Practical re-establishment of golf greens following winter damage

The project was carried out on natural winter-damaged golf greens in central Sweden. In 2018 the research plots were on two different golf greens at Surahammars Golf Club. The greens were divided into two blocks, where Poa trivialis was used in one block and Agrostis stolonifera in the other. Across the blocks, one half was designed to be treated with wetting agent (primer select 20 L/ha) and the other half was left untreated. Each block was divided into two plots, with two replicates each:

• Control (no seed) • Vertical cutting + drop seeding (2 mm) • Slit seeding (Vredo)

• Spike seeding (Sisis) The results from 2018 were good. Re-establishment was good for both Poa trivialis and Agrostis stolonifera, except for the sowing method vertical cutting + drop seeding and the control plot, because of warm weather from the start of the experiment. The weather in May and June was so warm that germination of the two grasses went very quickly. The results showed that it is very important to have good soil contact if the seed is to germinate. Spring 2018 became extremely hot and no rain came during the study period. Another significant factor in this year was the high ground temperature, which caused the establishment to accelerate very quickly, especially for Agrostis stolonifera. The results showed that both slit and spike seeding were clearly superior methods to drop seeding and the control treatment. Unfortunately, we were unable to test wetting agent in 2018.