By Alex Glasgow, NZ Sports Turf Institute
cover on the entire playing field area and, which required the re-establishment of Kikuyu on the area. This could not simply be done through the traditional method of sowing seed in the autumn. Instead, establishing Kikuyu would require the field to be sown initially in a traditional species (rye grass) to establish a short to medium-term turf cover.
A large part of a combined primary/ intermediate school playing field in Auckland needs to be re-established because it has had temporary classrooms and construction carparking on it for a few years. During that period, the school had less than half of the total playing field area available and so that area was subject to heavy use. That reduced playing field area coped with the heavy wear remarkably well because it has a Kikuyu turf sward – this is a drought tolerant grass that has good wear tolerance plus an ability to spread back into areas
Dense Kikuyu turf cover on intact sports field area – the aim is to establish the same on the area to be re-established in the background. Image courtesy of NZ Sports Turf Institute
if the cover is worn away. This school field wasn’t established in Kikuyu in the first instance but over the years Kikuyu gradually spread throughout the field to establish a full Kikuyu cover.
Unfortunately, the presence of the temporary classrooms and the construction carpark killed off much of the Kikuyu that was present in that area. The aim was to have a complete Kikuyu
Kikuyu will subsequently be established into the area via sprigging or plugging and its spread will be promoted so that a full Kikuyu sward replaces the rye grass within a couple of years. So, instead of the easy option of simply planting the traditional grass species, there is a plan in place to establish a better grass species that is more complicated to establish in the first instance.
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SPORTS & RECREATION
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CASE STUDY
Establishing the best grass species can be tricky
