The big show, anchored by the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America (GCSAA), was held Feb. 23-Feb. 26 in San Antonio, with most activities occurring at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center. Here are some of the things
Neil Cleverly. Photo by Lawrence Aylward.
we saw and heard at the show.
It was a cold, blustery morning to spend on a turf farm, but that didn’t stop the “Zoysia as a Game Changer” event from happening on Monday, Feb. 23, at Bladerunner Farms in Poteet, Texas, about 30 miles from San Antonio. Many presenters at the event, including Milt Engelke, Ph.D., professor emeritus at Texas A&M University, dressed for the occasion. In the photo above, Engelke holds up a tuft of zoysiagrass and explains that it has a very high lignin and silica content, which can dull a mower’s blade similar to sand.
In the afternoon, the event moved to the clubhouse of the Golf Club of Texas in San Antonio, which recently underwent a wall-to-wall conversion to zoysiagrass under golf course architect Roy Bechtol, who calls zoysia “the best playing surface you can have as a golfer.”
Neil Cleverly, superintendent of the Olympic Course in Rio de Janeiro, was also on hand at event to talk about the course’s fairways, which feature Zeon zoysia.
Above: Milt Engelke. Photo by Lawrence Aylward.