Tahoma 31 Bermuda grass

[Jim Franklin]

Any supers have experience with this strain of grass? We are sick and tired of playing soft, wet bent grass in the summer. I have been told this is a grass that will allow mid-Atlantic courses to play firm and fast in the summer. Would be interested in others' opinions.

[John Mayhugh]

There's a public course here in Kentucky - Park Mammoth - that just opened this year. They went with Tahoma 31 for the fairways and it worked really well during the summer. I haven't seen how it plays in dormancy.
My club replaced zoysia with tahoma in one poor draining fairway area (100 yards from green and in) and it was a vast improvement in firmness. I think it's an audition for regrassing everything at some point. That small sample of dormant tahoma played great last week.

[Anthony_Nysse]

Any supers have experience with this strain of grass? We are sick and tired of playing soft, wet bent grass in the summer. I have been told this is a grass that will allow mid-Atlantic courses to play firm and fast in the summer. Would be interested in others' opinions.

Renovating A Classic - Sod Production Services

[Mark Smolens]

Thanks for that article. Very interesting for the non-superintendent crowd...

[Alan FitzGerald CGCS MG]

Any supers have experience with this strain of grass? We are sick and tired of playing soft, wet bent grass in the summer. I have been told this is a grass that will allow mid-Atlantic courses to play firm and fast in the summer. Would be interested in others' opinions.

It all depends where in the Mid Atlantic you are. Also I believe Columbia kept their poa greens and the Tahoma was for fairways and roughs. Ie I'm not sure it would give a good enough greens playing surface that for north all year., especially if its needed overseeding. Bentgrass is a tough plant if managed properly so there may be other underlying issues at play, but again it all depends on the location as there is a cut off point where the bermuda would be better. IMO the switchover is probably around Richmond.

[Jim Franklin]

Any supers have experience with this strain of grass? We are sick and tired of playing soft, wet bent grass in the summer. I have been told this is a grass that will allow mid-Atlantic courses to play firm and fast in the summer. Would be interested in others' opinions.

It all depends where in the Mid Atlantic you are. Also I believe Columbia kept their poa greens and the Tahoma was for fairways and roughs. Ie I'm not sure it would give a good enough greens playing surface that for north all year., especially if its needed overseeding. Bentgrass is a tough plant if managed properly so there may be other underlying issues at play, but again it all depends on the location as there is a cut off point where the bermuda would be better. IMO the switchover is probably around Richmond.

Just outside of Baltimore.

[Alan FitzGerald CGCS MG]

That far north, bentgrass is the best option for greens.


I might be worth investigating using Tahoma for fairways in Baltimore based on Columbia and some other DC courses, but I think overall, bentgrass would still end up as the best choice. Being a little over an hour north of you, it definitely would be too much of a compromise here, especially based on the courses that are using (or have used) it for the range tees with mixed results. Any benefits of summer use would be offset with going into/out of dormancy in the spring and fall, along with the potential for winter kill if there is an abnormally cold winter.


The Eagles use it for the Linc and their practice fields, but their use/needs are different to golf, so a slow/late spring green up isn't as much of an issue. The Linc is overseeded, but the practice fields are not, and start to go into dormancy in late October/early November so it isn't as much of an issue in fall than it is in the spring.


Springfield Country Club outside Philly converted to Bermuda a number of years ago. I believe they had a rough first year or so getting it established (due to an extra cold winter) but as far as I know it is doing good now - although I had pretty much forgotten about it until this conversation - so they might be a good resource to look into using it.

[Jim Franklin]

Thanks Alan.

[Lester George]

I specified it at Gibson Island in MD and will be using it at Lexington G&CC in VA.  Also using it at Kinloch GC on the north end of the range tee for summer hitting.  Really good stuff.  Out performing most every warm season grass in the Mid-Atlantic I have seen in the past three years.

[Stephen Northrup]

Any supers have experience with this strain of grass? We are sick and tired of playing soft, wet bent grass in the summer. I have been told this is a grass that will allow mid-Atlantic courses to play firm and fast in the summer. Would be interested in others' opinions.

