In a series of three articles golf consultant, Kevin Munt, considers the golf green
management options for three differing golf club operations. The premise being that the club's management are considering the way forward for the next five years. In the first of these articles Kevin discusses the maintenance of ‘quality’ Poa annua surfaces
Three men went to mow!
... and the first was mowing poa G
enerally speaking, in the UK, golf green swards are dominated by three main grass surface types:
Poa Annua, Bent/Fescue and Creeping Bent Grass. Admittedly, there are often any number of combinations of the four named species but, usually, Course Manager are aiming to maintain their greens with a dominant sward made up of one of the three types listed. The decision on which of these three types a club wishes to pursue is the most important decision they will make. So, has your club, or are you, making the right choice on which to mow?
Consulting Process
When a golf club calls in a golf course advisory consultant it is normally because they are looking for a second, third, may even be tenth opinion! Often, they are at a crossroads of thinking which has developed out of any number of greens maintenance proposals - all of which are believed to be for the best of the club and its membership. It is vital that the consultative process takes full account of all the extenuating factors before arriving at the advisory solution. You may feel that I have just stated the obvious. However, it is not always happening. For example the club’s officials believe in a highly promoted, species
conversion as the way forward, the membership is not convinced. The Course Manager is passionate about a traditional maintenance route but his committee want an expert opinion first. The club do not want any disruption to their fantastic ‘green’ surfaces, but the CM and Greens Chairman have other ideas. The
management committee want a species conversion but the CM is happier maintaining what they have got, in the way they always have. The political, theoretical and emotional elements of these scenarios are complex. A good consultant should carefully consider all of them before recommending a way forward to the client.
I do not believe in ‘blue prints’ for
golf green maintenance. There are far too many differing environmental, political, financial, practical, and theoretical factors out there within our 3,000 golf clubs, to shoehorn in ‘one way’ thinking and practice. A uniform agronomic ‘across the organisation mantra’, applied to every golf club scenario, is destined to failure at some clubs. The clubs who are the subjects of this failure haven’t only wasted their money on consultancy fees, they can also lose membership and other golf related income. It is a consultant’s duty
to carefully evaluate each of the factors listed above before providing answers.
Consulting - You try it
By way of a demonstration, let us all be consultants for the next five minutes and take a look at this scenario. We have been asked into Meadowland Park G.C. by the Greens Committee
Chairman to make
recommendations for the maintenance of the
greens for the next five years. Having spent a day at the club on a fact-finding mission we have gathered the following information:
The club is a private members’ club that is eighty years old. It is located in a commuter suburb of a major city conurbation. They have a full membership of 650 members, a small waiting list, and are a popular venue for society and corporate days that they accept twice a week. The club is very competitive across all of its sections at county and national levels. There are six other clubs within thirty miles and there is a lot of local rivalry over who has the best course and, in particular, the best greens. This rivalry turns into who can produce the fastest greens in
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