Maintenance of Grass Tennis Courts for Optimum Water Use and Wear Tolerance.

Much of the research conducted on water use and wear tolerance has been targeted at short cut golf course greens and tall grass sports turf and their associated species. Little to no research has been conducted on grass tennis courts to understand the wear tolerance and consumptive water use of the diverse species that are planted and used on grass tennis courts. Our research objectives are (i) evaluate the wear tolerance of eight experimental selections including three Agrostis species (colonial bentgrass, creeping bentgrass, and velvet bentgrass), two Kentucky bluegrass selections, two perennial ryegrass selections and one fine fescue mixture, (ii) measure the water use (evapotranspiration) on the same eight experimental selections and to develop reliable crop coefficients for optimal irrigation efficiency, and (iii) evaluate the eight experimental selections for their anatomical, morphological, and physiological characteristics that have known associations with wear tolerance under simulated traffic and actual tennis match play. Three experimental grass singles’ courts were constructed to implement this research.