Golf Course Applications Of Near-Surface Geophysical Methods

As of 2000, there were over 15,000 golf course facilities in the U.S.A. alone. The upkeep of<br>these facilities requires continual maintenance and occasional remodeling. The superintendents and<br>architects responsible for the maintenance and remodeling efforts need non-destructive tools for<br>obtaining information on subsurface features within golf course components such as greens and tees.<br>The subsurface features of importance include, but are not limited to, engineered soil layer<br>characteristics and drainage system infrastructure. Near-surface geophysical methods can potentially<br>provide a non-destructive means for golf course superintendents and architects to obtain the shallow<br>subsurface information required to address their maintenance and remodeling concerns.<br>Two near-surface geophysical methods, electromagnetic induction (EMI) and ground penetrating<br>radar (GPR), were assessed with respect to golf course applications. Investigations were conducted at<br>two sites. EMI and GPR were tested on a tee and a green at the Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin,<br>Ohio, U.S.A. GPR was also tested on a golf course green at the Guelph Turfgrass Institute &<br>Environmental Research Centre in Guelph, Ontario, Canada. Although the EMI apparent electrical<br>conductivity measurements showed substantial variation across the tee and green on which data were<br>collected, there was no apparent correspondence of these values with the engineered soil layer horizontal<br>boundaries or the drainage system infrastructure. GPR proved to be more capable of obtaining readily<br>useable information on the golf course tee and greens that were investigated, at least in regard to<br>engineered soil layer depths or horizontal boundaries and in locating the subsurface drainage systems<br>present. In addition, computer modeling of synthetic GPR profiles provided valuable insight and helped<br>considerably with data interpretation. While more research is certainly warranted, near-surface<br>geophysical methods, particularly GPR, appear to have the ability for obtaining the data needed in golf<br>course maintenance and remodeling applications.