These standards would reflect a balance between the needs of a fairway from a players perspective (who may desire a shortly mown, weed free fairway) and the type of course that exists.
| Performance Standard | Parameter to be achieved (When measured at any time during the year) |
Comment |
| 1. Total ground cover | Min. 95% | This may be adjusted to allow for seasonal growth of grasses, with slightly less total ground cover during the autumn / winter period, especially when divot recovery may be a problem. Certain parts of the fairway may also form golf green surrounds as well as high wear traffic areas from greens to tees. These areas may need to be considered as a subsection of the fairway and given another parameter, or alternatively if a high minimum ground cover figure is to be maintained on these areas, this may result in higher maintenance costs due to frequent returfing and diverting of traffic. |
| 2. Desirable grass species content | Min. 80% | Quite a range of grasses could be included here depending upon the type of course: Moorland courses will have different species from lowland parkland courses. Assess your needs accordingly, because from an ecological point of view the fairways will want to complement the habitat. |
| 3. Annual meadow grass content | Max. 20% | Ideally this would be nil, but such a figure is unrealistic. Areas which become heavily compacted will most likely be the areas which reach the maximum figure. |
| 4. Fine leaved weed content | Max. 10% | This would include weeds such as clovers, pearlwort, parsley piert, toadrush and yarrow. Too much flowering white clover can be a problem, but not as much as in the semi-rough/rough. |
| 5. Broad leaved weed content | Max. 2% | This would include weeds such as daisy, dandelion, etc. |
| 6. Moss content | Max. 10% | This figure might be varied due to seasonal growth, allowing for may be up to 10% during the autumn / winter period, coming done to a maximum of 5% during the playing season. |
| 7. Algae content | Max. 3% | Slightly more leeway than the previous areas would be permitted. Algae present on a slope would need to be treated as this may be a hazard and cause a golfer to slip. |
| 8. Earthworm surface casts | Max. 10 per m2 | As usual a figure needs to be set to prevent smothering of the grass. A slightly higher figure may be considered if cultural control, alone, is being carried out. For such large areas, a realistic figure for the soil type will need to be set - with acidic sandy soils, the figure may be lower, whilst neutral loamy soils may require a higher figure, otherwise high amounts of chemical would probably be needed to achieve the standard. |
| 9. Pest infestation | Nil | This relates to leatherjackets and chafer grubs which will exhaust the grass roots and should not be tolerated. Consideration might also be given to rabbit/mole damage, although these larger pests might be considered as a separate entry. |
| 10. Disease infestation | Max. 5% | This is nowhere near as critical as on greens and tees and it may be environmentally and financially unsound to spray fairways as a matter of course. It may be decided that the parts of a fairway that surrounds a green may need a lower figure, say 2% max., to help reduce the potential for disease spreading onto the green from the fairway. This would be a more sensible approach than a blanket figure for fairways as a whole. |
| 11. Grass length | (a) 12mm or (b) 18mm | (a) during the main growing season; (b) outside of this. |
| 12. Thatch depth | Range 3mm-15mm | A greater leeway than the previous areas, although too much can encourage annual meadow grass, weeds, moss and algae. |
| 13. Root depth | Min. 75mm | In general, the deeper the better, but 75mm should realistically be aimed at as a minimum. Some form of criteria may also be built into this relating to root density as well. It may be easier to achieve a greater depth as wear is much less concentrated than on tees and greens. A deeper rootzone will also help the fairway to better withstand dry conditions, consequently reducing the need for not only expensive irrigation, but also for using an important environmental resource - water. |
| 14. Sward colour | Uniform 'medium' green | This may be an ideal, however, without fairway irrigation this may be irrelevant for parts of the year. A dark green colour may not be particularly desirable as this may require a relatively high fertiliser input to achieve. |
| 15. Quality of cut | Sharp and uniform | No jagged, blunt or bruised edges. This will ensure the mower is set correctly. the striping of fairways may also be considered. |
| 16. Surface evenness | Using a 0.5m straight edge - Max ± 6mm | It is unlikely that a perfect evenness to the surface is achieved. |
| 17. Soil pH | 5.0-7.0 | This would depend upon the type of course and the species present. |
| 18. Phosphorus content | ADAS : 0 -2 | |
| 19. Potassium content | ADAS : 1 - 3 | |
| 20. Permeability of the soil profile | 1.0 cm/hr | A balance would need to be achieved between a reasonably well drained fairway in the winter and one that doesn't dry out too quickly in the summer. Surface runoff from sloping fairways can improve the overall drainage capacity, without increasing the permeability rate. |