What good are golf courses? A pollinator meadow and more at U. Maryland

Photo by Sam Bahr of me with other tour-goers – professors of entomology and plant sciences – in front of the UMD Pollinator Meadow.

Hear me out

I suspect that many of the Rant’s most eco-minded readers are critics of golf courses, for reasons like these. My friends, too.

But like lawns, which shockingly have some benefits, golf courses have some, too. The USGA makes their case. Me, I usually sigh and predict that if they weren’t golf courses all those acres of open space (at least) would be built on. But I sure agree that golf courses can and should do better!

The UMD Course

So when the University of Maryland Golf Course was closed for repairs and its horticultural consultant offered a tour of its Pollinator Meadow without fear of errant golf balls, I jumped at the chance on a beautiful morning in August.

Right in the middle of the 150-acre course there was a 1-acre rough like those found on Scottish links courses (like this one), primarily of non-native fescue grasses. Then in 2008 it was completely removed and replaced with what’s now the Maryland Golf Course Pollinator Meadow.

Sam Bahr with Switch Grass.

Our meadow guide was Sam Bahr, the campus horticulturist whose very exotic landscape in the middle of campus I showed you in this post. But when the golf course decided to replace their traditional rough with a pollinator meadow, they asked for Sam’s help because of his prairie work at the Missouri Botanical Garden and his extensive research on the subject. His design goal for this project was to follow the ecosystem model of a native tall grass prairie, like where Sam grew up in SE Kansas, with grasses dominating.

As Sam wrote in an email, “All of this information and my experiences led me to believe that having 70-80% of the bio-mass of the prairie, consisting of the four horsemen of the plains would lead to a much more stable planting that would be much more resistant to weeds and non-native plants. The four horsemen of the plains are Big Bluestem, Little Bluestem, Switch Grass and Indian Grass. These were not only present in the Plains, but pretty much the entire eastern half of the country including places like Long Island, New York and the Suther Prairie in North Carolina.

“Recent research has discovered that much of the southeastern United States was actually grasslands, rather than forest. The western quarter of the state of Maryland was thought to be grasslands at one time before conquest by the Europeans.” Who knew?

One early idea was a field of pure Common Milkweed, and a few of them did germinate there. “However,” Sam writes, ” very few survived for more than one or two months. Was it the lack of the right mycorrhizal fungi or some other issue? I am not sure I will ever know. However, the initial idea of starting a very large stand of Common Milkweed from seed was a failure. I am very glad we had a backup plan in place in case it was a failure. “

All the meadow plants here was grown from seed, sourced from Ernst Conservation Seeds in Pennsylvania “because they had far more local ecotypes of seed available than some of the less expensive western U.S. sources of seed.” Seeing none of their prepackaged seed mixes to his liking, though, Sam bought a custom mixes of his own.

Since the first planting, more have been added each year, continually increasing species diversity. Sam says that “sowing in December allows for natural cold-moist stratification over the winter and for the seed to work down into the soil through freezing and thawing soil heaving action over the winter.”

The meadow consists of over 95% U.S. native plants grown from seed collected within 500 miles. Adding still more diversity are the plants that have appeared on their own, like Blue-Eyed Grass, Rough-Leaved Goldenrod and Slender Southern Ladies Tresses.

Management

What’s working well for the meadow is the maintenance strategy of using primarily native, tall, warm-season grasses that out-compete the nonnative weeds, plus the lack of fertilizer or irrigation. Sam says he “pulled a few weeds the first year but very few after that.” He hopes that “we’ve created a sustainable prairie where you don’t need an army of people constantly weeding to keep out undesirable plants.”

As expected, the tall grasses also kept the native wildflowers much smaller in size than what one would see in a garden.

The meadow is mowed once a year, in December. (A burn would be more effective but the flammability of the grasses would prove too scary in that location.)

The Plants

The four primary grasses of Big Bluestem, Little Bluestem, Switch Grass and Indian Grass make up 80 percent of the plants. Did you know that grasses sequester more carbon than trees?

Seen in mid-August, clockwise from upper left: Giant Ironweed, Blue Ageratum, Cenna marylandia, and Prairie Partridgepea.

From top: Southern Slender Ladies Tresses (a native orchid), and the white flowers of Boneset.

Not shown: Sunflower, Monarda, Grey-headed coneflower, Blackberry, Gaura, Mountain Mint, Fox Sedge, Rush Junkus, Coreopsis., Eupatorium, Baptisia, and Canada Goldenrod.

Explore more plant photos here.

Wildlife in the Meadow

The list of critters using this biodiverse acre is long and changing but just recently an Applied Agriculture class visited recently with insect nets and “captured things like milkweed bugs, grasshoppers, goldenrod soldier beetles, many species of butterflies and moths, bumblebees, carpenter bees, halictid bees. There are lots of earthworm holes, ants as well as pillbugs and sowbugs feeding on the organic matter laying on the soil. We find deer poop and signs of deer browsing from time to time.”

Each spring the course hosts a BioBlitz sponsored by the Audobon Society, during which these photos were captured of insects and reptiles, including some award-winning shots. (It’s hoped that publicity, like this post, will bring more locals to next spring’s BioBlitz. Happy to help if I can!)

Photo by Sam Bahr.

Below the Pollinator Meadow, in a drier spot with no fertilizer run-off from the fairway, is another rough. It’s shown here with golf course superintendent Brendan Rapp surrounded primarily by Indian Grass (Sorghastrum nutans) thriving in that dry, poor soil.

Notice the big “M” in the background? Could have been a turtle, ya know. (Go Terps!)

The Turf

I was happy to hear that the fairway is now made up of Bermuda grass, a more sustainable choice requiring fewer inputs. It receives one application of fungicide per year, plus some pre-emergent herbicide in the spring to combat clover. However, the closely mown Bentgrass on the putting greens requires more.

More Sustainability Projects

I also got a quick tour of other areas where exciting projects are happening on the course. The largest is the “Biodiversity Restoration” project that began after a 2022 storm felled over 250 trees, a project that includes not just new trees and erosion control but also bird houses like the ones above, bee boxes, bat and owl houses.

Then there’s the wide variety of research and teaching work happening on the 150 acres not used for golf – in the departments of environmental science, entomology, ornithology, plant sciences, applied agriculture, geographical sciences, geology (studying groundwater), and engineering. Outdoor teaching opportunity even extend to local schools. Here’s a video about the UMD course as a “living classroom.”

I took fast, bad notes about these and other encouraging practices as UMD staffer Laura Russell excitedly told me about them in a phone call, but I’ll just refer you to this list impressive listshe sent me. Wow!

The Bigger Picture – University Golf Courses in the Forefront

After touring the Pollinator Meadow I got the big-picture tour via golf cart with course director Jeff Maynor, who came to UMD in 1997 after working at the U.Georgia and N.C. State golf courses. I asked what other courses were making news in the golf world for their sustainability practices and he directed me to Michigan State and U. Michigan in particular.

When I followed Jeff into his office I immediately spotted the hula hoop leaning against the wall – because I’m a hooper myself, ya know! When he explained that it’s used for teaching, I begged for a demonstration and here you see it – he’s not swinging it from his hips, like classic hula-hoopers, but using it as a visual to improve his swing.