Department of Agriculture’s specialty crop research initiative, which would help expand the program. A group at the University of Minnesota developed the sensors that are being used.įrank said the universities as a group will apply for a grant through the U.S. The research is being conducted in conjunction with several other universities. What we will never be able to do is predict winter weather, but if we can take some of the guesswork out of it with data, it gives superintendents help for what is a serious problem.” “What we don’t have is a systematic approach and data to pull from. “Superintendents work hard on it every year, but a lot of it is guessing and going on what worked or was tried the year before as in tarps on greens, different fertilizers in the fall, clearing snow from greens, those kinds of things,” he said. “We hope to get to a point where we can provide real-time data to help superintendents make decisions.”Ĭarey Mitchelson, executive director of the MTF and the director of operations at College Fields Golf Club in Okemos, said the hope is for the study to help superintendents find ways to produce healthier turf each spring. “It was a huge issue here and elsewhere in 2014 and there are still quite a few courses susceptible to these winter problems each year,” he said.
If we have success and collect data this year we can develop a data base at some point and then develop from there a model to assist the superintendents with their winter issues and decisions on what to do.”įrank said multiple efforts have been made in the study of ice damage and winter kill since the winter of 2014 when an ice layer formed on many courses in northern states causing unprecedented damage across the Midwest. We are kicking the tires and figuring it out. “This is the first year with the sensors.
“We are trouble-shooting now, finding out if they are going to work and a goal of this is hopefully to develop something that could be commercialized where a course could purchase it and install on, say, a problem green to monitor conditions,” Frank said. A cell connection updates the data on the greens through the winter. Kevin Frank, MSU professor and turf extension specialist, said the MTF funded the purchase of six sensors that have been installed at six Michigan courses and are currently collecting data, including soil moisture and temperature at three depths as well as measuring oxygen and carbon dioxide levels. A study of winter weather effects and ice damage on golf courses using sensors implanted in greens by Michigan State University’s turfgrass program is being funded in part by the Michigan Turfgrass Foundation.
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