The Superintendent

Ed Faulk served as the assistant superintendent at Gold Mountain Cascade Golf Course from 1984 to 1996. Ed has been the superintendent of the entire 36 hole Gold Mountain Golf complex when the Olympic course opened in 1996. Ed is a highly respected golf course superintendent in the Western Washington area by his associates, Gold Mountain members, and his crew.

The Course

Gold Mountain Golf Club is a beautiful tree-lined 36 hole golf complex that is ranked in the "Top 100" public golf courses in the United States. The Cascade Course is a great "northwest style" golf course and it was designed by Ken Tyson and opened in 1971.

The championship Olympic Course was designed by John Harbottle III and it opened in 1996. The Olympic Course has been host to many great tournaments among them the 81st U.S Amateur Public Links Championship in 2006 and the NCAA Men's West Regional Golf Championship in 2008. In July of 2011 The Olympic Course will host the U.S Junior Amateur Championship. Ed and his crew received great compliments and rave reviews from the USGA for the preparation and conditioning of the course during the 2006 Publinks, but as anyone who plays there knows, it's always in tournament quality condition. In January of 2011 the Olympic Course was rated in the "Top 5 public golf courses for under $50.00 in the United States".

The Results

"We had some devastating damage from winter stress on some our greens last winter and because of the cold and wet conditions in April and May it was difficult to stimulate recovery. We initiated the Redox program in May and the response was immediate and recovery time was reduced. We continued to use Redox all year and the general consensus from everyone at Gold Mountain is that our greens have never been better. I've used all the expensive foliar sprays, but no product has worked as well as Redox. The fact that Redox is considerably less expensive is very refreshing."

The Superintendent

Mark Seman grew up with turfgrass maintenance in his blood. Clarence Seman, Mark's father, spent over 25 years in management at the Pierce County Parks Department. So, Mark was involved at an early age in the turf management business and has been around golf and worked on golf courses since he was a young man. For the past 25 years he has been a golf course superintendent, including the past 10 years as superintendent of Sumner Meadows Golf Links in Sumner, WA.

The Course

Sumner Meadows Golf Links is a Lynn Horn and John Harbottle design and was built in 1995. The original greens were bentgrass but after 15 years have converted to predominantly poa. The golf course is owned by the City of Sumner and is one of over 120 golf courses in 27 states to be managed and operated by Billy Casper Golf management company. In 2009 and 2010 Mark was honored with Casper Golf's "Bang for the Buck" award which is a tribute to the superintnedent who creates the best playing conditions while making the best use of his budgeted funds. Mark has always been a very innovative and creative superintendent who is constantly looking for opportunities to improve his course on a moderate budget.

The Results

"My greens have been as healthy as they've ever been. I've had very little incidence of disease all season long and the greens have had better consistency, less stress, and I obtained a much better turf response from Redox than I did from the higher priced foliar sprays. I also liked the fact that Redox formulated my nutritional mix specifically for my golf course needs. The quality that Redox provided and the substantial cost reduction to my fertility program made it a win-win."

In 2009, we decided to begin testing Redox products here at Escondido. It so happened that we experienced 69 days over 100 degrees which made fertilizer inputs extremely critical on our bentgrass greens. By using regular applications of Turf Rx Supreme, Turf Rx K+, Turf Rx C 85, Turf Rx Micro and Turf Rx Ca, we almost eliminated the need for our normal weekly spoonfeed of foliar nitrogen. I firmly believe that we were able to recover from the stress of that brutal summer faster than we would have using our normal fertility program.

This year we incorporated the Redox program on the entire course with excellent results. We dropped our previous nitrogen requirements from 3-3.5 pounds of nitrogen annually to .5 pounds. The zoysia fairways and rough actually looked better on this low nitrogen program than before with the granular programs which we had been happy with. Not only did conditions improve, but we did it with a significant reduction in cost. I can't afford not to keep using Redox products!

The Redox line has demonstrated to me that humates reduce the amount of fertility and improves the soil compounds. I have reconsidered a different approach to my fertilization techniques by giving higher priority to soil humus. I feel that Redox's products are superior because plants that are grown on soils which contain adequate humic acids are less subject to stress. I believe these products produce better soil and better soil makes minerals and fertilizers go further.

The weather in South Carolina over the last calendar year has been a roller coaster ride. We saw a wet cold winter followed by the hottest summer on record. Ironically enough this was the year we implemented a full Redox program at Chechessee Creek Club. Not only did we fair well, our turf improved tremendously. I had used some of the Redox products prior to this year but was still primarily on a granular program. The granular programs I had been using delivered fertility and yielded great soil tests but I was shocked at the difference in turf quality the Redox program brought to our course. There were no peaks and valleys in our growth patterns like I had experienced with our old programs. The idea that such small quantities of nutrients when readily and easily available to the plant could be so successful made me skeptical but it worked. The fact that our overall turf health improved so much was not lost on the golfers. Our membership is very happy with our turf and I plan to continue/expand our use of the products. I am happy to share our story and programs with other superintendents because I believe in them.