Golfdom, June 2011

FIGURE 1 2009 STUDY Season long soil moisture content in the upper three inches as affected by various wetting agents applied to a 1 year old A4 creeping bentgrass sand putting green with 07 soil organic matter 2009 was a very wet season FIGURE 2 2010 STUDY 36 TurfGrass Trends June 2011 www turfgrasstrends com w e t t i n g a g e n t s Continued from page 35 hydrophobic using wetting agents can lead to slightly lower soil moisture than untreated areas This phenomenon was observed and described in the August 2010 issue of GCM Soldat et al 2010 when a putting green soil treated with wetting agents Aqueduct Primer 604 or Revolution had lower moisture content than the untreated control early in the season under wet conditions and greater moisture content than the control later in the season under dry conditions Hence the marketing experts can have their cake and eat it too Some wetting agents can decrease moisture under wet conditions and increase it under hydrophobic conditions For more information on wetting agents see Wetting Agents What are they and how do they work Karnok et al 2004 But now lets take a closer look at some differences among products during two very wet years in Wisconsin We definitely learned that the behavior of wetting agents can be site specific soils weather etc from the 2004 GCSAA Wetting Agent Evaluation Throssell et al 2005a 2005b With this in mind the following results are from a one year old A4 creeping bentgrass USGA putting green with no amendment The organic matter content of the root zone averages a paltry 07 The putting green was mowed six days a week at 0125 inch with a Toro 1000 To this putting green five wetting agents were applied and compared to a non treated control Each treatment was replicated three times in a randomized complete block design We measured the volumetric soil moisture content in the upper three inches every week with a TDR probe Soil moisture content in the upper three inches as on the same site low organic matter content and another higher organic matter content sand putting green in 2010 as affected by Revolution the only wetting agent re tested from the 2009 group 2010 was wet as well but results are much less pronounced than those seen in 2009