The EarthWorks Podcast

At this years Golf Industry Show in Orlando, Florida we were given the opportunity to share the show podcast stage and record a live EarthWorks Podcast. Fortunately, we had great support and were able to bring to the stage Todd Bohn and Woody Moriarty from Desert Mountain, Walter Pritchett from Hurstbourne CC, and our old friend Armen Suny. The crowd was loud and there were a lot of distractions,...

We had the pleasure of talking with Sam Ferro, President of Turf & Soil Diagnostics, one of the leading physical testing laboratories in the country. We are very strong believers in the Three Legged Stool agronomic model which explains how soil chemistry, physics and biology must work together to build a well balanced soil profile. We know that chemistry can affect physics by helping air and w...

One of the biggest conversations today in the turf industry is water. How do we manage water usage on a golf course or sports complex to preserve the commodity? Water bills are rising in all areas of the country and that trend will only continue. A west coast golf course can spend over one million dollars a year on their water bill! Everyone from EarthWorks to the seed breeders are working on ways...

It is always interesting to talk to a superintendent who has worked in both a cool season climate and a warm season climate. Adam Miller, the Director of Agronomy at Berkeley Hall Golf Club in Bluffton South Carolina, started his career working with warm season grasses in South Carolina. He then spent a number of years in the Mid Atlantic working with cool season grasses before returning to South...

Kevin sits down with Jeff Jensen, GCSAA Field Staff Rep for the Southwestern United States. His involvement with the GCSAA chapters in that region make him an important voice in some of the "front line" issues facing the golf industry today. Our discussion covered the broad topics of water rights, land use, and what the industry needs to do to ensure they have input regarding who gets the dwindlin...

We visit with EarthWorks chemist, Lawrence Mayhew and talk about something we are very excited about: our newly reformulated Foliars+ products that are now using Eco-Adaptive Technology. This new technology follows nature's path to nutrient balance in the soil which allows for optimum nutrient uptake. Too many liquid products are weighted heavily on one or two nutrient formulations and that restri...

Craig Moore joins Chad Kuzawa to discuss the challenges and beauty of managing golf courses in the harsh climate of “America’s North Coast”. They discuss golf architecture and history as Craig walks us through the happenings at Marquette Golf Club. Help us bring in the new year with a new guest but old friend, Craig Moore. The EarthWorks team wishes everyone a very successful 2023!

Over the past two and a half years we have had the pleasure of interviewing some of the best in our business. We have produced well over 100 EarthWorks podcasts and are getting hundreds of listens every week. The archived podcasts, found on the EarthWorks website, are getting hundreds of listens weekly as well. Doing a "Best of Podcast" was very difficult because there were so many great interview...

Traditionally, at year's end, the EarthWorks team of agronomists gets together to look back and review. This year we talked about the weather around the country and the struggles that many of our friends in the turf business battled through. We also discussed the state of the industry and what we have heard may be emerging trends. A few new ideas coming out of the development halls of EarthWorks c...

The EarthWorks podcast dips into a beautiful and ecologically unique part of the country as we welcome our guest Billy Bagwell and he welcomes us to Callawassie Island. In 2022 Billy had a very big year. As the Director of Agronomy, Billy recounts the full course construction project underway at Callawassie. In November the Carolina’s GCSA Conference saw the closing of his term as President of the...

Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville Kentucky is one of the true gems in the golf course industry. A Jack Nicklaus design built over the beautiful rolling hills of central Kentucky. We had the great honor of sitting down with John Ballard, the Golf Course Superintendent. We talked about the rich history of Valhalla, its partnership with the PGA, and the extensive history of tournaments the property ha...

On this EarthWorks podcast, we spoke with Justin Woodland, who recently set up a GoFundMe page: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-giving-bus-driver . The Giving Bus Driver was created to help fellow Turf Head, and friend of EarthWorks, Dave Wilber make an impact in his community. While serving as a bus driver in the Littleton, CO school district, Dave began relating to and helping kids he saw on his...

