s t m e e t s p e c i a l c o n d i t i o n s . In the c a s e of f e s c u e , one of the t h i n g s t h a t w e r a n i n t o t h a t g a v e u s
l o t s of t r o u b l e to s t a r t w i t h w a s the f a c t t h a t somet i m e betx^een the p e r i o d of the f i r s t d e v e l o p m e n t
of
the
seed h e a d , the p r i m o r d i a of the s e e d h e a d , as w e
c a l l i t , a n d the t i m e w h e n it c a m e o u t a n d b e g a n
to
m a t u r e s e e d , w e g o t a c h e c k in the d e v e l o p m e n t of t h a t
s e e d h e a d . F r a n k l y , w e are n o t sure y e t w h e t h e r it is
due to a v e r y m i n u t e
insect we call trips that burrow
d o w n i n s i d e of the l e a f s h e a t h and f e e d o n the v e r y
s u c c u l e n t d e v e l o p i n g s t e m of the s e e d h e a d or w h e t h e r
it is due to a w e a k t y p e of f u n g u s t h a t t h a t
insect
c a r r i e s in t h e r e . F o r t u n a tl e l y , e x c e p t t h a t w e do w a n t
a d e f i n i t e a n s w e r , it h a d n t m a t t e r e d too g r e a t l y . b e c a u s e w e f o u n d t h a t b y b u r n i n g off the r o w the p r e v i o u s f a l l , w e c o u l d e l i m i n a t e m o s t of the t r o u b l e .
A s s o o n as w e h a v e e n o u g h m a t e r i a l ' d e v e l o p e d , w e g e t
the n e w s t r a i n i n t o the t e s t p l o t s . T h i s is a s e r i e s
of t e s t p l o t s w h e r e w e are t r y i n g to d e t e r m i n e
the
q u a l i t y b y d e t a i l e d r e c o r d s , n o t o n l y of f e s c u e s , b u t
of b e n t , b l u e g r a s s e s and some o t h e r
s p e c i e s on a comp a r a b l e b a s i s . W e u s e t h r e e h e i g h t s of c u t - 1|r a n d
3 i n c h e s - - i n o r d e r to g e t some i d e a of the p e r f o r m a n c e of t h e s e v a r i o u s g r a s s e s as t h e y w o u l d b e h a n d l e d
e i t h e r on f a i r w a y s , l a w n s or o n h e a v i e r d u t y t u r f s u c h
as a t h l e t i c f i e l d s , a i r f i e l d s , e t c . A s y o u w o u l d exp e c t a f t e r y o u h a v e h e a r d so m u c h a b o u t it the p a s t
t w o d a y s , h e r e is a p l o t of M e r i o n b l u e g r a s s . ^ v e r y body recognizes that varying environmental
conditions
may effect performance
of i n d i v i d u a l t y p e s of g r a s s .
W e h a v e t h a t e m p h a s i z e d p a r t i c u l a r l y i n the c a s e of
our creeping bent
strains where nearly every section
of the c o u n t r y h a s i t s o w n p r e f e r e n c e . In o r d e r to
g e t as w i d e
a r a n g e as p o s s i b l e w i t h the f a c i l i t i e s
t h a t w e h a d a v a i l a b l e , vie a l s o p l a n t e d o u r
fescue
s t r a i n s d o w n at B e l t s v i l l e w h e r e D r . G-rau c o u l d
directly supervise their maintenance and h a n d l i n g . There
is a t r e m e n d o u s l y w i d e r a n g e
in e n v i r o n m e n t a l c o n d i tions between State College and Beltsville.
