TurfComms V. 14,1.3 Nov. 14, 2002 PURPOSE: To pass on what we learn willingly and happily to others in the profession so as to improve turf conditions around the country. Dr. James B. Beard: My wife and I, while in Michigan, visited Dr. Beard and his wife Harriet at their summer home on Lake Leelanau. I had heard that Harriet was a great help to Dr. Beard's success. I came away feeling that Dr. and Mrs. James Beard were a very synchronized/intermeshed team. Hopefully that team will continue to benefit the turf industry with their combined effort. Dr. Beard and Harriet are currently working on a revision of Turfgrass: Science and Culture. It would be great to have an updated edition of this classic. TRANXIT: Went to the September No. TX GCSA meeting and Tranxit was the subject for the educational session. This was put on by Don Wilson of Griffin Co. The main emphasis was Poa annua control in overseedings. Apparently the material can be used like Kerb or Rubigan and applied before overseeding to provide control. Like Kerb it also can be put on in the spring to remove Poa annua and the overseeding. Like Kerb the chemical will move after application, especially in clay soils but, not to the extent that Kerb did (does). To insure that it doesn't move apply at the beginning of a rain free period and water in with lots of shallow irrigations. Tranxit is both foliar and root absorbed. It has a seven day half-life in the soil. Applied in winter cold it kills TURFCOMMS is published at unpredictable intervals by the editor and publisher Douglas T. Hawes, Ph.D. Assistant Editor, Cynthia Maddox e-mail: dhawes@dallas.net web site http://www. geocities.com/turfcomms/index.html 3517 Deep Valley Trail Piano, Texas 75023 (972) 867-0176 Subscription cost is $15. Send checks to Doug Hawes at the above address. plants very slowly; also plants that are nitrogen deficient die slow. A little ammonium sulfate applied with the chemical improves kill. Rapidly growing plants are those it kills the quickest. Foliar adsorption is needed for a good kill of mature Poa annua plants in the spring time. You can expect slight yellowing for a week on bermudagrass greens and also a growth regulator effect. When used in the fall, in advance of overseeding, the Company claims it is not injurious to the bermudagrass and will not affect perennial ryegrass establishment. If you plan to overseed with Poa trivialis wait 14 days after Tranxit application. One gram/A will act as a growth regulator of perennial ryegrass during the prime growing season of the ryegrass; while 2 to 4 grams/A will remove the overseeding. Beware 4 grams may give you too quick a transition. For postemergence control of cool season grasses use of a surfactant is suggested. The methylated seed oils have been found to work the best and the organo-silicones the worst. Turf South: the magazine for turf care professionals: I read a fair number of magazines and journals trying to stay up with the latest. I'm not always happy with what I write or what is in the better turf magazines (Golf Course Management, Record, and Golfdom) but then I read the competition and conclude they are just in a different league. 
The first mentioned magazine in this paragraph, August 2002 issue, on page A18, writes about "velvet bluegrass" being planted on three greens of the US Open site. Then in a caption on pg. BIO it writes about covering drains to prevent "leeching". A spell checker should have caught the incorrect spelling of leaching. The first error would have required a turf knowledgeable editor or writer. I strongly urge that you take the big three 
reasonably seriously. The rest of the literature should be viewed with a big ?-mark. QUACKGRASS and MORE: I don't often run into quackgrass since my New England 
days but, twice this summer I ran into it once as a lawn (almost pure quack) and twice as a garden weed. It doesn't make much of a lawn. It just doesn't have any density. However, as a flower and vegetable garden weed it is great. Supposedly, one tiller can produce 21 foot of rhizomes in a growing season. I tried my best to get all 21 feet when pulling it but even in sandy soils that had been loosened with a spade, that can be difficult. Like bermudagrass the rhizomes will grow through asphalt and I found one rhizome that had grown through a crocus bulb. But, before I was done weeding my brother's flower gardens in Colebrook, N.H., I came away with a very healthy respect for 
the competitiveness of another rhizome producer, Lily-of-the-Valley. This ornamental ground cover may not have the length of rhizomes that quackgrass does but it sure can produce a massive mat under the soil surface of roots and rhizomes and it is, slowly but surely, invasive. I also got reacquainted with Red (Sheep) Sorrel another rhizome producer. It doesn't begin to compare to the above two. My brother and his wife had brought a house in Colebrook, N.H. and Cynthia and I went 
up to help them move in. The house is at 1100 feet of elevation and by the end of September they had a light frost. I took on the task, for a good week, of pruning trees and weeding gardens. My 67 year old body did a lot of complaining about over-using muscles not often over-worked. One of the highlights of the trip was an early evening side trip to "moose alley" a little further north where we saw one moose for about 5 minutes. On the drive home we saw a pair just off the road about 40 miles to the south of Colebrook. We played the local Colebrook C.C., a nine hole course, and my brother showed me who the better player was on this wide open and relatively easy layout. My wife and I then flew down to Conroe, N.C. where my son-in-law took me to the Boone Golf Club and showed me he too could beat me. This is a nice Palmer designed golf course that was a joy and a challenge to play. I broke 100 on the first but not the second course, and my game was no worse on the second course. My only excuse was the use of borrowed clubs at both courses. LAWN AGENT CUES EMBRYO SHORTFALL: That was the article title in October 12 issue of Science News. It was reporting on an article to be published in Environmental Health Perspectives, of research done with mixtures of 2,4-D, mecoprop, and dicamba. The Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison researchers feed mice food laced with these herbicides. The killer is that, "Surprisingly, mothers exposed to the lowest herbicide doses, in general, produced the smallest litters of mice." Not bad if your looking for mice control, but these research results are going to be hell on the turf industry. JIM MOORE DID IT: Most if not all my superintendent readers do not need to read Jim's article, Whose Team Are You On? in the Nov.