The Thanksgiving holiday is upon us, and we wanted to thank you all for supporting EarthWorks over the past 35 years. It is also important to us to remember, and express our gratitude, to Jerry Brunetti who we lost to cancer in 2014. Jerry was our founding partner and the driving force behind EarthWorks. As our original product formulator we would not be here without him. Jerry's formulas remain t...

Time to change it up on the EarthWorks podcast and feature your crazy, funny, wild stories related to golf course maintenance. Kevin Hicks narrates this silly stuff that we all have witnessed on our golf courses. We want to thank all the listeners, and friends, for contributing the content for this edition. It’s important to laugh in the face of some of the seriousness that dominates the career of...

The golf course was barely visible as the robotic voice interrupted my jam, “you have reached your destination.” Cruising down the long driveway the golden November sunrise revealed fog-laced, emerald fairways and the setting of this week's podcast Paramount Country Club. If you are looking for a detailed soils and golf talk then our guest Matthew Kerens will not disappoint. Paramount is an A.W. T...

You always remember your first! For EarthWorks that’s Green Pond Country Club in Bethlehem PA. It was the first place that EarthWorks fertilizer was ever spread. This took place before Rodger Zellner joined the team as golf course superintendent. When we first met Rodger, he had a pretty good idea of how to grow grass. After walking him through the EarthWorks program, that was being used on the pr...

We are joined by Golf Course Architect David Druzisky whose work can be found all around the western United States. This puts him on the front lines of designing for dwindling water availability. We covered a number of topics related to the latest renovation trends. David describes his process for design from concept to finished product, which includes hand drawn sketches all the way to constructi...

Oxygen may be the most important nutrient in all of turf management. If there is too much water in the soil, oxygen will not be present, and few plants can survive. In 1984 Dennis Hurley founded Turf Drainage Company of America. By using a few patented products, he started helping golf courses move unwanted water off of playing surfaces. Today Dennis, along with his National Account Manager, Zach...

Ken Lochridge, Golf Course Superintendent at Glen Head Country Club tells some stories about fortitude and steadfast work as a turf student and young green keeper in the Long Island golf course industry. Good things come to those who wait and work hard and Ken’s experience reinforces that great notion. He discusses the challenges of limited budget and man power, working for demanding bosses, and m...

Humic acids have come into favor recently in the turf industry. However, there is still a lot of misunderstanding when it comes to what they do and how to know if you really have good humic substances in your products. Lawrence Mayhew, a world renowned humic substances expert, talks with us about what good humic acids really look like. As a founding member of the Humic Products Trade Association (...

Managing over 100 acres on the 6th oldest college campus in the United States is not an easy task. Randy Haffling has been doing just that for over 14 years at Moravian University in Bethlehem Pennsylvania. For the last six years, he has embraced a biological soil management program for the campus. This has changed the soil chemistry bringing the soil pH down by a full point. He has also built a l...

This week’s podcast features a conversation with Brian Boll and Kevin Hicks. Brian leads a great team at the venerable Interlachen Country Club in Minneapolis. As a high school kid, I had the chance to play it several times with my golf team, and it’s been a treat to re-visit the club so many years later and play a small part in an upcoming renovation at the famous club. One of the many things tha...

This is the second of a two part podcast series with Joel Simmons and Peter McCormick, founder and maestro of TurfNet. Peter talks about his challenges, over the years, with depression, alcohol and other mental health considerations. He shares some of the warning signs and coping strategies that turf managers should be aware of. In Part 1, the topics ranged from McCormick's background in the green...

If you have been in the turf industry during the past 30 years you are familiar with the online platform TurfNet. This week we start a two part series with TurfNet Founder Peter McCormick. TurfNet has been, as their tag line, says “Rooted In Innovation Since 1994. They have built a powerful online community for “TurfHeads” all across the world. In the TurfNet Forum they have helped many people fin...

This week we chat with John Murray, equipment manager for the Federal Club and the Kanawha Club, both located in VA. We discuss how he juggles jobs at two courses, family life, and his unique craft of guitar building. John's background is diverse ranging from managing a playground equipment company, to being a caddy, and finally an equipment technician. Coming to the industry later in life, he bri...