Steven Huffstutler, CGCS said: Thanks Andy. I hadn't thought about that, just trying to figure out what we're gonna do when we rebuild. I'm beginning to think this might not be such a great idea, but having gotten burned with Champion, I'm trying to come up with a strategy to try to maintain a pure stand and keep encroachment at bay. I was thinking that it might be easier to cut encroachment out of the collars than the green, but I'm thinking you may have to cut the collars at .25"
Steve
Up until 2013, we had tifeagle collars and approaches at Pine Tree. Though really cool, playability wise, we had to use yellow dots all winter long to see the cleanup edge and also identify if a ball was on a green or not, for marking purposes. After a marking issue during the club championship, they were switched out that summer.
We used boards year round to minimize suppression of the collar and maintained at .250". It wouldn't grow any higher and we never mow any turf off the collars in the winter months. They were installed originally to minimize encroachment, or when it occurred, it was in the collars, not the green.