Golf courses walk market tightrope to conserve water

Oct. 5—The severity of the current drought's threat to the Colorado River reservoir system has heightened attention on the practice of overseeding Bermuda grass lawns with winter rye grass when cool temperatures cause Bermuda to go dormant and lose color.

Rye grass seeds require a heavy soaking in the fall to germinate, and then owners must apply more water throughout the winter than they would on dormant Bermuda.

As golfers from near and far begin to flock to local links, Mesa's roughly 20 golf courses are beginning the annual ritual of overseeding.

The process ensures lush carpets of grass greet golfers on the greens, fairways and tee boxes rather than tan expanses of playable but less aesthetically pleasing dormant grass.

But this year, overseeding is likely to put even more spotlight on water use at golf courses, which has the misfortune of being more conspicuous than other industries, including data centers, that use as much or more water.

The City of Mesa is encouraging water customers this fall to forgo planting winter lawns. Scottsdale, too, is discouraging overseeding and is forbidding homeowner associations from mandating overseeding by homeowners.

Several Mesa golf courses said that not overseeding is not an option, as the golfers who come here between November and April expect bright green grass.

"Why are they coming here? Because the grass is green and they love the course conditions," said Don Rea, secretary of the PGA of America and operator of Mesa's Augusta Ranch Golf Club.

"If we stop overseeding, people will just go somewhere else," he said.

While local courses are overseeding this year, managers said they are cutting water consumption in other ways.

One course manager believes improvements in agronomy could allow Arizona courses to someday forgo winter overseeding without sacrificing course quality.

But that time hasn't come yet. Winter is the golf industry's most important time of year, when rates are at their highest, and Mesa's grass has got to be good.

For Rea, November through April are the only months the course is profitable.

If Arizona's courses aren't on par with other regions in the winter, Rea believes players may take their money to other warm-weather golf destinations.

"We consider ourselves stewards of these (water) resources," Rea said, "and then at the end of the day, we're trying to have a nice product out there so people continue coming to Arizona."

Turf is a valuable crop for the state: a 2016 study by the University of Arizona's Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics found that golf contributed $3.9 billion in sales to the state's economy in 2014 while using only 1.9% of Arizona's freshwater.

"In the winter, (players) want everything green," said Johnny Webb, superintendent of Mesa's Desert Sands Golf Course. "We're going to use the water in winter."

Webb thinks most courses will cut their water in the summer, when water demands are high but course revenue and traffic are at their lowest.

He said overseeding takes a lot of water at first, but after germination he can cut back and use substantially less water than in summer. He recalled one January when he didn't need to irrigate his course at all.

"It's the summer that you use a lot" of water, Webb said.

Webb also said that "golf is very on top of" water conservation. He said irrigation technology is "way, way better than the old school way," making it easier for superintendents to prevent waste.

Rea said many courses are using high tech sensors to measure soil moisture and salts, so superintendents don't overuse water.

On his own course, he said he is able to control each individual sprinkler head, so he doesn't need to waste water if he wants to put extra moisture on a particular problem area.

That level of control also allows courses to use less water by taking out non-functional pieces of turf.

Joe Dahlstrom, chief operating officer of Paradigm Golf Group, which manages the Mesa-owned Dobson Ranch Golf Course, said the course has successfully converted many areas from grass to alternate surfaces that don't need watering.

After experimenting with several different materials, they've had success with using volcanic cinders from outside Flagstaff and plans to significantly expand its use in other areas, especially under trees.

Webb estimates he's been able to trim about 3 acres of grass from his course to conserve water.

"If people just looked at areas that aren't playable and replaced those with something aesthetically pleasing, that's a big step" toward saving water, Dahlstrom said.

Dahlstom and Rea also believe the trend toward augmented reality golfing will allow the industry to expand without adding additional acres of turf.

Dobson Ranch has the TopTracer system installed on its driving range, which allows golfers to virtually play courses all over the world, and Augusta Ranch is launching the system on its range Nov. 11.

Dahlstrom thinks a future direction for Arizona golf may be to transition to hybrid strains that don't require overseeding. He said scientists are developing hybrids that maintain their playability and color while dormant.

Dahlstrom said one of Paradigm's other courses, Bali Hai in Las Vegas, has successfully transitioned to a hybrid grass and no longer requires overseeding.

Eliminating common Bermuda was "no easy task," but the change has put Bali Hai in a much better position than its competitors as Lake Mead, a major water source for Las Vegas, dries up.

Dahlstrom said Las Vegas is a different climate than Phoenix and the same grass wouldn't work, but he thinks other new hybrids and technologies are coming that could eliminate overseeding for Arizona courses.