As the 2021 season winds down, many of us spend time reflecting on what was accomplished and come up with ways to make next year even better. If you are thinking of ways to make 2022 your best season yet, I encourage you to consider quantifying and recording key putting green performance characteristics such as clipping yield, green speed and firmness. This data can be reviewed throughout the year and at the end of the season to gain insight into what is really working well and what can be changed to improve consistency or manage inputs more efficiently. These are my top-five reasons to collect putting green data:
- Collecting data and presenting it in a meaningful way can illustrate how much work goes into providing the course conditions you deliver. Those greens don’t mow themselves every morning – and you should communicate that to stakeholders at your course. Not only does data collection and presentation illustrate the hard work you are putting in, it also makes it easier for you to communicate with stakeholders and decision-makers in a language that everyone understands.
- Data collection helps you understand how various inputs – such as mowing, rolling, growth regulators, fertilizers or topdressing – impact putting green speed and/or firmness both in the short term and over the course of a season.
- Collecting data on a consistent basis can provide insight into how often greens are within your course’s target range for green speed, and what effects maintenance or weather have on speeds. This type of information can be used to help explain the need for additional resources if your greens aren’t meeting expectations, or to explain some of the inevitable fluctuation in green speed that occurs throughout the year.
- Having data on course maintenance and putting green performance can be helpful when navigating disagreements about historical green speeds or explaining the impact weather can have on green speeds. For example, you might find that green speeds averaged 1-2 feet slower on days after a rain event.
- If data is collected on multiple greens, it can reveal differences in performance from a playability and agronomic perspective. That knowledge can then help you tailor your program to the needs of each green to achieve better and more-consistent results.
- A bonus reason to collect data – it’s easy! There are several products designed to help superintendents organize putting green performance data and the USGA Green Section has been hard at work developing the DEACON platform to make it as impactful and easy-to-use as possible. This platform stores data, creates easy-to-understand graphics for analysis and communication, and is available for you right now. Contact your regional USGA agronomist for more information.
Collecting data alone won’t provide better putting greens, but understanding how putting green performance varies throughout the year and how maintenance practices impact that performance will help guide future decisions. We’ve all heard the adage “You can’t manage what you don’t measure” and there’s no better time than now to start measuring how your greens are performing so you can make 2022 your best season yet.
Central Region Agronomists:
Paul Jacobs, agronomist – pjacobs@usga.org
Zach Nicoludis, agronomist – znicoludis@usga.org