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Rolls of sod await shipment from a California farm. Sod growers say they have changed their operations to grow more warm-season grasses that typically require less water. Turf Continued from Page 3
“Projections for this year are pretty strong,” he said. “I would say that most sod farms right now are probably seeing a slight challenge with inventory, because people were slowing down a little bit, being cautious, and now there’s a high- er demand.” California had 37 sod-growing operations cov- ering 9,883 acres in 2019, resulting in $117.6 mil- lion in sales, according to the U.S. Department of AgricultureNational Agricultural Statistics Service. Those growers nowmust deal with California’s onrushing drought and the likelihood of wa- ter-use restrictions affecting, among other things, watering of lawns. That has prompted a move to low-water-use sod, something LeMay has been promoting. “We’ve been really pushing hard for water-sav- ing grasses, i.e., Bermudas, St. Augustine,” LeMay said. “They’ll get by with less water. They go dor- mant in the wintertime—no water requirements at all when they go dormant.” Low-water sod is taking root especially on golf courses, Marman said. “We’ve had a consistent gearing up for the drought over the last 15 years,” he said. Marman named Ti fTuf, developed at the University of Georgia, as a sod capable of us- ing 39% less water than Tifway 419, the world’s most popular Bermuda grass. Another new turf, Tahoma 31, was shown in Oklahoma State University testing to use even less water than TifTuf, Marman said. “Through university testing that’s backed up by university documentation, you now have a grass that is encroaching on 50% water savings on top of the already existing Bermuda grass- es,” he said. “You’re just moving in a direction where you now have grasses that per form better waterwise.” Fox said when his company took over the Escondido sod farm in 2016, about 90% of its output was cool-season grasses tailored to tem- perate climes; the remainder was warm-sea- son turf. The mix now is 60%/40% in favor of warm-season. “Almost al l our commercial projects are
warm-season,” Fox said. “Anything going to parks, schools, golf courses is now some form of warm-season grass, Bermuda grass or Paspalum. The last drought had a heavy influence on what we’re shipping tomarket today.” Going to warm-season grass can save 20% to 30% on a water bill if managed properly, he added. “There’s still a lot of people that want that full-season look, but there has been a definite shift in two areas,” Fox said. “One, they are shift- ing away from cool-season to warm-season. We’re also seeing the size of yards shrink. People are putting in less grass, trying to save water.” Marman sa i d h i s company ’s Nor the rn California farms in Livingston and Patterson used to grow 80% cool-season grass and 20% warm-season about 20 years ago; now, those numbers have reversed. “We’ve really flipped up there, and that is by and large because of water,” he said. “The same thing is starting to slowly happen down here in Southern California.” Producers also said turf grass can mitigate the “heat island” effect, in which hardscapes reflect heat and warm the surrounding area as a result. A 5,000 square-foot lawn can be as much as 60 degrees cooler than hardscape, according to the Lawn Institute. LeMay remembers the previous drought, and the resulting bullseye on people’s lawns. “During the last drought, there was what I thought was an unfair target put on grass,” he said. “It’s just too easy for them to say, ‘Stop watering your yard.’ They don’t look at the other benefits.” Fox echoed these concerns. “Let’s use grass where its best use is, for play ar- eas or runoff areas, for pets,” he said. “It’s a fact that grass is a lot cooler than any hard surface you can use, including synthetic turf. There’s plenty of studies to show that the heat-island effect is very real. You need tomitigate that, and the best way to do that is with trees and turf.” (KevinHecteman is anassistant editor of AgAlert. He can be contacted at khecteman@cfbf.com.)
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May 12, 2021 Ag Alert 27
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