SportsTurf provides current, practical and technical content on issues relevant to sports turf managers, including facilities managers. Most readers are athletic field managers from the professional level through parks and recreation, universities.
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/50965
SIMMONS FIELD Original construction date: 1959 Size: 121,900 sq. ft. Use: 800 hours of baseball specific include NCAA competition, High School regular and post season games, and baseball camps. Variety(s) of turfgrass(es): Kentucky bluegrass with perennial ryegrass in the wear areas. Overseed: This year overseeded with 'Rush', 'NuDestiny', 'Award' and 'Impact'. Also use RPR ryegrass to overseed the walk up areas, grass baselines and areas around the mound. Mix composition: 91 % Sand 9 % other Other mix: 2% Silt, 2.9% Clay, 4.1% Gravel Drainage: Herringbone system Challenges: This season was the most challenging I have ever survived since being a sports turf manager. Columbia (MO) led the country in most above average snowfall for a season at 320% above normal this year with 45.6". We had one of the wettest springs on record with 4.31" of rain and 13.79" of snow in March, and we had 45+ days in the 90's with the peak of 108 on August 2nd. It was the first time in my career that I printed of safety standards for how many hours you could be outside in below zero temps and how many hours you could be outside with temps in 100's. Since the heaviest snow was in February when the team was practicing we had to do whatever was possible to get them outside. We borrowed two snow blowers and started removing the snow. It took days to finally break through all of it but little by little we started seeing the field. The spring had many tarp pulls and lots of hand dragging because it was too wet to get any machines on the field. We have Kentucky bluegrass baselines and all the moisture and play took its toll on them so we decided to do a mid-season replacement. Due to snow we actually did the replacement a day before the game. If the NFL guys can sod before a game why couldn't I, with thick cut sod. I had them cut the sod at 1.5" and we installed it. The coaches and players loved it, and it is still holding up to this day. The summer heat combined with the camp schedule made keeping 1.25" bluegrass a real challenge. I had always played around with bio-stimulants but this is the first year I used a program. I used Floratine Astron, Knife+ and Power C3 when I sprayed my fungicides (program designed by myself and Dr. Lee Miller of the University of Missouri) and was able to keep my grass growing and www.stma.org SportsTurf 41 green through most of the summer. The base- ball coach said it was the first time they had green grass after the month of June. Besides the weather the other reason I wanted to submit for Field of the Year is be- cause of my student interns. When I started at Mizzou I told the students our goal is to win an award and they helped me prepare this ap- plication. They work so hard and I want them to be showcased for their efforts. The intern program was started by Dr. Minner and Dr. Brad Fresenburg with Jeff Salmond, CSFM as one of the first to participate. The interns get to do everything on the field and when they graduate they have years of actual working ex- perience as well as having a degree. SportsTurf: You mentioned a lack of records in your entry. What kind of record keeping do you use? McPherson: I have been tracking every- thing in my Outlook Calendar this past year. I share the calendar with my co-workers and we are trying to record everything we do. Specifically we are tracking fertilizer, chemical, topdressing, and aeration applica- tions. We are also putting notes for spreader settings, etc. This helps us fine tune applica- tions our next time out. We are also recording disease instances or any unusual things we may find on the grass. For example my first year here we got summer patch on the blue- grass earlier than I thought we would see it in the year. After recording it in Outlook I would go one year in the future and put Sum- mer Patch arrived last year on this date and then put a 2-week reminder to give me enough time to purchase some fungicide. I would then get the reminder and start moni- toring for Summer Patch, watch the weather and apply a preventative if conditions were right. I believe this helped us keep the diseases under control last year. I would also put in all "last-minute" requests that would come through during a sports season and proac- tively see if they needed to be done the fol- lowing year so we could do them on a practice or off day for the teams. ST: What channels of communication do you use to reach coaches, administrators and users of your facility? Any tips on communi- cating well? McPherson: I always try to meet face to face and to have one point of contact with each team. Sometimes different coaches