I f , eventuo.lly, w e p u t our

finger on a strain that in

our t e s t i n g w o r k h a s g i v e n u s d e f i n i t e and s i g n i f i c a n t
indications
of s u p e r i o r i t y , the n e x t step t h e n is to
d e v e l o p e n o u g h seed to g e t into p r a c t i c a l , c o m m e r c i a l
p r o d u c t i o n . The n e x t step f r o m the p r o p a g a t i o n r o w s ,
m u l t i p l i c a t i o n r o w s that I h a v e s h o w n y o u p r e v i o u s l y ,
Is the p r o d u c t i o n of f o u n d a t i o n seed s t o c k . These
a r e a s are c a r e f u l l y t a k e n care of b y the staff at the
c o l l e g e in the w a y of s e e i n g that the m a t e r i a l that is
b e i n g g r o w n Is r e a s o n a b l y p u r e - - f r o m the m i x t u r e s - and e q u i v a l e n t to the m a t e r i a l t h a t carae
originally
f r o m the b r e e d i n g p r o g r a m . If n e c e s s a r y , v o l u n t e e r
p l a n t s are r o g u e d out and e v e r y t h i n g p o s s i b l e Is done
to see that w e h a v e g o o d f o u n d a t i o n seed m a t e r i a l .
E v e n t u a l l y the m a t e r i a l goes f r o m the f o u n d a t i o n seed
stock f i e l d to c o m m e r c i a l p r o d u c t i o n .
This Is a f i e l d of f e s c u e out at I m b l e r , O r e g o n , w h e r e
H . L . W a g n e r Is g r o w i n g t h o u s a n d s of a c r e s of g r a s s
for s e e d . H e is d o i n g a v e r y n i c e job o n It as
are
m a n y of the b e t t e r g r o w e r s in O r e g o n . T h e r e is the end
p o i n t so f a r as the p r o g r a m of the d e v e l o p m e n t of a
s u p e r i o r s t r a i n of g r a s s Is c o n c e r n e d .
!

I h a v e n t said a n y t h i n g about the time i n v o l v e d . It
Is a long p e r i o d . Y o u h a v e to h a v e a; y e a r or m o r e i n
the I n d i v i d u a l p l a n t n u r s e r y and two y e a r s to d e v e l o p
s u f f i c i e n t m a t e r i a l for y o u r t e s t p l o t s . Vie like to
h a v e turf i n a test p l o t for a t h r e e - y e a r p e r i o d w h i c h
t o t a l s s i x . A f t e r w e k n o w that w e h a v e s o m e t h i n g that
is s a t i s f a c t o r y , there are two m o r e y e a r s n e e d e d f o r
p r o d u c t i o n of f o u n d a t i o n seed s t o c k , In d e v e l o p m e n t of
the seed for c o m m e r c i a l p r o d u c t i o n . A n d f i n a l l y , it
t a k e s two y e a r s to get y o u r c o m m e r c i a l p l a n t i n g
in
seed p r o d u c t i o n w h i c h is a t e n - y e a r p e r i o d u n d e r the
b e s t c i r c u m s t a n c e s . If w e r u n into some d i f f i c u l t i e s ,
it adds u p to m o r e than ten y e a r s .
One of the m o s t d i f f i c u l t things t h a t I h a v e encountered in this w h o l e t e s t i n g p i c t u r e Is to get a satisf a c t o r y y a r d s t i c k to m e a s u r e turf q u a l i t y . It isn't
t o t a l y i e l d for the season as the o r d i n a r y c o m p a r i s o n s
are m a d e in a g r i c u l t u r a l m a t e r i a l s
such as forage
c r o p s , c o r n or c e r e a l s , or f r u i t , e t c . W e are." Intere s t e d In a lot of i n t a n g i b l e s that are n o t n e a r l y so
easy to p u t y o u r f i n g e r o n . W e u s e d to try a n d get at
it b y m a k i n g o b s e r v a t i o n a l r e c o r d s r - an a l l over grade
of one p l o t in c o m p a r i s o n w i t h a n o t h e r . W e l l , that
w o r k e d fine w h e n w e only h a d six or seven strains of
g r a s s e s to c o m p a r e , b u t w h e n w e h a v e a n y w h e r e f r o m 50
to 1 0 0 of them g r o w i n g in the same l o c a t i o n and showing all degrees of d i f f e r e n c e s , It gets to be a 3 - r i n g
circus and y o u r h e a d gets In a w h i r l b e f o r e y o u get
over a dozen of t h e m . W e , t h e r e f o r e , h a v e d e v e l o p e d a

scheme w h i c h includes certain things
that g o t o make
up
this d e s i r a b l e
turf quality that w e want*
Those
c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s are d i f f e r e n t w i t h d i f f e r e n t g r a s s e s .
