ALM Note: Turf Maintenance? Rolling not an aid to turf survival.

It seems that there are some that still see rolling as part of turf maintenance, particularly sports turf maintenance. Whilst rolling may have a place in some circumstances, it?s use generally on turf is going to cause outcomes which are the opposite of what we want from turf particularly at a time when we are trying to optimise performance without the use of irrigation.

The capacity of turf to survive between rainfall events is directly proportional to its access to a volume of moisture in the soil. This will be reduced by the compaction resulting from rolling as it will reduce oxygenation of the soil and reduce root depth as well as reducing infiltration and therefore reducing soil moisture directly.

Compaction will be more evident on fine textured and heterogeneous soils than on coarse and uniform soils and is mostly evident in the top 50-75mm.

Pedestrian traffic and play as well as vehicles cause compaction and the faster the travel the more the compaction, football boots with stops apply about 10 kg/cm2, street shoes and running shoes about 0.4 ( about 1.2 at heel strike), however when running this can increase to around 15 kg/cm2.

All this means that we should be doing whatever we can to eliminate or reduce compaction in order to have healthy turf surfaces with plants that are able to access a large soil moisture reservoir. Regular aeration activities including coring and spiking to maintain and enhance oxygenation and water infiltration rates.