-Dec. Green Section Record. This is an excellent article on what it takes to become an older successful superintendent. Read it or better yet pass it on to those young assistants "wanna-bes". USGA GREEN SECTION RECORD: As most of my readers are well aware I think the Record is a magazine every superintendent should be reading. You get 6 great issues for$18/year. Use your own money. Show me how professional you are. However, the Nov.-Dec. issue has one article I feel needs a little further clarification. That article is Perennial Ryegrass Fairway Renovation. The article should leave you with the idea that the seeded cultivar Yukon is the only one currently out there that has the winter hardiness needed to renovate perennial ryegrass fairways to seeded bermudagrass in the transition zone. If it has done that then fine, because that is currently where we are at. Knowing that, be absolutely sure you buy certified seed and save a pound or so with the labels and certification so you can sue the seed dealer into bankruptcy if he sold you something that wasn't Yukon. As far as I know there is not a lot of Yukon seed being harvested. LETTER TO: Mr. Michael Wallace, CGCS President GCSAA October 17, 2002 Dear Mr. Wallace: I am a turf consultant, semi-retired, and a former instructor of turf maintenance. George Renault was one of my pupils. Although I no longer am an associate member I do receive a subscription to GCM and the USGA Record. In the October issue of GCM you have a President's message I would like to discuss. I have not liked GCSAA surveys in the past and I'm not sure I am going to like this one that you mention in your column when the full results are known. At least on this one GCSAA had non-members polled. What was the ratio of non-members to members who returned the survey, or answered the poll? I also imagine many of my questions won't be answered until the survey results are published in the future; but here goes: 1) The five commercial industry publications besides GCM were? 2) Seeing that the USGA Green Section Record is not a commercial publication I assume it was not included. Yes or No? 3) I assume Golfdom and Grounds Maintenance were included? I don't feel any others were even worth including which brings me to my next question. Are the directors of GCSAA so unsure of the quality of GCM that they need to have a survey run? I guess I have answered my own question - Yes. 4) Although I have been known to strongly disagree with the USGA Record it is the most credible publication for your industry. I don't care what your survey shows and you shouldn't believe your survey and here is why. If the Record was included in your sampling you could very easily arrive at the numbers you arrived at because such a small percentage of superintendents (GCSAA members and non-members) get this publication. Now this 
is something I, if president of the GCSAA, would be ashamed of. I know when I found out what percentage of superintendents were getting the Record in my 13 state Region when I was Mid-Continent Director of the Green Section I was dumb founded. Superintendents want to be considered professionals but don't subscribe/read the best journal available. Maybe you should have all class A and B members get a copy of this as part of their mem-
bership. I'm sure a cost effective deal could be worked out with the USGA As you can guess by now I am known as an opinionated S.O.B. I consider myself a friend of both the GCSAA and the USGA. And as a friend I'm going to tell them both when they go astray. Look forward to seeing more informa-tion on this survey. These and my further opinions of it will probably be published in TurfComms. Yours for Better Turf, Douglas T. Hawes, Ph.D. The REPLY: Dear Dr. Hawes: November 8,2002 Thank you for your letter about the blind readership survey. GCSAA commissioned the study to gather data to demonstrate to advertisers the value of spending their marketing dollars in Golf Course Management as compared to competing publications. We were very confident that the results would be very strongly in favor of GCM, and the survey results show the merit of our confidence. We are very proud of our magazine and the contributions that our members and editorial staff make to deliver the industry's leading publication every month. I agree that the Green Section Record is an excellent publication. It was not included in the survey simply because advertisers cannot buy ad space in the Record. I hope you will review the complete survey results on www.gcsaa.org as background for whatever you choose to pub-lish in your TurfComms newsletter. If you have any specific questions about the survey after reading the complete questionnaire, methodology and results, please contact Teri Harris at (785) 832-4465 or tharris@gcsaa.org. Sincerely, Michael Wallace, CGCS REPLY TO THE REPLY: Thank you for the reply. I have now gone and reviewed the survey at www.gcsaa.org. Why not say in your "President's message" that "GCSAA commissioned the study to gather data to demonstrate to advertisers the value of spending their marketing dollars in" GCM? Why not include Grounds Maintenance in the survey? It certainly is a better one for superintendents to read than some of the others you include. I certainly can understand the need to assure advertisers that they are going to get their money's worth by publishing in GCM. But, I find your Oct. President's message somewhat misleading. On the other hand I have no doubt about the accuracy of the poll when all factors are considered. I still feel you need to get the GCSAA's superintendents on the Record mailing list. END