Low‐impact conversion of cool‐season golf fairways

Abstract Turfgrass breeders regularly release new cultivars with documented improvements in aesthetics, playability, and stress tolerance for golf turf fairway use. However, complete renovation of the existing fairway results in significant losses of recreational play and potential revenue. Field experiments were conducted on mixed cool‐season species fairway to evaluate the potential for grass conversion programs using either no chemical suppression or reduced‐impact chemical suppression programs compared to complete renovation. Chemical‐treated main plots were vertically mowed and seeded to subplots of creeping bentgrass ( Agrostis stolonifera ‘Piranha’), tall fescue ( Schedonorus arundinaceus ‘Super Sonic’), or perennial ryegrass ( Lolium perenne ‘LS Brand’) at 49, 490, and 490 kg pure live seed ha −1 , respectively, and monitored regularly for 1 year to assess multispectral reflectance and visually perceived playing condition. Results suggest that aggressively suppressing vegetation on low‐input golf fairways has drawbacks for both playing conditions and the health and density of turf, as measured by ratio vegetation index (RVI) and normalized differential vegetation index (NDVI), consistent with previous studies. Over a 1‐year period, perennial ryegrass generally outperformed tall fescue and creeping bentgrass in conserving RVI, NDVI, and golf fairway turf quality and improving dark green color index when lethal chemical rates were used to enhance seed establishment. An unconventional approach involving a combination of trinexapac‐ethyl and a sublethal dose of glyphosate, not previously documented in scientific literature, reduced chemical impacts on these metrics and produced comparable improvements to RVI and visual turf quality after 1 year compared to lethal vegetation suppression.