I’m a member of Columbia CC and very pleased with our new fairways so far. If you’d like to come out and see how the course is playing next summer, please let me know! Happy to host you.

[John Emerson]

Not to be condescending, but IronCutter is old news and significantly outperforms Tacoma 31 in every single turf quality parameter used for cultivar evaluation (NTEP). If one is wanting to establish new Bermudagrass ironcutter is the better choice.

[Anthony_Nysse]

Not to be condescending, but IronCutter is old news and significantly outperforms Tacoma 31 in every single turf quality parameter used for cultivar evaluation (NTEP). If one is wanting to establish new Bermudagrass ironcutter is the better choice.

John,
  What courses have installed IronCutter?

[John Emerson]

Tony,
Don’t have the complete list, but if you reach out Adam Russell I am positive that he can tell you every location of iron cutter in the world. It’s only been around since the last round of NTEP trials so it still fairly new. It was an experimental variety from OK St. and didn’t even a name until 2018 I believe.

[Adam Russell]

Tony,
Don’t have the complete list, but if you reach out Adam Russell I am positive that he can tell you every location of iron cutter in the world. It’s only been around since the last round of NTEP trials so it still fairly new. It was an experimental variety from OK St. and didn’t even a name until 2018 I believe.

Thank-you kindly John. You are correct on the name & timing. IronCutter is the newest commercial bermuda release, and it shows extreme cold-tolerance while also performing very well in droughty, arid places like Phoenix and humid, tropical locales like South FL.. Being so new, we are just getting up enough acreage at US sod farms nation-wide to be able to support full conversions for entire courses. That will happen next year. Tahoma is nearly 3 years older for reference, but certainly an elite grass like IronCutter.

IronCutter has survived -13 degrees and 350+ hours sub-freezing with 0% winterkill in February 2021 in Oklahoma. We've just wrapped IronCutter's first season as the northernmost bermuda athletic field in the country at Northwestern University in Evanston, IL (Ryan Field), and after 2 winters of testing it was chosen as the first planned bermuda planting in Central Park NYC's 160+ year history (besting T31 in tests). Both places are ecstatic with performance.

To steer this back to architecture, we've been fortunate enough to be planted at a number of cool, historic courses in the DMV area up to Philadelphia that are investigating whether to convert from older bentgrass. Most start with a range tee, then convert short game areas, then on-course tees and surrounds until a decision is made on full conversion. I predict 20+ courses in that corridor will convert fairways in the next few years to T31 or IronCutter, mainly because memberships are getting older and it's much easier to get bermuda to bounce for the duration of a playing season rather than bentgrass. That keeps the classic contours playing as they should, and grass heights can be adjusted much quicker to respond to stresses of each season. As a researcher and lover of both grasses as playing surfaces, bermuda wins over bent right now because it can adapt better to cold than bent to heat with less inputs. Many places in the US Mid-Atlantic (and even up into the Northeast) have been hotter for long stretches of summer that last 3-5 years than the Southeast US.


Our goal as researchers and breeders of grasses is to make them play exactly as each sport intends with zero inputs. We're not even close to achieving that, but many species are making great strides. We've got bluegrass that can survive well into the Southeast, Bermuda & Zoysia pushing into CT & the PNW, and heat-tolerant bentgrass is pushing back into the lower transition zone against ultra-dwarf bermuda. Very soon, an improved Poa annua seed will release. Great choices for golf architects keen to make courses play a certain way.


If anyone has further questions or wants references, message me. I'll recede into the background now. 

[Tom Bacsanyi]

Tony,
Don’t have the complete list, but if you reach out Adam Russell I am positive that he can tell you every location of iron cutter in the world. It’s only been around since the last round of NTEP trials so it still fairly new. It was an experimental variety from OK St. and didn’t even a name until 2018 I believe.

