Read on Twitter
The sand applied with this week’s aerification, is the first bit of sand applied to putting surfaces this season. I used to think regular topdressing was a necessity, I no longer believe it to be true. #hngcturf
On Monday, @asianturfgrass posted this tweet, which led me down a rabbit hole of reading and got me thinking about topdressing amounts expressed as a depth, as well as correlating topdressing amounts to #clipvol. https://twitter.com/asianturfgrass/status/1290252829844676609?s=20
One of the posts I (re)read was this @asianturfgrass post from May. In it, he suggests; "Matching sand topdressing to the growth of the grass works out pretty good when applying 1 cm3 of sand for every 1 cm3 of clipping volume." https://www.asianturfgrass.com/2020-05-01-sand-topdressing-by-growth-rate/
Some quick math reveals this is 1 mm of sand applied to a square meter for every 1 liter of clippings removed from that same square meter.
As I have this data, I summed it up & this season, on ave, we have removed 1.2 L of clippings from every square meter of putting surface.
As I have this data, I summed it up & this season, on ave, we have removed 1.2 L of clippings from every square meter of putting surface.
As I'm reading these articles, our aerification plan was already in place and about to be executed. It gave me a great chance to estimate the amount of sand applied by depth.
Some quick math-21407 liters of sand applied to 12077 sq, meters, when 1L of sand applied to 1 sq meter equals 1 mm of depth, tells me we applied 1.8 mm of sand during this topdressing event. An amount slightly more than our season-to-date #clipvol of 1.2L/sq meter.
Digressing; I feel our greens have been better this season without regular applications of sand. With the sand present, mowing and rolling schedules have been consistent. With growth rates closely monitored, we haven't seen the surfaces become puffy due to lack of sand.
Past experiences have always seen us causing some amount of damage to the leaf tissue post-sand application. We've completely eliminated this damage and thus summer decline, by not topdressing on a regular schedule.
Moving forward, I see us applying sand during two windows each season. August aerification and late fall, ahead of winter.
As I suspect our total season #clipvol will be between 2.5 and 3 L per square meter. We will aim to apply about 1 mm of topdressing in the fall.
As I suspect our total season #clipvol will be between 2.5 and 3 L per square meter. We will aim to apply about 1 mm of topdressing in the fall.
For those wondering; 1mm of topdressing is 15.7 yards of sand applied over 130,000 sq ft.
