A NOVEL AND EFFECTIVE METHOD OF LYSIMETER DESIGN AND INSTALLATION IN A USGA SPECIFICATION GOLF GREEN

The primary concern of turfgrass superintendents is the management and maintenance of pristine turfgrass manicured to perfection on facilities subjected to regular close grass mowing, frequent use, intensive wear and increasingly, all year round play. Sand based rootzones compound the problem because of their inherent characteristics such as physical hardness, a general lack of organic matter, limited cation exchange capacity and water retention leading to the loss of nutrients to the environment. Despite these shortcomings, their use in turfgrass sporting facilities is growing in popularity because of their desirable characteristics such as excellent drainage and especially the capacity to withstand wear during all seasons, but more importantly during wintertime. A United States Golf Association (USGA) specification golf green equipped with more than one hundred lysimeters was recently constructed at University College Dublin with a view to study nutrient and pesticide loss and/or sequestration in turfgrass. The lysimeters were fabricated from butyl rubber fastened onto 1 m² (1 x 1 m) timber frames. Each one was plumbed using standard domestic plumbing materials (32 mm waste discharge pipes, jointing sockets and bends, 110 mm unequal T connections and Fusetite commercial glue) to a collection point. The system is flexible and can facilitate the application of a vacuum or positive air pressure either to withdraw moisture or apply sub-aeration to each lysimeter and so simulates modern football pitch designs. The lysimeter design and fabrication method together with the installation protocol represents a very simple, efficient, effective, high capacity, cheap and easy to install system. It also has the capacity to collect leachate from a large physical area of a typical golf green and to deliver it via a network of dedicated underground pipes to a leachate collection facility. It is also possible to subdivide the green into discrete sections to track the efficacy of a range of applied nutrients and other products over time at differential application rates.