The Ohio State University

Home TurfNotes Miklagard Golf Club is situated 20 miles north of Oslo, Norway. The course was designed by Robert Trent Jones II and opened June 2001. Miklagrad Golf Club is an open parkland course with high rough and water measuring 7300 yards par 72. Our golfing season runs from May 1st through mid-November with approximately 30,000 rounds logged during this period.
The golf course is grassed to:

Greens: Creeping bentgrass Penn A4
Fairways: Perennial ryegrass, smooth stalked meadow grass, (Poa pratensis)
Tees: Perennial ryegrass, smooth stalked meadow grass
Rough: Perennial ryegrass, smooth stalked meadow grass
Long rough: Fescue

Norway's climate is an extremely challenging climate to construct and maintain a golf course because of the long winters which leave tens of inches of ice and snow on the course. A serious problem for us is freeze injury that occurs in late winter/early spring. During March (the exact dates are dependent on weather conditions) we enter cycles where daytime temperatures cause daily thawing and melting of ice next to the grass plant followed by freezing at night when temperatures drop. The resultant freeze injury can be huge as shown in some of the photographs.

Photograph 1: The top photo was taken the first week of April from the 17th green looking back down the fairway towards the 2nd fairway. The 2nd fairway suffered little freeze injury because if faces south and is more open compared to the 2nd fairway that is shaded.

Prior to the freeze/thaw cycles, we try to remove the ice the ice from the greens using an ice breaker fitted to a compact tractor. We also manually try to remove the ice using snow shovels. When all ice has been removed from the green, we cover the whole green with a perforated plastic sheet; this sheet keeps frost off the green and increases the temperature of the grass canopy during the day. On tees, fairways, and roughs he ice and snow is left to melt naturally because of the amount of ice and snow that accumulates.

Photograph 2:This photo was taken on the 9th green during the first of April. Although the green was not completely dead from freeze injury, we did re-turf the green. We have cut the sod with a sod cutter. We removed the turf and re-turfed.

The winter of 2007/2008 was an average one for temperatures and snowfall. However, we were slightly late, we believe, in removing the ice from the greens. The result was the death of 10 greens, and four others that received significant damage. We estimated that 70 percent of the turf on tees, fairways, and roughs was lost.

Greens Re-establishment

Photograph 3:This photo shows the 9th green in the first week of April. We are laying rolls of Penn A4 in rows straight up and down the green, using plastic board to work on so not to put a heal mark in the soft turf. A thin layer of sand was spread over the green prior to laying the turf. It took 5 of us all day (12 hours) to turf one green.

During the first week of April we started re- turfing the greens. The turf chosen was Penn A4 creeping bentgrass and it was imported from the United Kingdom. Removing the dead turf and laying the new turf was a massive job. The greens had to be playable within one month. The new turf was approximately 25 - 30mm long when we laid it. The turfing job we did had to be perfect - no gaps- so we could start verticutting the new turf as soon as possible to get the height down to a playable level, the new turf had its first cut at about 15mm and the cutting height was gradually reduced to 5mm for the opening of the course. To help smooth the surface we started as soon as we could with a 100 percent sand topdressing program (frequent heavy rate).

Tees, Fairways, Roughs

The rest of the course was overseeded with perennial ryegrass and smoothstalk meadowgrass. We fertilized aggressively using granual fertiliser applications during the spring followed by spoon feeding the course with liquid applications of iron, urea and potassium nitrate during the summer. Frequent irrigation was required.

Green Staff Golf Course Manager - 12 month contract
Head Greenkeeper - 12 month contract
Deputy Head Greenkeeper - 12 month contract
Mechanic - 12 month contract
Irrigation Technician - 12 month contract
Chemical Technician - 8 month contract
7 Assistant Greenkeepers - 7 month contract
6 seasonal geenkeepers - 3 month contract

Robert Lucas is an OSU International Turfgrass Intern, and Ian Ross is the golf course superintendent.

Posted by Robert Lucas & Ian Ross