Through a unique partnership, Paradise Valley CC has locked in on “distribution uniformity” as the key to irrigation sucuess in today’s world of scarce and costly water.
In the arid Southwest, global warming and exploding populations have converged to lay siege to every drop of available moisture—and make advance claims on whatever else may fall out of the sky or be found underground.
But even as this new threat from a “giant sucking sound” grows louder, no one’s giving golf courses in the region any breaks. If anything, demands to provide pristine, lush and ever-more-challenging playing conditions have only intensified.
To survive in this environment, the solution is straightforward: Management of clubs must find ways to do more (improve both the condition, and appeal, of their properties) with less (water). That’s pushed initiatives to reduce water use to the top of just about every property’s short-term agendas. And if there was a divining rod that could guide them to new solutions, it would point to the case of Paradise Valley Country Club near Scottsdale, Ariz., which has already taken progressive steps that are paying real dividends, even before it has fully implemented its plan.
Better Uniformity
Faced with allocations for water that was already costing it $275,000 a year (primarily to irrigate 122 acres of its golf course), the management of Paradise Valley CC, a 1,000-member private club that opened in 1953, made reducing water use a top priority at the beginning of 2007. A number of courses of action were considered, including some rather dramatic turf removal plans.
But when the club’s management team, led by Golf Course Superintendent Rob Collins, took a closer look at data from its irrigation system, which had been installed in 1995, it identified an opportunity to bring more efficiency to how it watered the course, by focusing on distribution uniformity (DU).
A measure of how evenly water is applied across a defined area during irrigation, DU is expressed as a percentage, and DUs of less than 70% are considered poor. Paradise Valley’s study of its historical data showed DUs in the low 60s. “It was clear that we were using more water [than we should be] because of a lack of uniformity,” Collins says.
Collins and his team set out in search of an irrigation partner that could help Paradise Valley improve its system’s DU. Some consultants and suppliers stopped short of making hard promises when challenged for solutions that would assure a higher DU. But one, Toro Irrigation, stepped forward with a proposal that would guarantee a minimum DU of 80% for five years.
Instant Results
The Toro proposal revolved around the installation of over 3,100 new sprinklers that would irrigate 111 acres. Three
TurfGuard™ sensors would be installed per green, to measure temperature, moisture and salinity on a real-time basis, with Collins and his staff able to take the readings from any online computer.
With the guarantee of gains in DU that would be made from these improvements, Paradise Valley could minimize the amount of turf that would have to be removed. For the 11 acres that would no longer be irrigated, Collins and staff devised a plan to convert the areas to landscapng that would still be aesthetically pleasing but require low water use, with nearly 4,000 tons of fine gravel spread in the converted areas, and about 500 new desert trees and shrubs planted.
A new weather station was also installed as part of the fast-tracked, $2 million project, for which construction started in late May of 2008, and was in the punch-list stage 4 months later.
“It was a tight window,” says Collins. “We closed nine holes at a time and with good teamwork, it all went pretty quickly once we started.” The club was even able to perform some needed work on its tees at the same time, he reports.
“The tough thing about irrigation renovations is that when you open things back up, you often don’t see a lot of what was done,” he notes. “But the teework and what we did with the turf conversion areas helped to add value visually.”
And even with the project only 90% complete, Paradise Valley was already seeing real payoffs behind the scenes, too. “We saved nearly 20% of our average water use for the month of August,” Collins reports. At the same time, DU levels have been improved as promised, with Toro technicians working closely with the Paradise Valley staff to help make adjustments as needed.
“We’ve been measuring as we go,” Collins says. “Eighty percent DU sounds good when you put it on paper, but it’s a little more challenging in practice; a lot depends on how you test and when you test, and many other variables.”
Already, though, Collins has seen enough to feel confident that the five-year guarantee will be met—maybe with plenty to spare.
“It’s already become clear that [Toro] is willing to do whatever it takes—changing nozzles, replacing products—to get to [the guaranteed levels] and beyond,” he says. “We’ve already learned a lot about sprinkler spacing and the importance of keeping sprinklers to grade that will help us [achieve 80 percent DU].
“As we continue to gain experience, I think we can go even higher. But even at just that minimum level over a five-year period, you would be talking about some really significant water savings.”
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