A bit about Southern playing surfaces

Greens can often be the most fickle element of a golf course, whether you're a golfer trying to get off them with as few putts as possible or a course superintendent striving to keep your visitors and members happy.

Golfers desire consistent speeds, a true roll and a pleasant overall appearance from putting surfaces. "How's it rolling?" is a popular refrain as players pass through the clubhouse corridors. Many of these characteristics and how they can be achieved depend on the make-up of the surface itself.

The Southeast is blessed with beautiful year-round weather, although it can become furnace-like from June - August. The hot, humid summers combined with mild winters, plenty of sunshine and moderate amounts of rainfall make it the perfect breeding ground for Bermuda grass.

Bermuda grass is a warm seasonal perennial grass adapted to tropical and subtropical climates. It grows best under extended periods of high temperatures, mild winters and moderate to high rainfall. Many of the courses on Hilton Head Island and throughout the Lowcountry rely on Bermuda grass in both the fairways and on the greens.

Harbour Town Golf Links , site of the annual Verizon Heritage on the PGA Tour, the highly-regarded Long Cove Golf Club, The Robert Trent Jones Course at Palmetto Dunes , Oyster Reef Golf Club and the Golf Club at Indigo Run are just a few of the courses using Bermuda.

TifEagle, one of the many varieties of Bermuda grass, is used for the putting surfaces at both Harbour Town and Long Cove, the island's two top-rated layouts. TifEagle is the third generation of Bermuda grass varieties developed exclusively for golf greens at the Coastal Plains experiment station in Tifton, Ga. TifEagle can stand up to the physical stress of low mowing heights, recovers more quickly from mechanical injury, has better color, is extremely cold hardy (most Bermuda begins to lose its color as temperatures drop below 50° consistently) and is both drought-tolerant and drought-resistant.

Mini Verde is another hybrid of Bermuda that is popular in the South. Mini Verde is the fifth type of ultra dwarf Bermuda in existence. It provides extremely durable and fast-rolling putting surfaces. It's similar to bent grass, which promotes a truer, faster putting surface than Bermuda. But bent grass can only be maintained in cooler climates. Mini Verde is much sturdier than its Bermuda family members, and thus can stand the heat of Florida's summers.

States employing courses with Mini Verde greens include Florida, Texas, Mississippi, South Carolina, Arizona and Louisiana.

Although it's more difficult to maintain because of its resistance to extreme temperatures and humidity, bent grass is often used throughout the Lowcountry and in portions of the Southeast. The most prominent bent grass greens in the South belong to Augusta National Golf Club, site of Masters.

Augusta National switched from Bermuda grass to bent grass in 1981 to provide a faster putting surface and keep scores down. Bent grass, which has thinner blades than the stubby Bermuda, makes for a faster and truer putting surface. Unlike Bermuda grass, there is no grain in bent when it is cut closely.

A final piece of information that's helpful to remember when visiting a golf course in the Southeast is that overseeding is a common practice in the fall.

Overseeding is the laying of grass seed on top of existing grasses to promote new growth or to replace the existing grass with a new strain for the season. It's most commonly done by courses that use Bermuda grass, which goes dormant in winter.

In the fall, a Bermuda grass course will put down ryegrass (or some other type) seed on top of the Bermuda grass, timed so that as the Bermuda grass goes dormant the ryegrass grows in. Then, in spring, Bermuda grass will be seeded over the ryegrass.

Many courses that overseed will offer discounted greens fees during these periods because the greens will be heavily sanded and the new grass may not be cut for a week to 10 days.

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