In the c a s e of the f e s c u e s , w e h a v e t e n t a t i v e l y p i c k e d
u p s u c h t h i n g s as c u p p i n g to w h i c h f e s c u e
is p a r t i c u l a r l y s u s c e p t i b l e . T h a t i s , the o p e n i n g u p of a b a r e
area in a t u r f . Prom a golfing
standpoint
t h a t Is a
very
s a t i s f a c t o r y q u a l i t y b e c a u s e the b a l l d r o p s d o w n
i n t o t h e m . S p o n g i n e s s a p p l i e s p r i m a r i l y to o u r b e n t
t y p e s as a n i n d i c a t i o n of t u r f q u a l i t y . W e say t h a t
since t u r f Is u s u a l l y g r o w i n g b e t t e r
in the H a y - J u n e
p e r i o d t h a n i n the l a t e r p e r i o d of the s u m m e r , w e liave
to m e a s u r e t h a t q u a l i t y to see w h e t h e r it h a s g o t t e n
worse
f r o m one p e r i o d to a n o t h e r . T h e n , of
course,
d i s e a s e is s u c h a t r e m e n d o u s l y
important factor that
w e t a k e t h a t i n t o c o n s i d e r a t i o n ; n o t o n l y the d i s e a s e
i t s e l f , b u t the a b i l i t y of the g r a s s to r e c o v e r f r o m
d i s e a s e r a p i d l y . In a d d i t i o n , w e
are I n t e r e s t e d
In
d r o u g h t t o l e r a n c e . W e e d i n f e s t a t i o n is a n I n d i c a t i o n
of g o o d s t r a i n s - - of the v i t a l i t y of y o u r s t r a i n . W e
are I n t e r e s t e d in c o l d t o l e r a n c e a nl d c e r t a i n l y to some
e x t e n t In t e x t u r e . N o w t h a t I s n t the e n d of It b e c a u s e w e are n o t i n t e r e s t e d to t h e same e x t e n t In a l l
these
characteristics. Therefore, we have
t r i e d to
r a t e the i m p o r t a n c e
of t h e m a n d h e r e Is w h e r e w o g e t
into m o s t of the d i f f i c u l t y .
T h i s is the
scheme
t h a t x^re h a v e b e e n u s i n g f o r the
l a s t two y e a r s i n a t t e m p t i n g to e v a l u a t e t h e s e v a r i o u s
g r a s s e s b y l o o k i n g at one c h a r a c t e r
at a t i m e . T h e
sum of a l l of It g o e s i n t o m a k i n g u p t h a t t u r f q u a l i t y
t h a t w e are p a r t i c u l a r l y I n t e r e s t e d I n ,
D e f i n i t e l y y o u m u s t t a k e into c o n s i d e r a t i o n e n v i r o n mental conditions and particularly moisture
and tempe r a t u r e w h e r e y o u are n o t a p p l y i n g w a t e r t h r o u g h i r r i g a t i o n , I a m a w f u l l y g l a d t h a t w e h a v e f i g u r e s on
w e a t h e r c o n d i t i o n s b e c a u s e it h a s e n a b l e d u s to s h o r t en d o w n o n o u r t e s t p e r i o d . T h e
environmental condit i o n s , the w e a t h e r c o n d i t i o n s b e t w e e n 1.91+9 a n d 1 9 5 0
w e r e so e x t r e m e t h a t I t h i n k w e g o t as m u c h
information on performance
of i n d i v i d u a l g r a s s s t r a i n s in
those two y e a r s as w e m a y o r d i n a r i l y g e t In a 5 to 6
y e a r p e r i o d , I u s u a l l y like to h a v e 3 or
y e a r s of
r e s u l t s , b u t I ara m u c h b e t t e r s a t i s f i e d
to b a s e a dec i s i o n o n two y e a r s of r e s u l t s w h e n the e x t r e m e s in
w e a t h e r c o n d i t i o n s are as w i d e as t h e y are h e r e .
