Groundskeeping Journal Issue 1 2019 | Page 48

TURF MANAGEMENT Terralift Performance Fertilisers Across groundskeeping, performance fertiliser specialists Terralift are boosting sports and amenity turf quality, heightening `green’ practices across football, rugby and golf, while improving surface playability year round. heir organically derived nutritional and rootzone supports are reaching beyond traditional NPK and trace elemental methods to help create optimal growth environments throughout sport. T At Leigh Sports Village, Lancashire, head groundsman Keith Porter has adopted Terralift fertilisers and its innovative Quadrop water management system for the 12,000-capacity stadium’s main pitch and three other natural surfaces. His sons Martin and Matt worked under him for some years, before Matt moved over to regional executive for Aitkens, sole national distributor for Terralift, and has supplied Keith ever since, with products including TX10 and TX11-1-5 naturally slow-release organic granular fertilisers for the stadium pitch and liquid feeds for the other natural turf areas. Keith finds the slow-release fertilisers particularly helpful in avoiding turf ‘burnout’. When we introduced grow lights four years ago, we were concerned that we would stress the turf and cause yellowing,” he explains, “but because the TX fertilisers are organic, they break down slowly, which helps the plant avoid stressing.” Home to Leigh Centurions and Leigh East rugby league clubs as well as the base for Manchester United FC ladies, Manchester United U23s Premier League 2 and U18s Champions league, and host for occasional rugby league internationals, the Village needs to deliver sustainable sportsturf quality at all times to meet its commitments of up to 90 fixtures a year on the stadium pitch alone. “We attract plenty of travelling teams from the UK and overseas including Japan and the US,” explains Keith, a past groundsman of the year. “I’d known about Terralift products since the time the Village was built, 14 years ago, when a greenkeeper told me about them and their benefits and started using them soon afterwards.” 48 GroundskeepingJournal.co.uk | Sept/Oct 2019