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UMD/TEXAS destroying FedEx Field


Littleyog

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Bermuda is a warm season grass.  Rye, bluegrass, bent grass are cool season grasses.  Fescue can handle both, but not extreme of either, which is why in transition zones of the country such as washington DC you see a lot of fescue.

 

However fescue does not make a good athletic turf.  There are no rhizomes and fescue does not heal and spread rapidly.  Therefore, in a transition zone such as dc, you can choose your poison, basically.  Cool season grass that dies in the summer, or warm season grass that dies in the winter.

 

If you ever see a golf course in the winter (in transition zones), the greens remain a beautiful shade of green.  That is because they are bent grass, a cool season grass.  The fairways are basically dirt... the remnants of the now dormant bermuda.  In the summer, if the greens arent watered 5-6 times per day(called syringing), they turn brown and die.  By contrast, Bermuda fairways need little irrigation in the heat of summer.  Some courses overseed with winter rye, but by and large they just let it go dormant.  So when Kai Forbath says FedEx is dirt painted green, what he means is that the dormant bermuda is painted green.  The same bermuda that is thick and tough through september into october, but goes dormant after the first frost.

 

Fun fact... those beautiful fairways at Augusta National in early april are actually winter rye grass sewn in the fall.  Bermuda doesnt come in until May in Augusta

 

Anywho, that leaves the northern grasses.  I have read where cleveland browns stadium uses a bluegrass, which is a grass that thrives in cool weather and grows with rhizomes (necessary for self healing).  

 

So what have we leearned here folks?  The latitude of washinton dc makes it a transition zone, without a doubt the hardest zone to grow grass.  In decemner, Florida stadiums have immaculate, lush, bermuda.  In december DC has dormant bermuda.  In July, bluegrass would wilt and die in DC.  In northern ohio, bluegrass thrives in the summer.

 

Fedex has recently installed `latitude such and such`, a genetically modified strain of bermuda that is supposed to stay green deeper into the season in cooler climates.  However i think its mostly bs.

 

What I wonder is why they cant verticut, aerate, and overseed FedEx the first week of October with bluegrass?  Time it right, they could have up to 2-3 weks for it to take hold.  Or just put down bluegrass sod in late october?  

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59 minutes ago, zoony said:

 ..... Time it right, they could have up to 2-3 weks for it to take hold.  Or just put down bluegrass sod in late october?  

 

Good stuff zoony. The story has been for a few years now, that they just replace the sod between the numbers sometime in early November.

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On ‎9‎/‎3‎/‎2018 at 8:38 PM, zoony said:

Bermuda is a warm season grass.  Rye, bluegrass, bent grass are cool season grasses.  Fescue can handle both, but not extreme of either, which is why in transition zones of the country such as washington DC you see a lot of fescue.

 

However fescue does not make a good athletic turf.  There are no rhizomes and fescue does not heal and spread rapidly.  Therefore, in a transition zone such as dc, you can choose your poison, basically.  Cool season grass that dies in the summer, or warm season grass that dies in the winter.

 

If you ever see a golf course in the winter (in transition zones), the greens remain a beautiful shade of green.  That is because they are bent grass, a cool season grass.  The fairways are basically dirt... the remnants of the now dormant bermuda.  In the summer, if the greens arent watered 5-6 times per day(called syringing), they turn brown and die.  By contrast, Bermuda fairways need little irrigation in the heat of summer.  Some courses overseed with winter rye, but by and large they just let it go dormant.  So when Kai Forbath says FedEx is dirt painted green, what he means is that the dormant bermuda is painted green.  The same bermuda that is thick and tough through september into october, but goes dormant after the first frost.

 

Fun fact... those beautiful fairways at Augusta National in early april are actually winter rye grass sewn in the fall.  Bermuda doesnt come in until May in Augusta

 

Anywho, that leaves the northern grasses.  I have read where cleveland browns stadium uses a bluegrass, which is a grass that thrives in cool weather and grows with rhizomes (necessary for self healing).  

 

So what have we leearned here folks?  The latitude of washinton dc makes it a transition zone, without a doubt the hardest zone to grow grass.  In decemner, Florida stadiums have immaculate, lush, bermuda.  In december DC has dormant bermuda.  In July, bluegrass would wilt and die in DC.  In northern ohio, bluegrass thrives in the summer.

 

Fedex has recently installed `latitude such and such`, a genetically modified strain of bermuda that is supposed to stay green deeper into the season in cooler climates.  However i think its mostly bs.

 

What I wonder is why they cant verticut, aerate, and overseed FedEx the first week of October with bluegrass?  Time it right, they could have up to 2-3 weks for it to take hold.  Or just put down bluegrass sod in late october?  

 

 

Or just put in field turf which is fine.

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On 9/3/2018 at 11:25 PM, zoony said:

I also read that heinz field is heated with underground pipes.  That is pretty ingenius, keeps the soil temps up even in the winter.  Heinz has bluegrass blend... cool season grass, just like cleveland

A little too pricey under Snyder’s watch.  I hear he’s going to throw a few of these on field when the weather turns.

 

75E6E1D4-2D65-45BB-B8E5-4B7B1E3FF4F4.png

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