During the year, I may receive between 10 and 35 emails or phone calls a week asking specific questions on bentgrass. The topics may range from fertility, watering, height of cut, fungicides, which type best fits my location, and other golf-related issues. I also receive several phone calls from clubs or homeowners with bowling courts, cricket courts, badminton, and formal garden use; the occasional homeowner who decides to plant his entire lawn in bentgrass and is that a good idea. The rooftop bentgrass yards in the big cities seem to have become very popular over the last couple of years. Once a year, I get questions on building bentgrass miniature golf courses, which I have actually gone to visit.
I received a few questions over the last couple of weeks which, as a turf manager, surprised me and makes you wonder.
I received a phone call from an artist building a living wall mural entirely out of bentgrass, who wanted to know proper fertility and water use. He also wanted advice on different bent selections for color. The mural will be faces of the nation. This is a cool and unique use of bents that would be exciting to see. I asked him to take pictures when it is grown in so I could share it with other turf managers.
Once a year, I get a person wanting to build a green or complete golf course indoors in either a very cool climate or the desert. They ask, "Can this be done?" Can you afford to build it, because I am sure a person would try.
Last week, I received a phone call from a shipbuilder looking for a salt-tolerant bentgrass to be used on towable barges for complete golf holes to be used on the ocean for three guys to play on from their yachts.
I met an old greenskeeper who once told me he "could grow that Penncross on anything, anywhere, including the break room table." I wish he was still around so I could introduce him to a few guys who had the same idea.
