TTA Award W inners Congratulations to TTA’s 2013
Environmental Stewardship Award Recipient
TPC Southwind By Liz Nutter, Managing Editor, Leading Edge Communications (publisher of Tennessee Turfgrass)
O
ne of the first golf courses in Tennessee to become certified as an Audubon Sanctuary 21 years ago, TPC Southwind in Memphis was honored at TTA’s 2014 Annual Conference with the association’s 2013 Environmental Stewardship award. Opened in 1988, the 18-hole, par-70, private facility is a Tournament Players Club that is owned by the PGA Tour. The tournament held there, the Federal Express/St. Jude Classic, moved to Southwind in 1989 and typically takes place the first weekend of June. Superintendent Jim Thomas, CGCS, and his crew maintain around 220 total acres on the property, including about 150 acres of golf turf, as well as native areas, lakes, ponds and streams. Originally, Southwind’s greens were creeping bentgrass, but in 2004, the course was renovated and the greens were converted to Champion ultradwarf bermudagrass. The fairways and tees are Meyer zoysiagrass, and the roughs are a hybrid bermuda. In addition, the maintenance group has incorporated about 25 acres of native areas planted in a mixture of fine fescues that are allowed to grow up to 12" to 18". “Those are spread out across the whole golf course in small and large areas that add a lot to the wildlife on the course and help give it a natural, meadow look,” Thomas explains. “We also have a few Audubon-like flowerbeds where we’ve tried to stick with native plants.” 28
TENNESSEE TURFGRASS
Thomas is particularly conscientious about trying to conserve water and manage it most efficiently through the course’s irrigation system, as well as through the application of wetting agents and plant growth regulators. “We use our ponds for irrigation, with wells that fill the ponds,” says Thomas. “A series of streams connects the lakes and runs through the property. We keep buffer zones along the
edges of all the water areas, not only for aesthetics but also to protect the banks from erosion.” For water clarification and to control algae in the ponds, Thomas uses ecofriendly products. Around some of the lakes and ponds, he has installed aquatic plantings to act as filters for surface water running into them, with a no-fertility zone around those areas.
Jim Thomas, CGCS (left), superintendent at TPC Southwind, accepts TTA’s 2013 Environmental Stewardship award, presented by Jason Sanderson (right) at the 2014 TTA Annual Awards Ceremony during this past January’s conference.