Daily News

ASBA's Position Papers can be found on the website, www.sportsbuilders.org, on the page for each division. They can be downloaded and printed out free of charge. They can be an invaluable source of information to members as well as to others in the industry.

The award is a special, one-time scholarship funded by The Toro Giving Program in celebration of the company's Centennial this month as well as STMA's SAFE Foundation. The grant honors long-time Toro agronomist, Dr. James Watson, who passed away Oct. 1, 2013.

From Jamie Mehringer, J&D Turf: In case you missed it...Last week, Andrew Berlin, owner of the South Bend SilverHawks announced that the synthetic playing surface at Four Winds Field will be replaced with natural grass. Click HERE to see the video interview and his comments from WSBT in South Bend.

STMA's Certified Sports Field Managers program continues grow with 177 members achieving the designation. The program began in 2000 and a total of six people attained the designation that year.

Yellow nutsedge is now one of the most common weeds in turf. Even though all textbooks say it thrives in wet areas, some of our worst yellow nutsedge infestations occur in dry years when turf thins. Though yellow nutsedge acts like an annual, it is technically a perennial surviving from tubers year to year.

When the current Sun Life Stadium field here was built in 1995, runs of flat, perforated pipe were laid under the natural grass field to promote drainage. Some 20 years later due to the compaction of the sand rootzone, buildup of organic material from repeated resodding projects and extremely high use by various sporting events, concerts and monster truck rallies, some patches of the ground needed to be repaired. This led to replacing the original pipe with the same product.

Well, this takes the cake for the most imaginative offseason use for a ballpark we've seen: the Toledo Mud Hens are converting the Fifth Third Field playing field to a putt-putt golf course after the season.

What are some of the best examples of general career advice? By general, I mean not specific to your field but to anyone. It could be advice for someone looking for a job, trying to get a promotion, changing careers or for someone who wants to excel at the job he or she already has.

Commercial companies that are exhibiting at STMA's annual conference and exhibition now have the opportunity to gain recognition for their new products at the STMA show. By submitting an entry into the Innovative Awards Program, that entry will automatically be promoted as a new product.

Determining ways to maintain athletic fields without pesticides can cause even the best turf managers to stumble – literally. There is a fine line between aesthetics and safety when talking about athletic fields, according to UConn researchers who are studying the best practices to comply with a 4-year-old law banning pesticide use on school grounds that serve students through grade eight.