Thank-you kindly John. You are correct on the name & timing. IronCutter is the newest commercial bermuda release, and it shows extreme cold-tolerance while also performing very well in droughty, arid places like Phoenix and humid, tropical locales like South FL.. Being so new, we are just getting up enough acreage at US sod farms nation-wide to be able to support full conversions for entire courses. That will happen next year. Tahoma is nearly 3 years older for reference, but certainly an elite grass like IronCutter.

IronCutter has survived -13 degrees and 350+ hours sub-freezing with 0% winterkill in February 2021 in Oklahoma. We've just wrapped IronCutter's first season as the northernmost bermuda athletic field in the country at Northwestern University in Evanston, IL (Ryan Field), and after 2 winters of testing it was chosen as the first planned bermuda planting in Central Park NYC's 160+ year history (besting T31 in tests). Both places are ecstatic with performance.

To steer this back to architecture, we've been fortunate enough to be planted at a number of cool, historic courses in the DMV area up to Philadelphia that are investigating whether to convert from older bentgrass. Most start with a range tee, then convert short game areas, then on-course tees and surrounds until a decision is made on full conversion. I predict 20+ courses in that corridor will convert fairways in the next few years to T31 or IronCutter, mainly because memberships are getting older and it's much easier to get bermuda to bounce for the duration of a playing season rather than bentgrass. That keeps the classic contours playing as they should, and grass heights can be adjusted much quicker to respond to stresses of each season. As a researcher and lover of both grasses as playing surfaces, bermuda wins over bent right now because it can adapt better to cold than bent to heat with less inputs. Many places in the US Mid-Atlantic (and even up into the Northeast) have been hotter for long stretches of summer that last 3-5 years than the Southeast US.


Our goal as researchers and breeders of grasses is to make them play exactly as each sport intends with zero inputs. We're not even close to achieving that, but many species are making great strides. We've got bluegrass that can survive well into the Southeast, Bermuda & Zoysia pushing into CT & the PNW, and heat-tolerant bentgrass is pushing back into the lower transition zone against ultra-dwarf bermuda. Very soon, an improved Poa annua seed will release. Great choices for golf architects keen to make courses play a certain way.


If anyone has further questions or wants references, message me. I'll recede into the background now. 

Yes but Ryan Field is overseeded with rye correct? Or do they just paint it?

[David_Tepper]

Info on Iron Cutter grass here:
https://heartlandturffarms.com/iron-cutter-bermuda/

[Adam Russell]

Info on Iron Cutter grass here:
https://heartlandturffarms.com/iron-cutter-bermuda/

Full disclosure, I named IronCutter and lead the company responsible for it's creation and licensing. So I'm extremely biased here, but I think there's enough people that have planted it to support my saying it's good enough to be a leading golf grass. We are striving to become the only company that owns grass seed production as well as vegetative types (non-seeded) of professional grasses. Curiously, this has never been attempted before.


Heartland is a fantastic grower and supplied Northwestern.

Yes but Ryan Field is overseeded with rye correct? Or do they just paint it?

Both , Big 10 football schedules are brutal on fields. 3-4 games in a row to start and end seasons. These pictures are from this morning at Ryan Field, and you can see the ryegrass isn't doing all the work. There's a surprising amount of IronCutter left with some green. It's changed my thinking about what a bermudagrass can and can't do in a northern climate. We're not exactly sure where the kill zone for bermuda is now.

[Jim Hoak]

The restoration of Brook Hollow in Dallas a couple of years ago was done totally with Tahoma 31.  In fact, we were told we were the first to use it for a total restoration. 
We love it!  It has held up very well.  No issues with it.  Anyone considering it should come see us.

[Sinclair Eaddy]

Jim, I think some folks from your club have visited US Naval Academy and the results there have been very good. The turf conditions and presentation of the course from my visits there have been top notch.

[Jim Hoak]

The Tahoma turf has a beautiful, dark green look to it.  The only negative we were told for Brook Hollow is that it doesn't grow much past 3 inches.  We wanted to use the same grass everywhere, except for our greens that are bent with Subair.  But we didn't think that a max of 3 inches was a problem for our rough, since Bermuda rough of that height is plenty difficult.

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