SportsTurf

July 2015

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.

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www.stma.org July 2015 | SportsTurf 9 SPORTSTURF: What are the most important changes you've seen in sports turf management in your career? OWEN: The explosion of technological innovations must head the list here, as it most likely would relative to most other industries. The expansion of the professional sports turf managers' network around the country and even across the globe has been phenomenal, in no small part due to the leadership and tone set by STMA. All members of the industry are benefitting in meaningful ways, as are related professions including builders, coaches, athletic directors and others. Research specifically targeting sports turf has burgeoned. A lot of very sharp minds at universities and elsewhere across the country are tackling difficult problems, finding solutions that can be used from small town school departments to international level professional sports. Look at the breadth of topics being investigated: from determining nutrients' impact in integrated management of pests, to developing models for managing municipal and school fields with no pesticides, to evaluating synthetic surfaces for optimum human and envi- ronmental safety, to breeding new and improved cultivars of grasses specifically suited for sports turf, to use of sophisticated lighting systems to increase turf potential. And more! The federal government has given a nod to turfgrass as an important component of our environment and deserv- ing of financial support, thanks to the tireless efforts of the National Turfgrass Federation (NTF) and many in the industry. Turfgrass is now considered an eligible entity in the Specialty Crop Research Program enabled in the Farm Bill. This is significant. It means that the door is now open for turfgrass researchers across the country to compete for federal dollars. In the past few years about $15 million has been distributed in research grants and other awards for turfgrass work. The devel- opment of the National Turfgrass Research Initiative (NTRI), the funding of turfgrass research staff at USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) labs in Beltsville and Utah, and more recently the implementation of the Grass Roots Initiative in partnership with the National Arboretum are all very positive developments. These efforts show a commitment shared by the public and private sectors to enhance and communicate the "I do have a synthetic surface pet peeve: people who use the word 'turf' to generically describe artificial surfaces. I just wish they'd cut it out."

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