following up the thread on drill and or not to fill.
With out naming who makes the Terra spiker, the English equivelant is not heavy enough or robust enough to stand up to the rigours of punching holes into a cricket squares in the middle of the season, short term may be, but long term it will break. If the two companies would like to go head to head on a demo day under the same conditions I know which one I would back.
That said, why drill it out, have to clean up the swarf and then have to ram every hole to regain equal consolidation.
Surely a solid tine creating a flute where by new soils can be impregnated into the holes, and then when mother nature takes over and expansion takes place everything is squeezed to a solid form once more, there surely is not the need to take out and have to repack manualy, just open up, no need to fill if your profile is clean. The fact that you have opened up the profile letting in air and water, revitalising the microbrial inviroment, with the profile as open as this at near enough any time of the year you can add into the profile any thing you desire, from standard fertilisers ,microbial digestors, minerals to alter cation exchange ratios/balances, it is a must to get these sort of products into the profile at depth and not sitting on the top, any one can feed grass from the top and it cosmetically looks great, the important part is what is happening under the surface, get those balances correct and you will find that pitches increase in pace and bounce and durability.
And Barry the Terra spike will go in at depth on your pitches in the middle of the season as well, I heard your comments from the Uxbridge meet, but if you want to try and get water in at depth in july you stand there with your hose pipe for hours. LOL. Seriously dont knock it until you have tried it. Watch this space as to what the ECB and RFU are up to in a joint venture to service the grass roots sports nation wide. Ahah that has got many of you wondering what might be happening. JB or CW but I did not tell you.
I would point out that the comments made at Uxbridge were not made during a presentation and were the personal views of one delegate in the audience.
5 Sep 2011 by mackay
The drill can be safely used on squares that would be pulled to bits by conventional spiking.
Terraspike is a great machine (I have one) but horses for courses.
I love this message board it always seems to discuss my problems without me bringing it up, I was actualy half way through sending grassman a pm yesterday when I decided to leave him in peace.. Basically I got a good quote for drilling not filling 27 wickets but, I'm deeply conflicted as for the price of some tines I can borrow either a terra spike or a pedestrian pro core both of which if they worked I could use more than once. My reasons for wanting to spike is purely because I've never been able to spike my squares and feel even without any serious problems that I can see getting air has to be good I would love to get a pitch inspector to advise but there is 2 problems with that. 1 the owner of my ground won't approve and 2 the price of getting the report done is almost half of the cost of drilling the squares.
What do you guys think can I do damage or are like all other aspects of Turfcare air is king ?
Smack my pitch up
Tumbleweed, get Boo Boo to bring his machine to you and perhaps if he were to do the two of us together - so to speak - it would make it cost effective.
Sounds like a very unconventional porno getting done by boo boo.
But I'd be interested if he wants to test his machine on the spikers graveyard
Smack my pitch up
It seems to me that there is a lot confusion over what someone might actually be trying to achieve with a certain machine.
The first thing to ask is, "What is the problem to be solved on the strip/square", closely followed by "With that in mind, what is the best tool to over come that problem with?" As has been said many, many times before, "Take a core - identify the problem - then select the most appropriate tool for the job after seeking sound fact-based opinion".
Sure, use a drill machine or a solid tine machine or a hollow tine machine or do a drill and hand fill operation - just remember:
1. they DO NOT all do the same thing
2. they DO NOT all produce the same results
3. they DO NOT all solve the same problem
There are plenty of people out there who have had success with all the above machines, but they weren't all necessarily trying to overcome the same problem... hence the reason they may have chosen a specific machine.
Get sound advice from your ECB PAdvsr. or agronomist. It might cost something for their advice but why "blindly" hire in a machine that you can't be sure will provide the results you seek.
Interesting post Montesa, I believe that both you and Boo Boo have vast knowledge on this subject, so I offer my situation for your consideration.
I have a very compacted, hydrophobic square, which will not allow water to penetrate the surface. Even in the depths of winter I cannot get a garden fork in more than 2 inches.
Sometimes when going over the ends with a Groundsman spiker, I can lift the top 1 inch off, suggesting to me a break and a hard pan.
I want a machine which will go through the pan, down which I can get some new loam (although not fill) to allow water passage, root growth and knit the square surface together.
What would you people recommend please?
Vic.
First things first Vic, get some turf retainers for your Groundsman machine, the top will at least stay in place. I think you might need a bomb to blow it to pieces, that should let some air in.
I think, if your square is as hard as you say, the drill might be a better option.
However, that Boo Boo knows a thing or two so who am i to contradict? Get him in and let him put that machine of his to the test.
It worked good for me last winter, November, but it struggled to get the required depth during renovation. I probably did not water the square enough, but if your square is that hard, should be a challenge. I can see another Uxbridge day unfolding.
Are you OK Montesa? not heard a lot from you lately.
Vic - I had the same problem. The first year I hired a tractor-mounted deep spiker (SoilReliever) and punched 6-8" deep with 5/8" tines after soaking. The spiker was slightly too big for my compact tractor, but not robust enough to deal with a hard cricket square. Turf was ripped in just a couple of places, on bare ends where the grass root wasn't strong enough, but this repaired over Winter. It would have been better to get the local golf course tractor on it and a robust spiker using turf retatiners. The idea was to create holes into which fresh loam and grass could be packed, to provide channels for deep rooting and to "nail" the surface layers of the square together.
5 years on it was a process of progressive soaking and sarrel rolling or light spiking until November, after which the Groundsman can really do its job. I was lucky enough to have a range of tines, including needle tines in clusters to act like a deeper form of sarrel roller, ending up with 1/2" solid tines punching up to 4". The ground has to have softened though, trying to deep spike on a hard square will shake the machine and you to bits.
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