Tech Notes Issue 15

Maintaining a Quality Practice Range Tee is Difficult but Critical to the Success of a Golf Club

With spring soon to arrive maintaining a quality practice tee through the season is a difficult challenge. Factors like size of the hitting area, and the intensity of use factor in the success of maintaining the tee. A few suggestions for maintaining a tee through the year are provided below.

Setup

The key to maintaining turf quality is to controlling where the golfers practice. Some suggestions on setup have been provided by the United States Golf Association. 

1. Place ropes approximately 2 to 2.5 meters apart across the width of the tee. Anchor the ropes so they can't be moved.
2. Create hitting stations approximately 3 meters apart within the roped area. Hitting stations can be defined with dividers, bag holders, bucket of balls, or small buckets containing topdressing for divot repair.
3. Given that most golfers will use the right-hand portion of the hitting station, the following day move the hitting stations to the left (sideways). This will allow for 2 days of use within the same roped area.
4. Every other day move the roped area. Moving the ropes should be coordinated timed with the mower  operator to save time. The ropes can be moved forward (or backward) 1 or 1. 5 meters. They do not need to be moved 2 to 2.5 meters because golfers tend to shy away from hitting to close to the ropes.

Using the setup described above a practice range tee with a width of 30 meters, it would take between 40 and 60 days before returning to the same spot.

Topdressing

In addition to proper setup, daily topdressing and seeding of the damagedareas is needed. This can be done withthe remaining topdressing mix(containing seed) in the divot buckets orfrom material provided. Additionally,some fertilizer should be added to thetopdressing mix (topdressing/seed) tohelp in seedling establishment.If the golf professional is in charge of therange the topdressing mix can be spreadin the evenings by the person or peopleresponsible for range cleanup. If themaintenance personnel are responsiblethe topdressing mix can be spread earlyin the morning prior to play.

Maintenance

The practice range tees should be coredtwice yearly in conjunction with a mediumto heavy topdressing. The teeshould be adequately fertilized. Summerannual weeds like crabgrass (Digitariaspp.)and goosegrass (Eleusine indica)  are a serious problem on highly wornpractice range tees. Although preemergentherbicides can be used to controlthese weeds they tend to lose efficacytoward the end of summer resultingin a burst of weed growth. In addition,the herbicides can/may restrict seed germinationof tee topdressing mix containingseed. The most effective cool seasonturfgrass to use in the divot mix forquick establishment and most competitiveagainst weeds is perennial ryegrass.Golf Mats installed toward the back ofthe range can provide hitting stationscan reduce wear and excessive injury tothe practice range tee during periods ofinclement weather saving the practicerange tee from excessive damage.

Reference:

Foy, J.H. and J. Beljan. 1994. Turfmanagement in a battle zone: Practiceranges. USGA Green Section Record 32(6):1-8.