Kicking it in to high gear- Grand Final Weekend 2016

I apologise for the lack of posts since the AGCSA conference. I have been traveling around the country getting to a bunch of seminars where we have sponsored them and given talks at some.

To give you an idea after the AGCSA conference I attended the following:

  • STA ACT
  • VGCSA Country meeting at Rich River
  • VGA Bendigo annual seminar
  • TGAA Corowa annual seminar
  • TGCSA annual seminar
  • SAGCSA conference
  • STA NSW Cricket Wicket 101 course (where i was an assessor for the day)

So as you can see it was fairly full on and the airline and rental car companies know me on a first name basis now. If you are on Twitter or a couple of the Facebook turf pages you would have seen a few pictures I posted as well. Let me just say if you haven’t had a chance to get to any turf turf seminars this year JUST DO IT. The information is first class and networking opportunities are endless.

Enough of that and onto the season. Well a wet start for most. Can someone turn the taps off please for a week or so. Plenty of weeds have been coming up as well and germinating quicker than usual. Get on top of this sooner rather than later.

One thing with the wet weather at least you can identify drainage areas that need to be worked on. If this is something you have in the back of your mind map it on paper so you can easily come back to it when you can.Skitch is a great app here where you can draw on pictures taken from your tablet.

As I write this we are still reasonably cool around Australia besides QLD (I don’t think they had winter this year) but it is about to heat will heat up i Sydney anyway around Grand Final time (Go the Swannies, not sure on NRL as my team is out). So here a few tips to prepare your turf:

  • Use turning boards for mowers, reduce victory lap cuts
  • Maintain adequate soil moisture throughout stressful times.
  • Keep a balanced soil profile (get a soil test do not guess)
  • Improve air flow – cut down trees/branches
  • Communication with the club management and members
  • Promote a healthy growing environment
  • Nutrition (Don’t be afraid to apply N – just know how much and what source)
  • Removing dew to reduce leaf diseases
  • Roll greens instead of mowing – alternate each day
  • Raise mowing heights (even by a 0.5 mm makes a difference)
  • Utilise bio stimulant products during the growing season such as kelp (proven to increase root mass), amino acid (heat stress), humic/fulvic acid products. For any bio stimulant look at what’s inside it and see how each component helps the plant- ask questions to those selling them.
  • Hand water with wetting agent tablets especially for drier areas

Weather for the week coming puts temps higher than they have been so far as you can see:

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Lastly 2 things the Monstar permit has been renewed please download the latest permit here

Also I have and event coming up in Adelaide in conjunction with K&B Adams, SAGCSA and Turfwise Consulting featuring 2 great Australian turf professors:

Percy Wong (Plant pathologist)

Peter McMaugh (turf and mite expert)

I will post more later but see all the information here

kb-ccc-sa-seminar-november-2016-main-seminar-invite

Good luck everyone hope you can get some downtime during the weekend. Feel free to contact me with any help needed

zreikat@campbellchemicals.com.au

Cheers

Nadeem