Grass Turning Brown

[emkayseven]

MIAMI — The Miami Marlins hit the road for the next nine games, which will give their grounds crew some time to revive the fading turf at the team’s new ballpark.

The grass has been turning brown because the retractable roof was closed more than anticipated in April.

“I would say the sod had as difficult an April as the team did,” team president David Samson said Monday.

That’s not good, because the Marlins went 8-14 in the season’s opening month.

The ballpark has drawn mostly favorable reviews, and the roof helped avert rainouts Sunday and Monday. But because the weather has been unusually wet for April, the grass hasn’t gotten much sun.

During the Marlins’ trip, the grounds crew will try sun lamps to help the grass, Samson said.

“Other retractable-roof ballparks had to make adjustments for at least one or two years to get their field right,” he said. “We had hoped to get it right the first time. So far it’s not right. We’re going to keep working and experimenting and finding a way to make it better.”

Samson said the Marlins remain confident natural grass can be successful in the ballpark, even though the roof will be closed for most games.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports...UsT_story.html

[Jay]

Unrelated: I remember reading that even if the roof will be closed at gametime it will be open on sunny days until a few hours before start when the a/c starts cranking.

But when it is raining do they keep the roof closed?

[Party]

Probably not. The costs of having to paint every year to prevent rust is probably more than the cost of fertilizer. The irrigation system uses well water. The only advantage of using rain water is that it puts nitrogen in the grass.

But I'm not sure.

The last sentence in that article is irrelevant.

[tr305]

It's actually been very sunny. Samson knows better. This has been an issue even during the first pre season games.

[Bobbob1313]

Ehe

[HUGG]

[Mainge]

That's what they did in the Astrodome before Astroturf

[THE_REAL_MIBS]

Maybe they need to call Houston's grounds crew and see what they do. The roof at Minute Maid is closed for nearly every home game in Houston from the beginning of May through the middle of September. Granted, it doesn't rain here in Houston everyday like it does in South Florida but the sun does still come out down there.

[Namaste]

It's actually been very sunny.

on which planet?

[tr305]

With the exception of the past 4 days, the weather in south Florida has been VERY dry. Not sure what in the hell he is talking about.

[Metes]

Talk to him, not us

[Beef]

In dry weather Bermuda grass generally turns brown in color but recovers quickly after a heavy rainfall.

http://www.bermuda-attractions.com/bermuda_0000ee.htm

[Party]

The grass has really improved over the last month. It's been a rainy summer thus far so that's probably helped a lot. Still a few rough spots around home plate and in the outfield.

[CrimsonCane]

There are tons of spots in left field (by the warning track) that are really bad. If you are at the Budweiser bar area, you can see it pretty clearly.

[Party]

Was at a sports turf managers' seminar today at the ballpark. Head groundskeeper said dirt cut outs from the dugout to the homeplate area will go in for next season to help keep maintenance down (did say Loria had to approve). Marlins Park was trying to buck the trend for retractable roof ballparks but it didn't work out.

The sun lamps will become a permanent fixture in the rightfield area when the team is on the road. Even went ahead and installed a power supply. They had the lamps on when I got there.

New turf (didn't say which type) will go in after the soccer games in January.

The homeplate area only gets about 3 hours of sunlight a day in the summer. The field looked really bad. Only part that looked like a major league quality field was the grass in the infield. The heavily used baseball field where I work has nicer grass.