Just to g i v e y o u an a l l o v e r p i c t u r e of p e r f o r m a n c e
b e t w e e n the v a r i o u s s p e c i e s that w e h a v e b e e n t e s t i n g ,
h e r e are some of the o u t s t a n d i n g
evaluations.
First,
w o h a v e the M e r l o n , t h e n some of the b e t t e r s t r a i n s of

fescues
and t h e n the a v e r a g e s of a l l o f o u r s t r a i n s
under t e s t , including various types of Colonial creeping b e n t , fescues
and bluegrass. The total makes up
60 s t r a i n s i n the t e s t . A s f a r as the a v e r a g e
score
in 191+9 w a s c o n c e r n e d , as y o u c a n s e e , w e h a d a v e r y
appreciable h i g h performance from our superior types
of b l u e g r a s s , the M e r i o n a n d our b e t t e r
strains
of
f e s c u e s . Y o u c a n see t h a t the f e s c u e s as a r u l e p e r f o r m e d s o m e w h a t b e t t e r t h a n the o t h e r s .
T h i s s h o w s y o u the p e r f o r m a n c e i n 1 9 5 0 , a n d I t h i n k
t h a t y o u c a n see a v e r y a p p r e c i a b l e
difference.
If
you will remember
the s t o r y in 191+9* the b l u e g r a s s e s
w e r e v e r y d e f i n i t e l y l a s t , the f e s c u e s w e n t u p a little b i t . T h e c o l o n i a l s w e r e m u c h b e t t e r in 1 9 5 0 t h a n
t h e y w e r e 111 1 9 ^ 9 • T h e n e x t slide
s h o w s y o u the detailed performance
of the b e s t of o u r f e s c u e s out of
t h o s e 29 s t r a i n s t h a t w e h a d to b e g i n w i t h i n 191+9•
The q u a l i t y g r a d e s r u n f r o m 86 to 7 6 . W e h a v e v e r y
d e f i n i t e i n d i c a t i o n s t h a t w e m a y h a v e b e e n a b l e to p u t
o u r f i n g e r o n some e x t r e m e l y i n t e r e s t i n g n e w t y p e s of
f e s c u e . H e r e a g a i n in the 1 9 5 0 t e s t s the same s t r a i n s
that were
t o p s in 191+9 are a g a i n at the t o p a l t h o u g h
n o t in the same o r d e r in 1 9 5 0 . R e m e m b e r t h e
weather
conditions were
e x t r e m e l y v a r i a b l e b e t w e e n t h o s e two
years.
W h a t is the a v a i l a b i l i t y of the m a t e r i a l n o w ? W e are
g o i n g to h a v e to w a i t u n t i l c ornmercia 1 prodLiction h a s
developed and I think that you can understand
that,
a f t e r s e e i n g the p r o c e s s t h r o u g h w h i c h w e m u s t . g o b e f o r e w e do h a v e c o m m e r c i a l
seed a v a i l a b l e . I have
b e e n d i s a p p o i n t e d so m a n y t i m e s w h e n I t h o u g h t w e h a d
p o s s i b i l i t i e s of g e t t i n g s o m e t h i n g b e t t e r t h a t I get
v e r y , v e r y c a g e y a b o u t t h i s whole-.-picture-. B u t I am
a l m o s t to the p o i n t of b e i n g w i l l i n g to
stick m y neck
out and
say t h a t w e w i l l h a v e w i t h i n the n e x t two
y e a r s some c o m m e r c i a l s u p p l i e s
of t h e s e
strains
of
fescue w h i c h have
s h o w n e v e r y i n d i c a t i o n of b e i n g improvements over w h a t we have h a d available
in
the
past.
- o -